A baby, a bicycle and a boring job

Brother Mark aged about one

In my last but one blog post, Coronation Year 1953, I’d written about the birth of my little brother, Mark, in July 1953 and how, soon after his birth, I was forced to become much more than big sister. This is what happened.

Within a few days of coming home, Mum developed an abscess in her breast. She’d have been pumped full of antibiotics now but in 1953 they had to wait till the abscess came to a head when it had to be lanced. In the meantime, Mum was in such pain that she couldn’t bear Mark near her. So, for approximately the first month of his life, I was the one who looked after him, fed him, changed him, bathed him, dressed him, as well as looking after Mum and washing the nappies. Terry towelling ones, of course, there were no disposable nappies then. In preparation for that particular chore, we’d bought a second hand washing machine. It was a bit of an antique, with a handle to turn the machine manually and an attached mangle that you had to turn but it was better than hand washing them. The district nurse who came daily to see Mum called me, ‘A proper little wonder.’ Fortunately, it was during the school summer holidays and he was a good baby.

              Mum had to go to the hospital to have the abscess lanced and she was in such pain when she came back that we cried together. I was shocked when I saw the wound for the first time when the nurse came in to dress it. It reminded me of an open mouth just above her nipple. Mum was so embarrassed about me seeing her. She’d always been so shy about showing herself to me before. When I was a child, she’d always made me turn my face away when she was dressing or undressing. Not surprisingly, the intimacy of her need drew us both closer together.

              I think it was having been such a help to Mum when she needed me that I was given a bicycle the following Christmas, probably purchased on the ‘never-never’, things usually were. How I treasured that bicycle! The girl on the blue bike soon became a familiar figure in Horwich as I roamed all over the place.

              St Catherine’s Church, where both my friend, Ada, and I had been confirmed the previous year, had now instigated a youth club and sometimes a Saturday dance. One of the people who came occasionally to both was a lad I developed a crush on. He was dark-haired with very dark heavily-lidded eyes and I thought he was lovely. On my bike, I followed him and his friends everywhere, well into the next year, showing up at the park where they were playing football, or just riding round Horwich in search of him. He must have cringed in embarrassment every time I showed up. A few years later, he asked me out and although he kissed me, I felt nothing. I was terribly disappointed.

              Some years later, my husband and I returned to Horwich for a short stay to show the children some of our old haunts. While I settled the children in the bed and breakfast place where we were staying, my husband went into our old local pub. I joined him there later, to find him talking to two men of about our own age. One of them I recognised immediately as a friend and neighbour. The other I had to be introduced to. It was the same lad I’d had the crush on but he had put so much weight on that I hadn’t recognised him. The only thing that hadn’t changed was his eyes, still smoulderingly dark and heavy-lidded. I don’t know who was more shocked, him or me. I'm not ashamed to confess that I based my main character, Nick Roberts, in A Suitable Young Man on him.

It was about the time of Mark’s birth that Dad started having stomach problems. He was advised that being hunched over the wheel of a bus for several hours and the quickly grabbed cups of tea and sticky buns wasn’t good for him. Also, he often worked standby shifts to supplement his wages which meant he sometimes had to work double shifts. He was always out either very early in the morning or back late at night; consequently he was always tired and we hardly ever saw him. He made the decision to leave the buses and went to work as a coach driver for a local firm. The money was a lot less, especially in the winter when there wasn’t much work and no tips but he hoped seeing more of the family would compensate. It was still a worry making ends meet even though Mum had gone back to work in the mill part-time leaving Mark with her sister-in-law.

Taking my big sister duties seriously

Because of this, I got the idea into my head that I should leave school once I turned 15 in the February of 1954 and go out to work to help out. When I first broached the subject to Mum and Dad, they wouldn’t hear of it; I simply had to take my ‘O’ levels (General Certificate of Education) exams when I was sixteen. You couldn’t just leave school even though the official school leaving age was fifteen. At grammar school it was sixteen. You therefore had to have special permission. Mum and Dad agreed to see the headmaster at Farnworth Grammar School. He was definitely unhappy at the idea of me leaving. By this time, I was adamant that it was the only thing I wanted to do. Reluctantly, he agreed that I could leave though his final words were, ‘Anne, you’ll regret it later.’ He was right, I did. I made up for it a lot later when I got two 'O' levels, one in Sociology, the other in English.

          So, in April 1954, when I was barely 15 years old, I left school and went to work for the Horwich Industrial Co-operative Society on Lee Lane to work in the Drapery Department. It was a dark, old-fashioned store with glass counters displaying buttons, thread and collar studs, the sort of things you see in a folk museum these days. There was a large polished counter for fabrics too and I liked that best, measuring the lengths of fabric against a yard ruler (no metres then) set into the wood of the counter. Through an archway was the Boot and Shoe department and I was always getting into trouble for going through to talk to the assistants in there. Upstairs was the Gowns and Millinery department. The store manager was a tall, upright man, dressed very formally, with a balding head and trim moustache. I was very much in awe of him though he was actually a kind man. I liked the people, the work, the store, but the trouble was I was bored. If I sold a packet of needles or some buttons in a day, I was doing well. There is, after all, only so much time you can spend tidying up and dusting in an attempt to look busy. What I really wanted to do was work upstairs in Gowns and Millinery, which was busier, but I was only the junior and such a move seemed unlikely.

After only a month or so, I handed in my notice and left. Ada was, by this time, learning to be a weaver at Victoria Mill and already earning good money on piece work. I think it was her influence that convinced me to go into the mill. Mum, who knew what it was like, did everything she could to dissuade me. With the same obstinacy when wanting to leave school, I stuck it out and got a job as a trainee towel weaver at the Beehive Mill.

'Bittersweet Flight' is here!

Cover design by BerniStevensdesign.com

At long last, Bittersweet Flight is here! This is my long-promised follow-up novel to A Suitable Young Man. I’d originally hoped to be able to produce it by December of last year, making it exactly a year after the release of my first novel. Unfortunately, because of various health problems, this deadline became impossible to meet. After much fine tuning and editing, it is available for pre-order from Amazon UK (and I assume from other Amazon stores) from Tuesday, 1^st March.

So what’s this one about then? It’s a touching tale of self-discovery, family, loss and love set in a Lancashire mill town in the 1950s.

It’s 1956 and Sally Simcox is a girl in trouble, at a time when having an illegitimate child is considered shameful. The father, Nick Roberts, had offered to marry her but, knowing he was in love with someone else, she’d told him she’d had a miscarriage.

Sally has fled to the anonymity of Blackpool, not knowing what she’s going to do there or how she will cope with her situation. On the day of her arrival in Blackpool, she meets a young RAF serviceman. He seems familiar and it isn’t long before Sally realises that he’s the last person she needs to meet for he is Nick’s younger brother, Phil. And he has no idea who she is. Yet it seems that their paths are destined to cross.

To tempt your reading appetite, an excerpt from Chapter 1 follows.

Chapter 1

Today should have been her wedding day.

A sense of desolation swept over Sally Simcox, causing her to falter as she stepped off the train on to the platform of Blackpool Central station. She stood for a moment, gathering courage, aware that her solitude marked her out from her fellow passengers, who were either in family groups or gangs of lads and lasses. Conscious that several of the lads were eyeing her up, she automatically straightened her spine, hoping someone would offer to give her a hand. When no-one did, she shrugged her shoulders and leaned to the side to compensate for the weight of her suitcase.

She staggered onto the main concourse of the station, amid all the hustle of a normal Saturday, mostly day trippers at this time of year, come for the famous Illuminations. Fighting clear of the crowds, she made her way to the exit and on to the street beyond where she stopped to take in this first sight of her beloved Blackpool. She put her case on the ground the better to absorb the sights, the sounds, the smells.

The Tower soared up, gigantic at such close quarters. To her left was the grey choppy expanse of the sea. Its sharp saltiness, the sweetness of candyfloss from a nearby rock stall filled her nostrils as she breathed in. For the first time in several days, she felt the stirring of anticipation and excitement. She was in Blackpool and at the beginning of a new life without her family. Being here was either a gamble or, as her brother, Jud, had said, ‘a bloody stupid idea.’ Gently, she put both hands on her belly in a protective gesture. ‘This is it, kid. It’s you and me against the world’.

From behind, someone barged into her and she landed with a thump on the pavement, where she lay winded. She glanced up in time to see a group of blue-uniformed RAF boys, laughing and jostling each other, eager to be at the delights of the busy seaside town. ‘You clumsy clots!’ she yelled after them, uselessly as it turned out for they were oblivious to anyone but themselves.

Then she felt a hand under her elbow and a voice said in her right ear. ‘Are you all right? Do you think you might have broken owt?’ The familiar Lancashire accent was reassuring.

‘No, I don’t think so,’ she said as, with help from her rescuer, she rose to her feet. Her suitcase had burst open and to her horror, her far-from-white underwear lay exposed to the world. ‘Oh, no!’ she said, inwardly cursing her mother’s laziness at not separating the whites from everything else when doing the washing, no matter how many times Sally reminded her. She gathered her belongings up, shoved them out of sight and snapped the case shut again.

‘You look a bit pale,’ the young man said. ‘Are you OK?’

She looked at him for the first time and saw that he, too, was an RAF serviceman, of medium height, good-looking in a quiet, restrained sort of way. Under his cap, his eyes were a grey-blue colour and he was fair-skinned. Troublingly, something about him was vaguely familiar. Aware that she was staring, she said, ‘I do feel a bit wobbly.’

‘Do you fancy a cup of tea? There’s a café not far from here. It’s a bit basic, but at least it’s clean.’

She shouldn’t; she didn’t know him. On the other hand, she did feel shaky and there was the baby to think of. ‘Thanks. But what about your mates?’ She nodded in the direction the other RAF servicemen had gone.

He laughed. ‘They’re not my mates. They were probably erks – National Servicemen – on their first pass after being on an armament course at Kirkham.’ He picked up her suitcase with ease and indicated that they should turn right. ‘I’m based at Kirkham too, only I’m a regular.’ The lift of his muscular shoulders showed his obvious pride.

He led the way down Central Drive until they came to a brightly lit café. From a juke box came the sounds of Elvis Presley’s ‘Don’t Be Cruel.’ Leaving her sitting at one of the formica-topped tables, the young serviceman went up to the counter where he chatted to the proprietor. He’d taken his cap off as they’d arrived, revealing fair hair ridged where the cap had rested. His manner seemed affable and easy-going, though he would never stand out from the crowd in the way Nick had done. A sharp pang of pain shot through her as she thought of Nick, lost to her now. Occasionally, she doubted the wisdom of passing up the chance of marrying him but the decision had been hers alone and she must live with the consequences. And she could never go back because she’d told her family – and Nick – that she’d had a miscarriage.

‘Are you feeling dizzy? Faint?’

She looked up, saw the concern in his eyes and pulled her thoughts to the present. ‘No, I’m OK thanks.’

He indicated the two thick white cups he’d placed on the table. ‘Sorry about the mugs but it’s a good cup of tea.’

‘I’m more used to these than china cups and saucers.’

He raised his own mug to touch hers. ‘I’m Phil, by the way, Phil Roberts.’

As he said that, the vague familiarity that had been troubling her since he’d first helped her to her feet, clarified in her mind and a sick feeling spread to her stomach. Improbable though it might seem, this personable young man was Nick’s younger brother.

The link to pre-order is here http://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B01CBTQH54.

Film stars, hair-dos and reminiscences

A timeless pic of Marilyn Monroe

  My lovely cover designer, Berni Stevens, and I have been having some interesting discussions about my new book cover (still under wraps so you’ll have to wait a while longer). These led to us both Googling women’s hair styles from the 1950s, the era in which my book is set, and commenting on the various film stars of that period. Forget today’s so-called ‘stars.’ A lot of them are no more than participants in reality tv shows. No, the film stars of the 1940s/50s/60s were stars in the true sense of the word, glamorous, handsome, beautifully dressed and coiffured .  Not that I knew any of them personally. The nearest I got to them was writing to ask for a signed photograph – and getting them too. I can still remember one address – Universal Studios, Culver City, Hollywood.

Going to the cinema now tends to be an expensive occasion, with costly seats, popcorn and drinks, making it more of a treat. Back in the 1950s, going to the ‘pictures’ was a common place event, like going to a dance hall on a Saturday night. Horwich, Lancashire, where I lived in the 1950s and where my book A Suitable Young Man is set, had three cinemas. The posh one was the Picture House and that tended to attract the most up-to-date films. Then there was the Palace which had a tin roof and where, if it rained, you couldn’t hear the film. I was once sat on the toilet there when a mouse ran from between my legs and under the gap in the door. Good job I’ve not been particularly afraid of mice. Last of all, was the flea-pit known as Johnny’s, real name long since forgotten though it might have been the Princes’ Theatre. No chance of hearing a film there either, with everyone talking among themselves and walking about. Because Horwich tended to be last in the distribution chain, the films shown at any of the cinemas tended to be old ones and changed frequently. This mean that we could go to the pictures three times a week for mere pennies. The most expensive seats were the one-and-ninepennies at the Picture House. You usually only went in these seats if you were with a boyfriend.

I was mad about the pictures then. Every week, I read the Picturegoer Magazine from cover to cover, learning about the comings and goings of the stars, what films they were making and what films were up-coming. All innocent stuff compared to today’s gossip magazines. For those were the days when all that was permitted to be shown of sex in films, was a chaste kiss. The bedroom door remained firmly closed. All down to censorship laws. When ‘From Here To Eternity’ came out in 1953, the swimsuit clad bodies of Burt Lancaster and Deborah Kerr in a passionate embrace on a beach caused an uproar. When the Rock Hudson/Doris Day films came out in the 1960s, even they were little more than saucily suggestive.

The gorgeous Dirk Bogarde

It was about this time that I first starting writing and my heros all bore a remarkable resemblance to British film star, Dirk Bogarde. With his smouldering dark looks and quirky smile, he really made my young heart beat faster. Later, when I discovered his whimsical autobiographical series, I became a fan of his writing. I wrote to him a couple of times, via his publisher, about something that had particularly drawn my attention or a coincidence that had occurred. Both times, I received a handwritten card – now much treasured. And I once had the pleasure of meeting him at a book event in Leeds a few years before he died. What a lovely man he was! Even as an old man, he was still a self-effacing charmer. When he died in 1999, I cried.

They don’t make ‘em like that any more!