Living For The City - The Story Of My First Job

Hi friends! Here's a standalone chapter from the memoir I'm currently writing. It is a gentle companion if you want to relax and sleep. Experience the atmosphere of the City of London in the late seventies, and hear the tale of an impressionable 17 year old (me) taking up my first job in a property company and coming into regular contact with some colorful characters.

For more narrative writing by me, please see Ted the Shed. All 34 chapters are available separately in Free Tracks. There is also an 8-hour version of the entire book on one track. If you would like to listen to the tracks in a flowing format but would also like the ability to pick out different tracks and stop and start, the Ted The Shed playlist is your friend! You can find all my playlists listed in my profile.

Transcript

Hello there, It's Mandy here. Thanks for joining me tonight. I'm planning to read you an extract from a memoir that I'm writing and this part which is called Living for the City focuses on the first proper job that I had after leaving school. Anyway, I really hope you enjoy it. Do let me know what you think. But before I go ahead, Please feel free to make yourself really comfortable settling down into your chair or your bed, Relaxing your hands, Softening your shoulders and releasing any tension in your jaw. That's great. Okay, So if you're ready, Then I shall begin. Living for the City. I applied for a temporary job at a property company in the City of London. I was excited to go uptown on the train from Bromley North and then, After a short walk from Cannon Street station, Go up to the 11th floor of a gleaming modernist skyscraper. I'd read the information they'd sent me and knew that they managed a lot of property in the City. I knew too from the BBC's Today programme that all the largest property companies in the world were British and that many of them were based in the City. This company was, As my dad put it, Rolling in dosh. But for me, The most important thing was that in their covering letter, They were looking forward very much to meeting me. So I dressed as smartly as I could, Which wasn't that smart. At 17, I wore a man's blue denim shirt for a jacket. Similar shirts in black brushed cotton denim and red workman's check hung at home among my Laura Ashley dresses, Embroidered cheesecloth smocks and, Weirdly, A cape made of psychedelic terry toweling with white fringing. They lived in the little cherry wood wardrobe I'd had since I was eight. My favourite things to wear, Though, Were the men's shirts and sometimes their trousers and shoes. It wasn't a fashion statement. It was because there was more room inside them. In a thickly carpeted room with a view of rival skyscrapers that I found it hard to tear my eyes away from, I was kindly questioned by a man and a woman and chatted away about my love of music, Dogs and my plans to study English at university that autumn. Having just left school, I wasn't used to being treated as an adult and my eyes widened when they offered me a cup of filter coffee and asked me if I took it with cream. After the interview, They told me they were sure they could find a job for me somewhere in the company. I was delighted. This was 1976, When jobs were plentiful and companies were pleased to have you, But even so I'd spent the last few years feeling so unwanted that their offer felt like pure kindness. It had started with poor O-level results. I'd passed a lot of them, 13 in fact, But my grades weren't as good as predicted and in the subject that was my entire raison d'etre, I had only just scraped through. E was for English. My English teacher, An older woman who wore thick stockings and sensible shoes, Carried a lorgnette and pinned brooches to her dress and who up until then I had adored, Told my parents that I could do the A-level if I must but that she wouldn't support my application to study literature at university. Dad came back from that meeting furious, Mum chilly. They asked me what the hell I thought I was playing at. But everyone knows I'm good at English, Was all I could say as accusations flew. But later that week, News came of a parallel controversy that had happened in O-level art to another pupil that everyone recognised as talented. This introduced an element of reasonable doubt into the courtroom of my parents' sitting room and I was allowed to continue at school and do my A-levels as planned, Rather than being sent to work on the sweet counter in Woolworths, The threat of those times. But the feelings of anger and shame played themselves out in my body. I couldn't meet the teacher's eye in class, Became sullen, Hid behind my curtain of dark hair. My eating became more disordered than it had been. Between dieting and binging, I felt out of control. The uncertainty was gruelling. When the time came to apply for university, I made up my mind to study psychology instead, Went to one sad interview after another. Reading, Cardiff and Strathclyde made unconditional offers. I delayed my acceptance. I'd assumed that studying the workings of the human mind would involve three years of reading books like Dale Carnegie's How to Win Friends and Influence People. If so, I might have been able to bear it. But the interviews revealed that the subject was more scientific than that. Meanwhile, In A-level English, I was transported by Shakespeare's King Lear. In my private cave of clothing, I cried tears of rage over Gloucester's blinding and Cordelia's death, And memorised huge chunks of the play despite myself. After two years of study, When a small brown window envelope came through the letterbox like a pay packet, I discovered I'd got an A for English. I'd also got an A for Art, A B in French and a merit in French S-level. The faint letters on that strip of thin paper changed everything. No one could argue against my decision to ditch psychology, Take a year out and reapply to uni to study English next year. Mum said I might as well apply to Cambridge in my spare year. So I did. I didn't get in, Though I did get the topmost mark possible in the English exam. I did, However, Get a place at my second choice of university. I received the news while working in a hotel in Chamonix-Mont-Blanc with a friend. Boogie Nights by Heatwave was playing in the background when I took the call from Mum. Darling, The most marvellous news! You've got in at York! I thought of the bright yellow trumpets of the daffodils that had been blooming on the city walls when I'd gone for my interview, The new friend I'd made while waiting to be seen, Someone I'm still in touch with today. That's the best news ever, Mum, I said. The uncertainty was, At last, At an end. I still had to slog it out in France, Though. The trip had turned tough. My imagination had again beguiled me. There was no sitting around in cafes listening to accordion music, Smoking gitane, Reading Paris Match and chatting to passionate young men about politics. We worked 12-hour shifts and only had one day off a week, Which, Of course, Was never the same day as each other. My French languished. My friend, Who did get into Cambridge, Spoke French so well that, After a few faltering attempts of my own, I clammed up whenever we were in the company of actual French people. I got the painful feelings again, Saw myself as a useless lump that took up too much space in the world. Thankfully, France ended. I started my new job in the city, Going up to town first thing with all the other commuters, Strap-hanging in the train from Bromley North, Surging out of Cannon Street with all the expert wielders of black briefcases and brollies. My job, A Dickensian one, Was to copy numbers and letters out of one ledger and into another. Why, I didn't know. I was always trying to find out. Other parts of the job were clearer, Fetching correspondence from the post room nine flights down, Filing and photocopying documents in the copy room two flights up. The important thing for me was that people were nice and I suffered none of the inadequate A-level feelings and none of the inadequate French feelings either, Even though I was still the same person who had ugly cried when reading out King Lear's final speeches in class and in France dropped trays of chocolat chaud and croissant in the lift, Overlooked diners hidden behind pillars in the salle à manger and failed again and again to scrub the deep steel kitchen sinks out properly. The same person who Madame, The proprietor, In her black grease-streaked dress screamed at Il faut bien frotter avec le produit. At the property company, However, I was never told who my boss was and never thought to ask. Judd, Head of the office of three quantity surveyors to which I was assigned, Was certainly a candidate for the role. He was a very tall man whose blonde hair grew in all directions and he wore a sky-blue shirt whose buttons lived under continual pressure. He was the sort of person your eyes strayed to. He came into work half an hour late every morning. Wakey, Wakey, He boomed. A pen-tidy flew off his desk as his briefcase landed. Pencils and rotaring pens bounced on the lino floor. Morning, Boss, The three of us chorused meekly back. A year or two later, I would be exposed to the feminist writings of Susie Orbach and Andrea Dworkin, But now I sprang to my feet, Ready to pick up any kind of desk detritus he could offer. He waved me back with a copy of the Morning Times. But I wouldn't say no to a coffee, He winked, Turning to the back of the paper, Uncapping his pen. Anyone else want one? I chirruped as I trotted off to the kitchenette where a filter coffee machine with jugs and a hot plate lived and was kept topped up by unseen hands. I thought this was the ultimate perk, Especially as a jug of single cream came with it. Judd took his coffee black. I did too, Now. I was, In any case, Slimming, Living on Diet Coke and climbing the nine flights to our floor every day, Even when the lift was working, Trying not to cave when the crusty cheese rolls came round on the 11 o'clock catering trolley. Colleagues caffeinated, I sat. Horror film starring Gregory Peck, Three then four, Said Judd. Beyond his desk, The plate glass windows offered a spectacular view of grey city roofs and rival skyscrapers, Glassy and new. Theomen, I suggested. Surely he knew that. Quick crosswords seemed a complete waste of time to me. He nodded, Filled in the letters. Alex Haley's best-selling novel, Five. I'd read this one. Who hadn't? Roots. Excellent, Excellent. Some Hastings wine, He said, Four letters. I thought about this. I sipped my coffee, Thin and bitter. He had obviously gone over to the cryptic crossword. Sometimes he dotted between the two of them. The answer came like a hidden compartment opening in my brain. Could it be Asti? I spoke casually, Though secretly delighted. As in Asti Spumanti? Sheer genius, Said Judd. Oh, This pen's no good. He threw the pen across the room and picked another out of the pot. I had to stop myself from trotting over to pick the broken one up, Like a dog. I was pretty good at anything that involved words, Including, Of course, Words hidden within a crossword clue, Not to mention anagrams. Here on the ninth floor, My prowess was proven daily. It must have been how I earnt my favourable reports to management, Since Judd was unaware of anything I did at work besides crossword clues. He spent the next half hour murmuring into his dictaphone the tiny tape destined for the pool, A room of neat young women with glossy lips and Farrah Fawcett Major's hair, Things I hadn't arrived at yet. I thanked God I had very little business in there. You had to shout to be heard above the thockety-thack of their typewriter keys, The ding of bells, The creak of the ratchets as they fed in fresh paper. It was like the nightmare of shouting out diners' orders to the chef above the din of clanging pans at the French hotel. Off to meet the client now, Said Judd when he'd finished dictating. Back before lunch, If anyone comes looking. I was never invited on any of Judd's outings, Though I was invited on others, Usually to measure office space, And usually by the most junior of the surveyors, A slight, Diffident man who had allergies and brought his own sandwiches. When Judd came back, He threw his usual invitation to lunch out into the room. No one took him up on it. One had his sandwiches, Of course, And the other liked the free lunch offered by the staff canteen on the top floor. I turned down Judd's offer, Too. The idea of accompanying him to the pub scared the living daylights out of me, For all sorts of reasons. I wondered whether Judd had any friends at work. He didn't communicate with the other surveyors much, But perhaps that wasn't what men did at work. Perhaps it wasn't what men did, Period. In the Saturday jobs I'd held until now, At Sainsbury's and WH Smith's, I'd made friends. The shared eye-rolls, The sniggers, The she-said-he-said conversations were how we survived the nonsensical rules, The totalitarian bosses, The drudgery of stocking the freezer with chilli blocks of New Zealand lamb or counting all the Mr Men books. We talked endlessly about being bored with our boyfriends, Bored with our jobs, Being in love with Brian Ferry or David Bowie, And feeling that as long as we stuck to our diets, We'd done something constructive with the day. Brainwashed by the 70s, Of course, But the camaraderie was real, And we learnt something important, How to pretend to be busy rather than actually being busy. But Judd rolled alone. He barrelled in through the double doors at around 2. 30, His eyes red and watering. He made it to his desk, Threw out a few cryptic crossword clues that I couldn't interpret, Then laid his head on the desk and went to sleep. He woke about four and fuelled himself for home with a black coffee. Right, I'm out of here, He said. See you all tomorrow. Good night, Boss, We chorused, More submissive than ever, Beaten down by his insouciant behaviour. As the weeks went on, I wondered why no one ever challenged him about his timekeeping and his drinking. Perhaps he did such a brilliant job in the approximately two hours of work that he did put in every day that he was irreplaceable. Perhaps he was the epitome of the gentlemanly capitalism that flourished in the City of London at that time, Where deals were done over lunch or golf. Or perhaps the bosses were compassionate for reasons I didn't know, But desperately wanted to. I once asked the junior surveyor on one of our measurement outings, What's the story with Judd, I said, As we stood in a huge empty office, One at each end of a tape measure. But he looked at me, Puzzled, As if he hadn't noticed anything untoward about our boss's behaviour at all. What do you mean, The story, He asked. I lost heart immediately. Oh, Nothing, I said. Besides, In my book, Judd was marvellous. I lived for any minor acknowledgement he might make of my existence and fantasised about getting trapped in the lift with him. When I left the job, It was him I missed. But then, He was one of the first people who liked me for something, Perhaps the only thing that I liked about myself, Being good with words. Joan was another person who could have been my boss. She held down her own mysterious clerical job in a small room across the corridor from our big open plan surveyor's office. I thought of her as elderly, But she was probably in her early fifties. She was short and slight, But made up for her smallness by having witch's hair, Long and grey and tangled, Spraying expensive perfume around the way other women sprayed air freshener, And invading other people's personal space. Her office garb was a grey dress and a double rope of pearls, Nothing unusual there, Except she seemed to wear the same dress every day, And with that fear of older people common to the young, I imagine she never washed it. Now, I suspect, She had several identical ones that she rinsed out in the evening and drip-dried over her bath. Marks and Spencers, Perhaps. Sensible. She took me under her wing, A mothering to compliment the father figure of Judd, But it was a strange care. She fancied herself clairvoyant, And frequently read my palm, Gripping my open hand with her nails to peer at the lines indented between the cushions of flesh. This fascinated me, And I couldn't help believing that I would have a long life, Come into a lot of money, Go on exotic travels, And have two children, One my own, The other a stepchild. Of relationships, She said, I'll see two husbands, Darling, One soon, The other later. She wasn't wrong about that part, As it turned out. During my first week, She was continually at my elbow, Explaining things with an oppressive level of detail that was, Nevertheless, Woolly. Write those figures in that box, Darling, She would say, Leaning over me at my desk, Her pearls jostling each other at my shoulder, The fumes of youth dew by Estée Lauder, Creating a little pocket of suffocation. Nah, Not like that. She snatched my pen and wrote the numerals even less legibly than I had. It took her a long time to show me how to work the photocopier, Even though I could see immediately how to do it. Line your original up with them marks on the screen, Lovely, She said, Peering at the faint lines on the screen. See, A4. But she fitted the page to the A3 lines. I didn't say anything. She pressed the button, The big, Blocky machine whirred and spat, And she held up a piece of paper, Three quarters black. Why has it come out like that? She asked nobody. She turned to me. Make sure you close the lid down properly, Won't you? Whenever I sought her out with a query, She was impatient. God bless us, Don't you fuss your head about that, Darling, Was a line I heard often. She didn't make my job any clearer or easier to do. It didn't matter. No one seemed to care what you did at work and wouldn't care until well into the 80s. At lunchtimes, I'd taken to wandering around the city on my own, Visiting a record shop I'd found and going into one of their sound booths where you could listen to music on headphones. You could stay in there a good half hour, Tapping your foot, Smoking a consulate menthol cigarette, Cool as a mountain stream, And watching the world go by to a soundtrack of your own choice. I listened many times to Bob Dylan's album, Desire, Which had been released in January of that year. I still know all the lyrics by heart. Another mission was to drift in and out of the fragrance departments of large stores, Picking up samples. I was determined to discover Judd's brand of aftershave. Weeks of research suggested it was Aramis. After a morning in the office, I loved the freedom of urban meandering, Would sometimes break into a trot, Other times adopt the pace of treacle, Enjoying the rush of others hurrying by. But Joan thought wandering at the city's mercy was no way for a girl to spend her lunch break. What if some boozed-up old bloke tempts you into one of them new wine bars, She asked. The irony of the fact that I didn't even have to leave my own office to find a boozed-up old bloke was lost on Joan, But she pressed her company onto me, Taking me out to find a square of sparse grass somewhere with a bench to eat our sandwiches. I always wished she would sit a few centimetres further away or walk at a distance instead of recruiting me at every opportunity to pull across the road, To hang on to among shoppers, To lean on, To get a stone out of her shoe. I edged infinitesimally away out of her force field. I longed for my lone city drifts again, But wasn't assertive enough to limit our contact. But strangely, On those days when she didn't turn up at work, She was alore unto herself about what she called going off on the patterned mick. I missed her. She was so honestly herself. It was a skill I had yet to master and perhaps never would. Mondays had a pattern. All right for later, Darling, Joan would ask on the bench. We unwrapped our sandwiches under the unblinking stare of pigeons. It was a grey day and rain was in the air. I made a noncommittal sound. That was good enough for Joan. Smash in, She said. When five o'clock came, She appeared at my desk, Sporting her hat and handbag like military garb and pulling behind her a large tartan shopping trolley. We went down in the lift, Then out of the huge plate glass doors and across the pristine square, Which I was sure got washed and scrubbed every night. A fine drizzle began. I was pulled along at great speed. Gotta get there before them barge poles get in, She told me, Pushing through the groups of drinking men in pinstripes, Spilling onto pavements, Jaywalking through the traffic jams, Breathing in the diesel fumes from queued taxis and buses. Then we vanished from the public gaze. It was a different route every time, A different location. A bloke gave me a tip off, Was all Joan ever gave away, A statement that gave me a thrill. The secret was safe with me. I could never have retraced our steps. We got to wherever we were going by back streets and snickets, Of which Joan was an expert navigator. She whisked me down alleyways whose names dripped history. George Yard, Bell Inn Yard, Grace Church Street, Bull's Head Passage. Sometimes we went further into department store territory. Today we stopped in the Leadenhall Market. The stores and shops were beginning to close up, But that was what Joan wanted. She edged me around a corner and down a narrow dripping passage behind some of the shops where we skidded on flattened cardboard and squashed oranges, Saw a rat disappear down a drain. She barrelled along to the far end of the passage, The trolley bouncing up behind her over the cobbles. And there it was, The treasure, Just beyond a sheer steel door to our left, A pile of black bin bags stuffed full to bursting. She steadied the trolley as best she could on the cobbles, Patted it like a dog and produced a paring knife from its front pocket. Now, You keep watch, Would you? She said. I nodded, Watched her slip the black plastic of the first bag in three different places. It was carefully done. She put her hand into all the openings and felt around inside, Gentle as a surgeon getting familiar with the patient's intestines. She shook her head. Nah, She said, That's just polyester. She could feel it, No need to look. She produced a reel of duct tape from her trolley now, Cut a short length off with the knife and taped up the damaged bin bag. Don't want to give the bin man a headache now, Do we? She said. I can help with that, I said, Wondering if this made me an accomplice to whatever crime was being committed, If indeed one was. While I took over on taping, She moved on to the next fat bag, Nothing but lining material and the next, Where she brought out a scrap of blue flowery cotton and rubbed it between her fingers. Cotton, But not lawn. It's hardly Liberty of London, Is it? I nodded and watched, Wondering whether a proprietor was about to come rushing out of the shop's back door and shout at us. She caught something of my nerves and smiled. Don't you worry love, It's not illegal what we're doing. It's all up for grabs once it hits the pavement. It's a public thoroughfare, See? It didn't look much like a thoroughfare that any member of the public would have chosen to walk in, And her reassurances seemed to contradict her earlier instruction about keeping watch. But perhaps lookout was just an honorary role. I may have been a bit wet behind the ears, But even I couldn't imagine anyone arresting an old woman and a girl for rifling through rubbish. She tackled more bags. I glanced at my watch, My hair was starting to drip, And we'd been standing here a good 20 minutes already. She must have had eyes in the back of her head. Don't worry love, It's a numbers game, See? As if to prove her right, From the seventh bag she drew out a piece of shining turquoise material that was so sheer it rippled and gleamed like a fast river. Oh my goodness, I said, It was a thing of purity, Heavenly in the dirty alley. Joan grinned. It's a good length and all. Sometimes beautiful fabric came chopped into small pieces, Whether to foil the barge poles, Or because the tailor had cut it that way. She stuffed the turquoise into her trolley unceremoniously. More treasures followed from that one glorious bag. A piece of black wool, Some more of the sheer material but in pink, Red satin, Glossy and faceted, Then three pieces of chocolate coloured herringbone tweed. I took one of the tweed pieces from the top of her trolley while she rummaged on, Felt its slightly abrasive texture, Marvelled at the bright colours deep in its weave, Oranges and reds. But the drizzle was turning to rain. Suddenly Joan, Who had been lost in her quest, Realised and straightened up. She saw how wet I was getting. She didn't look wet herself. I'm made up with that darling, She said, And you've a good girl keeping watch and patching up all the bags. Do you want to keep that bit? She nodded at the tweed. I didn't usually share in Joan's fabric spoils. It wasn't that she was mean with them, But I'd moved out of my parents' home for the time being and was house-sharing with some nurses. There was no sewing machine at the house in Ladywell, No pins, No scissors or thread. But, Yeah, I said to this offer, Thanks. I tucked it into my shoulder bag. I thought about my dad, Who, Despite our being fairly well off, Still loved getting things for free, A throwback to when he was a child and poor. I wondered if I would tell him about it. Decided probably not. He wouldn't have approved of the methodology. But I still have that beautiful piece of tweed somewhere in my chest of fabrics. Joan and I didn't always go scavenging out the back of city bailers. Another time it was day-old sandwiches got from the Marks and Spencer's dumpster. One day the tartan trolley got weighed down with cans of Guinness from the back of a pub. Joan said they were date expired. Once there was Debenhams and loads of pairs of women's trousers, All black, But unfortunately sized pens, Which fitted neither of us. It didn't stop Dot taking ten pairs. I wondered if she had children, Grandchildren even. But unlike most women, She never spoke about them if she did. Our fabric hauls, Though, Were my favourite. What Joan did with her beautiful remnants was a complete mystery, At least to all of us at the office, Where her grey outfits went unrelieved, Even by a bright scarf in, Say, Turquoise silk. But perhaps she had gowns of pink at home, Smart black skirts, Red satin blouses. In the four months I worked at the company, I must only have exchanged a few sentences with Dot. Yet, In some ways, Her influence on me was the most profound. She was mid-thirties with jet black hair in a pixie cut, The hairstyle of models. She wore long boots, Thick tights, Pale lippy, And micro-miniskirts with loose tunics over the top, Homages to geometry. Her desk was in our office by the window, But separated from us by a space that was too great to hold a conversation across. Space or not, She behaved as if she was sitting in an entirely different universe. She frowned if anyone from the group of surveyor's desks approached her, And any hope I had of solidarity with the only other woman in the office faded within the first week. She was on the phone a lot. Perhaps her speaking muscles were exhausted, Though Joan, Unusually forthcoming, Said that Dot had once had her own office. She'd ended up in the open plan following a reorganisation, And had been sulking ever since. Anyway, She said, That dozy girl is leaving at the end of the month. She spoke with affection. I was disappointed that Dot was going. I liked her bright outfits, Her superior air, Her rude way of dealing with the menfolk in our office. She was particularly scathing towards Judd. I could never hear their conversations, But he would slink back to his desk afterwards, As if he'd been hit by a snowball with a pebble inside. But Dot did have time for one man. He worked on a different floor, And most days delivered her a sheaf of papers. He would rifle through them, Point at something, Shuffle the papers back into a pile, Strike the pile with the back of his hand, Then leave. He sat on her desk all the while, Something none of the surveyors would have dared to do, And instead of the usual frost explosion, She would pivot her wheeled chair around to face him, Swing her leg, Talk in a low voice. She was the only one of us who possessed such a chair. Perhaps it had been a sweetener when she lost her office, Or perhaps it was a concession to her bad back as she often got up clutching her side. You could tell when the man was on the other end of the phone by the downward tilt of her head, The cradling of the receiver. He looked like a run-of-the-mill man in a blue suit to me. Too pristine, I couldn't see the attraction. I thought of asking Joan about their relationship, But couldn't imagine how I would frame the question. It seemed far too nosy. I'd only been there a fortnight when an enormous card came round, Hidden in a buff file folder. It had pastel animals on the front, And was full of names and affectionate messages. I read some of them for inspiration, But found them puzzling. Wishing you all the happiness in the world. Good luck in your greatest adventure yet, And most mysterious of all, The days are long, But the years are short. Enjoy them. Was Dot going on a round-the-world trip? In the end, I just wrote, Sorry you're leaving, Which I was. At three o'clock on her leaving day, People from all over the company, More people than I realised even worked there, Poured into our office. They sat on our desks, Clutched glasses of actual champagne, Brought down from the top floor by the caterers. Mushroom vol-au-vents were everywhere, Salmon pinwheels, Celery stuffed with cream cheese. The managing director, A gentle, Kindly man, Made a speech, And handed Dot the vast card. Dot was drinking orange juice. She opened the card, But only glanced quickly inside, Saying she would look at it properly later. She seemed embarrassed, As if she just wanted this whole darn thing to be over. There was a knock at the double doors. Two of the typists ran to open them, And something big, Wrapped in pink paper, Was pushed towards us on four wheels. I had no idea what it was, But Dot seemed to know instantly. Her mouth fell open. No, Not honestly. You haven't. You can't have done. A few nods and giggles. The surveyors, However, Looked as baffled as I felt. Oh, But we have, Said the MD, Smiling. Open it, Open it, Coerced the typists. Dot tore the sheets of wrapping off. Beneath them was a pram, A chrome splendor with chocolate brown upholstery. Dot stood gazing at it in a kind of rapture. It's a silver cross, She said. I could never afford anything like that by myself, Not in a month of Sundays. She dissolved into tears. I stood and stared. I wasn't sure which was the most shocking, Dot crying or Dot being given a pram. Details were given. We got in touch with your mum. We've got the receipt from Selfridges, Just in case. The mention of Selfridges brought fresh tears. I twigged. The back pain, The tunic tops, Of course. Dot was going to have a baby. As she turned sideways to pull a hanky out of her bag, I finally noticed. The tunic tops had done a good job of covering her bump, Which wasn't the biggest one I'd ever seen. But once you looked, It was pretty clear. My hand flew to my mouth. Joan was at my elbow. You look horrified, Dear. She took my arm and for once I leaned into her. I mean, I didn't even know she was, You know, I said. Joan laughed. Do at the end of next month or so I've heard tell. She popped a mushroom vol-au-vent into her mouth and made a face. Muck, She said. Anyway, Didn't she tell you, Her being your boss and all? My boss? I couldn't take it in. And I didn't even know she had a husband. An husband, Darling? She ain't got one of them. The hubbub of excited chatter continued around us. Dot was laughing now, Wheeling the pram up and down and around her desk, Followed by two of the typists. What? You mean he's left her? I said. Nah, Said Joan. She's never had one. She's doing this all on her own. And good luck to her, Says I. I stared at Joan. I hadn't imagined she would be so modern in her outlook. I glanced quickly around our assembled co-workers, Looking for expressions of disapproval among the general gaiety. I saw none. Perhaps they were hiding it, Or the people who disapproved haven't come to the do. Otherwise, Everyone seemed to feel that Joan's pregnancy and her determination to go ahead with it on her own was the best thing since mother's pride sliced bread. I tried to swallow my own shred of censure, Smiled to cover it. Joan reached for a salmon pinwheel and went on. Why else do you think we've pushed the boat out on a posh pram for her? I mean, She lives in a council flat in Wandsworth, Among all the other chavs. There's no bloke waiting in the wings to pick up the tab on all the stuff she'll need. And it ain't gonna get any easier, Let me tell you. I wondered about her own history. Was it possible that Joan too had been a single mother? Why did nobody tell me anything? I thought of my own mum. About a year ago, When she suspected me of messing around with my boyfriend—I hadn't been—she had told me, Sitting very upright at our kitchen table, That if I ever got caught like that, I'd be out on my ear. You would never darken our door again, She'd said, Being no doubt about that. Attitudes to unmarried mothers might have been beginning to change in 1976, But they hadn't changed in Bromley. My mum's words had terrified me. They had been a powerful deterrent, Were perhaps designed that way. So Dot's mum doesn't mind, I asked, Weakly. Joan rolled her eyes. Dot's a full-grown woman, Love. Who cares what her ma thinks? I took this on the chin, Suspecting, Prophetically, That I would care what my ma thought until the day she died, And even afterwards. But there it was. I downed a glass of champagne to deaden my shock. Dot had been my boss, But had never told me. I suppose she was on her final weeks, Couldn't be bothered. What mattered was the little boy or girl that was coming, Fathered perhaps by the man in the blue suit. Financially supported by him, Though I doubted it, Brought up by Dot in her council flat, Pushed defiantly across Wandsworth Common every day to the shops in a shining silver cross Grosvenor pram. And she was doing it with her mum's blessing, And if not that, The full blessing of her huge and lovely work family, Who had all signed the card and stumped up no less than a fiver each towards her parting gift. As the gathering continued, Getting noisier and giddier as the sun went down, And Joan went over to congratulate Dot, I thought it would be hard to find something so far removed from my own experience of life. My experience was that no one helped you, Least of all with anything you'd chosen yourself, Even something as innocuous as an application to university to study English. And Dot, Dot who went ahead and did it anyway, Who defied all the pressure she must have felt to have her baby adopted, Was so far removed from the timid, Compliant person I felt myself to be, That I could hardly credit her either. I put my glass down and followed in Joan's wake to go and congratulate Dot.

Reviews

What a lovely story, delightfully told. I'm not normally a fan of memoir, but I want to read yours. 📖❤️

I’ll be enjoying this again for another night or two due to inconveniently dropping off, but loved it already x

Mandy this was sooooo good. You’re an incredible writer. Can’t wait for more !!! In fact I think I might listen to this again!!❤️❤️❤️thank you❤️