It's the people, really

Come on!  While we’re feeling exuberant – Let’s go!

 

I’ve got something to say.

 

My mam’s 78, right?  Don’t tell her I told you.

 

I’ve just come off the phone with her.

 

What a buzz she gives me.

 

She’s called Winnie.

 

Except in Leeds, where she’s always been Gwen.  I understand this.

 

Neither name appears on her birth certificate.  I understand this, too.

 

The one thing she’d change is her height – which is diminutive.  But great things come in small packages.

 

In her teens she fought her younger brothers’ bullies.  With six sisters in between the first and last groups of boys (she was the youngest girl), she was effectively their only contactable elder brother.

 

The brothers above her taught her to box – their uncle being the INL and regional champion.

 

She gave up fighting when she took on Dave Richmond and lost.  Dave later became a decent player for York Rugby League.  I remember him from Rowntree’s – wish I’d known that story then.

 

I rang her today because it’s three years since my dad yielded-up the spirit – gave up the ghost.  So I thought I’d ring.

 

She had other news. 

 

About Annie – at eighty-eight the oldest of their clan (the “Monday Club”).  I might have met Annie all those years ago when I used to drop in on Black Magic from Moulded Chocolate for a chat by the conveyor.  Setting myself up for a ribbing by the beturbaned women packers in white overalls.

 

She’d gone to see Annie at the hospital.  The family left them to chat about Rowntree’s and queuing for tickets at the railway station – weekends away in the black & white era.

 

Annie’s family were glad she dropped by.  And they told her so – which was good, because today Annie died.  My mam told me this with a tear in her voice.  But I knew she was remembering good times.

 

I said to her: “Get out and live, mam.  Get out and live.”

 

She’s had trouble with her feet (and her height), but I think she might do something this time.

 

I told her: “Look at N.  Wandering ‘round Africa, all on her own.”

 

Tonight, N is heading out on a journey to the remote north of Lake Malawi – alone.

 

My mam thinks it’s dangerous – it probably is. 

 

But what do you want to die of?

 

Boredom?  Old age?

 

I cast my mind back to today in the office.  Do I really want to die of that?

 

“Get out and live, mam.  Get out and live.”

 

I’d like her to sit in a bar in Madrid – chattering to C in English.  They might even understand each other.

 

I suppose I’m blessed.

 

It’s the people, really.