Late and Seen!

This month's Derby Telegraph article (published on my birthday, too!) is about my inadvertent training for world-class athletics-ish:

Here's the text, if you can't read the photo:

Last month, I was bemoaning the fact that nobody was really sure whether I was a manager or not when I worked at Harold Wesley Ltd., in Burton in the 1970s.  Actually, that’s not quite true.  The senior management of Wesley’s and I were in no doubt as to where I fitted in the pecking order.

I think my mum had aspirations though.  That became clear when I received, unexpectedly one birthday, a very nice quality small suitcase with incorporated document case.  I think she rather thought this was what the aspiring young executive should have.  However, a document case rather implies that you have work to bring home and I barely had enough to do in my normal hours of work, without traipsing any home with me.  I did try to act the part for a while by transporting my lunchtime sandwiches in the suitcase, but it just made it look as if I was constantly leaving home, so I abandoned that idea.

In truth, any hopes of advancement I might have had would have been kippered by my inability to arrive at work on time.  You may recall that I had the same problem at the Plastics Warehouse?  Well, this was exacerbated by Wesley’s being the first job where it wasn’t practicable to walk or cycle to work, I had to catch the bus.

Catching the bus should not have been a problem, and wouldn’t have been to most people.  The best to catch was the No. 5 at the bus stop diagonally opposite from All Saints’ Church on Branston Road.  This left at about 8.10 and would get me comfortably to Dean and Smedley’s on Horninglow Road, around the corner from Wesley’s, just before 8.30 (which is when I was due to start work).  However, for every time when I caught this bus, there were at least a couple of times when I didn’t.

I should have been a world-class athlete as a consequence of running to try and catch the bus.  Never good at getting out of bed in the morning (I’m still not) I would leave my departure from our house in South Broadway St. until the very last moment.  A fast-ish walk down South Broadway St, whilst lighting a cigarette, usually turned to a steady lope along All Saints’ Road which then became a flat-out sprint as I saw the bus go past the church at the top of the road.  Sometimes there would be other passengers waiting at the bus stop and I would have sufficient time to get to the bus before it pulled away.  On other occasions, dependent on the degree of sadistic pleasure on the part of the driver, it would either wait for me to make it to the bus stop and fall aboard gasping for breath or, more frequently, pull away just as I was within a few yards of victory, leaving me doubled up with exhaustion and frustration.

If I missed the No. 5, I was left with the prospect of catching either a No. 12 or a No. 6.  Neither of these would get me to work on time, or anything like it and would also entail getting off in Waterloo Street to then walk, or more likely run, up Victoria Crescent. 

I would then have to try and insinuate myself into the factory in a way that didn’t call attention to my late arrival.  The best option was to make my way up the loading dock, hoping not to bump into anyone, and then, with a piece of paper gripped in my hand, walk determinedly toward my office as if I had just been somewhere to collect some vital statistics.

 I was now sharing an office with Gwen (who sometimes writes for this paper) and, for this ruse to work, I had to hope she wouldn’t call attention to my late arrival.  In her memoir ‘Wednesday’s Child’ she writes, “I’m sure Philip didn’t take kindly to me joining him as he liked being on his own – I suspect he thought I might grass him up when he sneaked in through the back door – late most days”.  Fortunately, she didn’t!

You can find this story, and a whole heap of others like it, in the new bumper collection of 'nostalgedy' stories "The Things You See..." available now on Amazon.