Writing – Whittlesey Wordsmiths

First Job?

At our last writing group meeting we decided to get on and with perking up our Wordsmiths Blog. Since the last post on here there has been a lot happening, not only have some of our members won awards and prizes but they have books and magazine articles published. We will update the site with these achievements in the coming weeks but for now a post from Sandra Hughes about her first job

My first Job

**Chiesmans of Lewisham (photo credit the Bygone Years)**

Aged 15, it seemed everyone in my form at school were looking for Saturday jobs, being successful in finding them before me, giving them spending power and a bit of ‘kudos.’ I was reminded of this as yet another friend mentioned seeing my granddaughter working in our local Post Office and commenting on how efficient and professional she was, and wondering exactly how many tasks she has had to learn. Obviously a very proud Grandma, this is her third ‘Saturday’ job and the aim is to continue when she starts at uni next week.

All of my children were encouraged to have ‘Saturday’ jobs and learn the importance of earning money for themselves, and now my grandchildren.

My first experience was in a department store like John Lewis, a shop called Chiesmans, in Gravesend.

I can remember going upstairs to the ‘office’ and enquiring about work and sitting and completing a form. I was successful and had to catch a bus into town, which was no different from catching a bus to school, early every morning. Staff had to enter by a back door, waiting for the metal entrance door being rolled up to allow us to enter. In the store, was an ancient lift, with a wrought iron door you dragged across to close before pressing a button to your floor.

I remember working in two departments, but not sure which order they came in. Bearing in mind it is a very long time ago. I worked in the card department, especially at Christmas, in the days of large boxed, satin padded cards. I thought that showed how special you were to someone. I also remember January Sales and having paperback books to sell. I particularly put aside a book which would improve my understanding of human anatomy and sex, of which I hadn’t a clue. I don’t think the book helped much!
The other department I worked in was haberdashery and remember the huge catalogues of sewing patterns and looking in wooden drawers to find the patterns requested by customers. Butterick and Style spring to mind. It was interesting for me as I made clothes for myself, being so tall, I could never buy trousers long enough. I had a friend whose sewing was very impressive, taught by her mother, and made my first daughter the christening robe from a Vogue pattern, which became a family heirloom. And a winter coat with cape. Mine was much simpler.

We enjoyed a mid-morning break, going up in the ancient lift to a staff café, looking over the streets below. Lunchtime would find me cutting through Woolworths to the side exit to a budget sandwich bar.

Spending my money, especially on clothes was a joy. I have always loved clothes and shoes. I earned 15/- every Saturday.

My first job after school was in a small Bank in London, which is another chapter/Blog.

To visit Sandra’s blog click here

Coming Soon!

Whittlesey Wordsmiths are working hard to have their latest collection of short stories, poems and limericks, ready for publication in the autumn. There will be one more month of submissions; then the final editing, cover designs to be finished, together with illustrations and title selection. We are working towards a September or October launch in time for our fans to buy copies as Christmas presents or as a special treat for themselves.

These and books from other local authors will be available at Whitt Litt 2

This will be our third annual collection, our fifth if we include last year’s two Christmas collections. We are thinking of offering our three major books as a boxed set (probably without a box though) or possibly all five as a set. We welcome people’s thoughts and suggestions.

**Where the Wild Winds Blow and A Following Wind,** **the first two collections**.

**Jingle Bells and Tinsel Tales and Windy Christmas ( that’ll be the sprouts). Our Christmas collections**

Shuttlers by Stephen Oliver a review.

Stephen Oliver is a prolific writer of short stories most of which occupy the Science Fiction and Fantasy genres.

Shuttlers is his first full length novel. I was privileged to read it prior to publication and enjoyed it thoroughly. Stephen is the consummate story teller the book is imaginative, original and not to be missed.

After reading the manuscript as it was then, I gave him my order for the first paperback print copy. If you can’t wait for the print edition the ebook is available now on Kindle,

Shuttlers eBook : Oliver, Stephen: Amazon.co.uk: Kindle Store

This is the blurb from the book cover.

Trouble is brewing across the Multiverse, and Justin Wilson, a young inter-reality smuggler, is in the thick of it. Alternate versions of the Earth are being raided, plundered and even accidentally destroyed, by Shuttlers, beings like Justin who can slip between realities with ease.

The story begins when Justin is arrested for smuggling forbidden books from his world into another by Pol Atkinson. Pol is a patrolman of the Sidewise Directorate, the organisation set up to prevent further damage to all these defenceless worlds. Justin eventually decides to work together with Pol to avert a conspiracy from gaining control of all of Earth’s alternate realities everywhere.

Forget about reaching for the stars, which may be impossible, and explore the infinite variations of our own world, where anything can and will happen!

Review written by Philip Cumberland

There was a young man from…

This post is from the very talented Valerie Fish. Not only is Val a terrific storyteller but she is an absolute star in the world of limericks.

writer working on typewriter in office — Photo by Andrea Piacquadio on Pexels.com

We are fortunate to have in our writing group, the extremely talented, Tessa Thomson, who writes the most beautiful poetry which often induces teary eyes round the table when recited at our monthly meetings…

Then at the other end of the scale, there’s me and my bawdy limericks! Well to be fair, they’re not all like that, although members of the clergy do have a tendency to misbehave…. And there’s a difference between being risqué and downright rude, I would hate to offend anybody.

I have been composing limericks for years, I have hundreds of them, enough for a book, which may be one day I’ll give a try.

What is it about a limerick that I find so attractive? I love that sing-along A A B B A rhyme meter (an anapaestic trimester, I’ve just learnt); I love the challenge of composing something that hopefully will make people smile, and I like to inject something different into my limericks, get that final twist. Sometimes it will take ages to find the right word, not the poshest or the longest, but the right word; it can make all the difference.

Where do my ideas come from? Sometimes I will have a prompt; in my early days, my local radio station ran a weekly limerick competition, incorporating a place in Cambridgeshire.

This was my winning gem:

This is from a while back, when Eastender’s viewing figures were a lot higher than they are nowadays…

At a fancy dress do down in Bury

Maid Marian had a drop too much sherry

It wasn’t young Robin

Who had her heart throbbin

‘Twas Little John who made Marian merry!

I am a regular contributor to the Daily Mail, where it pays (actually it doesn’t!) to be topical.

After Phil’s Christmas cracker with Mel

She decided to kiss and tell

To her best mate Lisa

Who gunned down the geezer

In a classic crime passionelle

And a couple more with a soupcon of Francais.

Late for school, couldn’t get out of bed

I’ve been summoned to see the head

In a fait accompli

No detention for me

Sir’s been given the sack instead

The wife got wind of our affair

When she came across a blonde hair

In the marital bed

(She’s a flaming redhead)

It’s au revoir to the au pair

My poor hubby doesn’t always fare well, I hope he realises it’s ‘what I call’ poetic licence…

It was all planned, a cruise round the Med

Now thanks to Covid 19, instead

I’m stuck home on my tod

Whist hubby, the daft sod

Is self-isolating in the shed

Last night I dreamt of the Azores
Palm trees, clear blue seas, sun-kissed shores
Sadly paradise
Was lost in a trice

Woken by hubby’s thundering snores

Here are those naughty men of the cloth….

With his sermon about to begin

The priest had to suppress a huge grin

Cos just minutes ago

Out the back with a pro

He’d committed a cardinal sin

Tired of living a life of vice

She went to her priest for advice

‘You must renounce your sin’

He said with a grin

‘But one last performance would be nice’.

Forgive me, father, I concede

I have sinned in word thought and deed

With Sister Theresa,

She begged me to please her

The poor girl was in desperate need

Followed by a few random risques…

The best man was proposing a toast

But he just couldn’t help but boast

‘Today’s stunning bride’

He drunkenly cried

‘Was yesterday’s notch on my bedpost!’

I just couldn’t believe my eyes

I have never seen such a size

There was no topping

Her melons, so whopping,

She waltzed off with ‘Best In Class’ prize

Under the boardwalk of Brighton pier

A drunken encounter cost me dear

I gave him my all

Up against the wall

The little’ n’s due early next year

Said the dentist, clutching his drill,

‘Now just open wide and sit still,

First a tiny prick,

That should do the trick,

You won’t feel a thing – but I will!’

I’ll finish with a nice clean one for all you animal lovers out there, I know we’ve got at least two here in Whittlesey Wordsmiths.

Lay quivering in his bed

Blankets pulled over his head

‘Whizz bang and pop,

Please make them stop

I’m waiting for walkies’ he said

I hope you have enjoyed this small selection of my work, and in these troubled times have put a smile on your face.

A link to Tessa’s blog:

https://tessathomsonpoetry.wordpress.com/page/1/?wref=bif

Valerie Fish

Observations of Life on Holiday by Gwen Bunting

Before we had the Corona Virus, before we were all locked down and isolating Gwen wrote this piece about a recent holiday. Holidays seem like distant memories now.

group of person sitting inside cafe le dome — A meeting of strangers Photo by Elina Sazonova on Pexels.com

On a recent journey I could not help but find people’s behaviour fascinating. Some being friendly; others reserved; and others downright aggressive. As the journey progressed observations became very much clearer.

The mum and daughter syndrome: the mother commenting to me, that now she was a widow she could enjoy all things SHE wanted to do, as opposed to her late husband’s dominance. Little did she know she had spawned a duplicate of her husband; a daughter! The daughter was an aggressive type, would barge her way to the front of any queue. Wow betides those poor souls in her way.

The quiet man who gave off the aura of ‘don’t speak to me’ was an interesting personality. He had a partner, whom conversed with him, but his sole intention at the dining table was to eat as much as he could in the time allocated. His partner was quite different. Nice friendly person.

The very tall man, his wife was bent over due to a back problem. Preventing her falling by constantly holding her hand. How dedicated can one be: Never had a chat with him, but on leaving the group he warmly shook your hand saying ‘it was a pleasure to have met you?’

The sad lady who had dementia and caused a lot of anxiety for her friend, who had not realised she was so confused. Her wanderings around the various hotel lobbies very early in the morning asking when the coach was leaving and having her bags packed. She realised on some occasions she was confused. It made life difficult for her friend, most of the group supportive when needed.

The gentleman who requested they change his bottle of freshly squeezed orange juice as this one contained too many pips. He got his way after many arguments. His face was not dissimilar to a beautiful pencil drawing on display in one of the hotel lounges. The said ‘orange juice man’ was extremely tall and as we were in Viking country I would have enjoyed researching his family history.

The various nations with whom we shared our hotels with were varied. One nation in particular took it upon themselves to attempt to clear the buffet of all foods. Hiding loaves of bread, butter pats and boiled eggs into every orifice that was available to fill. Life is very interesting when you are travelling and gives me lots of ideas to write stories about.

The Virtual Meeting

a formal dressed man faces a video conference screen, but hidden under the desk he is wearing spotty boxer shorts and red clown shoes — **There is always one.** **(picture credit https://www.leading-edge.co.uk/loving-the-virtual-world/)**

Thursday saw The Whittlesey Wordsmith’s first virtual meeting via Zoom. Stephen Oliver kindly hosted the meeting Cathy Cade did much of the organising thank you very much Cathy and Stephen.
Considering it was our writing group’s first attempt, as slightly older members of society, it went remarkably well. A few members were too unsure of their technical skills to try it. Gwen had problems seeing us and being seen, Sandra had synchronisation problems with her device or signal. Six of us started the meeting, five managed it right through.
The meeting followed its usual form in cyber space as it does in real life, plenty of wondering off topic and anecdotes but as usual an interesting conversation. Jane found it easier as she was able to see everyone’s faces and could lip read more easily.
It is was not as good as a real life meeting but it was nice to chat to friends and see their faces. Hopefully we can address the technical issues before next month, if we need to have another virtual meeting.

Reading whilst isolated

During this period of isolation and library closures it is worth knowing that not only are there books available to read for free online.

https://www.cambridgeshire.gov.uk/residents/libraries-leisure-culture/libraries/library-online/ebooks

https://www.goodreads.com/shelf/show/free-online

But if you enjoy a good read and would like to support your local U3A authors.

We have the following available on Kindle at modest prices, if you have Kindle Unlimited I think they are free.

Click on the link under the pictures to order

9781916481701 — Order the kindle edition

A following Wind book cover front page white writing — Order Kindle version of A Following WInd

Wendy’s fantastic autobiography is not available on Kindle but the payperback is available at Parkers, (they are open) or from Amazon with free delivery.

The Railway Carriage Child front cover2 — Order the Paperback of The Railway Carriage Child

Favourite poems

hunts cyclists 1 — Before it all started “Straight of limb, true of eye, steady and aglow.”

As an excercise our U3A writing group members each wrote a short piece about their favourite poems and included the poem or poems in the piece. Over the following months we will be publishing the contributions on this blog.

The first piece in this series is by Val Fish, it seems a strange time of the year to use this example but we are approaching spring, a time of renewal, new growth and the hope for better things. We can only have spring after winter the sun can only rise after it has gone down.

For the Fallen by Laurence Binyon

Inspiration for ‘For The Fallen’

Laurence Binyon composed his best known poem while sitting on the cliff-top looking out to sea from the dramatic scenery of the north Cornish coastline. A plaque marks the location at Pentire Point, north of Polzeath. However, there is also a small plaque on the East Cliff north of Portreath, further south on the same north Cornwall coast, which also claims to be the place where the poem was written.

The poem was written in mid September 1914, a few weeks after the outbreak of the First World War. During these weeks the British Expeditionary Force had suffered casualties following its first encounter with the Imperial German Army at the Battle of Mons on 23 August, its rearguard action during the retreat from Mons in late August and the Battle of Le Cateau on 26 August, and its participation with the French Army in holding up the Imperial German Army at the First Battle of the Marne between 5 and 9 September 1914.

Laurence said in 1939 that the four lines of the fourth stanza came to him first. These words of the fourth stanza have become especially familiar and famous, having been adopted by the Royal British Legion as an Exhortation for ceremonies of Remembrance to commemorate fallen Servicemen and women.

Laurence Binyon was too old to enlist in the military forces, but he went to work for the Red Cross as a medical orderly in 1916. He lost several close friends and his brother-in-law in the war.

For The Fallen

With proud thanksgiving, a mother for her children,

England mourns for her dead across the sea.

Flesh of her flesh they were, spirit of her spirit,

Fallen in the cause of the free.

Solemn the drums thrill; Death august and royal

Sings sorrow up into immortal spheres,

There is music in the midst of desolation

And a glory that shines upon our tears.

They went with songs to the battle, they were young,

Straight of limb, true of eye, steady and aglow.

They were staunch to the end against odds uncounted;

They fell with their faces to the foe.

They shall grow not old, as we that are left grow old:

Age shall not weary them, nor the years condemn.

At the going down of the sun and in the morning

We will remember them.

They mingle not with their laughing comrades again;

They sit no more at familiar tables of home;

They have no lot in our labour of the day-time;

They sleep beyond England’s foam.

But where our desires are and our hopes profound,

Felt as a well-spring that is hidden from sight,

To the innermost heart of their own land they are known

As the stars are known to the Night;

As the stars that shall be bright when we are dust,

Moving in marches upon the heavenly plain;

As the stars that are starry in the time of our darkness,

To the end, to the end, they remain.

Laurence Binyon 1869 – 1943

Postscript

I was privileged to perform on the stage at The Broadway Peterborough in 2014, in the ‘Sing for Life’ ladies’ choir, to raise funds for a new wing at Sue Ryder’s Thorpe Hall Hospice.

On the 100^th Anniversary of the beginning of the First World War, we sang an adaptation of ‘For The Fallen’ by Rowland Lee.

In the final few bars, we were as stunned as the audience as poppies came falling from above onto the stage. It was a moment I’ll always treasure.

Valerie Fish

The Railway Carriage Child now in print

Wendy's Book — Wendy Fletcher with her first print copy of The Railway Carriage Child

About two years ago I joined the local U3A Writing group as its third member. At my first meeting in Whittlesey’s Not Just Cafe, I was able to read a chapter from Wendy Fletcher’s autobiography. It was unfinished and hadn’t a title but it was for me a work of exceptional quality. Today the first-ever print copy was delivered to Wendy she brought it to the Writing Group (Whittlesey Wordsmiths) meeting opened the envelope and together with Wendy, we had the first sight of it.

This is the foreword

Against a backdrop of the Cambridgeshire fens, lies the

small market town of Whittlesey. Here are many features

of historical and architectural interest, including two

medieval churches, a 17th century Butter Cross and rare

examples of 18th century mud boundary walls.

Less well known, but still quite remarkable, are the pair of

Victorian railway carriages which stand just outside the

town.

Originally built for Great Eastern Railways in 1887,

they have been home to Wendy’s family since 1935.

Now, for the first time, Wendy shares the fascinating

story of her childhood, growing up as a Railway Carriage

Child in the mid to late 20th century.

With a wonderful memory for detail, she paints a

picture so vivid that we are there with her.

Through the eyes of an exuberant child, whose

imagination outpaced her years, we meet the characters

central to her life: an ancient Granny, still governed by the

old fen traditions of an earlier era, a domineering Mother,

a long-suffering Father, and Grandfather who died before

her birth but still inspires her dreams.

With the humour of hindsight, Wendy brings alive a

time when life moved at a gentler pace.

The final chapter follows Wendy as she returns to live

in the carriages as an adult, continuing the renovation and

preservation, to ensure that they survive for another

generation of her family.

Words Unspoken

This post is by Wendy Fletcher.

She shares her thoughts on people watching and how the way they interact with each other and their surroundings. These thoughts inspire her stories that form from the pictures in the mind’s eye. An interesting piece, an observation on observations.

Wendy’s new book, The Railway Carriage Child is launching soon for details follow this blog or follow the link to her site at the end of her post

man and woman sitting on bench — A young couple enjoying each other’s company Photo by Andre Furtado

I started watching people having conversations and wondered what they might be saying to each other.

Poetic licence allowed me to record these conversations without ever hearing a word.

Body language played a big part in this.

Were the couple on a bench leaning in close?

Were their knees touching?

Did they hold each other’s eyes as they talked?

man wearing suit jacket sitting on chair in front of woman wearing eyeglasses — Photo by rawpixel.com on Pexels.com

Another couple in a restaurant looked far more distracted. He pushed his vegetables around with his fork. She wiped her mouth nervously with her napkin.

person walking with puppy near trees — Photo by James Frid on Pexels.com

A man with a dog sat in the park. Every time he threw the stick, the dog bounded back, dropped it readily and waited for a fuss. The man leaned over and gave him a hug; not just a pat but a real hug.

Here were characters for a story.

Without eavesdropping, without intruding, I could incorporate their unspoken dialogue into an imaginary scene.

Maybe the young couple were being drawn closer together by some adverse reaction to their relationship. Did they face opposition from parents who perhaps thought them too young for a serious commitment?

Could the older couple in the restaurant be those parents, could they be disagreeing about handling the situation?

And the man in the park; probably Granddad, lonely after the death of his wife, relying on the closeness he feels with his dog, but about to realise how much his wise words are valued by his family as he steps into the role of mediator; to listen to the concerns of his daughter and son-in-law, to feel the pain of his grandson, torn between teenage love and parental concern.

Yes, the idea is growing. I can meld together this family of characters who have never met.

Now I just need to go and write their story.

Wendy Fletcher

Wendy has a blog feel free to visit it Wendy’s blog

Soon to be published.

Tag: Writing