B. Johnson - House Mother Normal

That’s it, over to the corner by the cup-

board. Yes. Yes, Charlie, I can .

Here’s my mop. What’s she soaked it in this time?

Smells like what you were mixing, Charlie .

Lark is right, Charlie

Let’s get hold of this mop properly. Now where shall

I try to land it first? Off!

He’s a good pusher, Charlie.

George’s let his mop fall, get him right in the PUSS!

One to me, very pleased.

Off we

go again. I shall win again, I know. George is hopeless.

Aim at chest this time, oh flinch! SHOULDER!

Still a solid blow, his hardly flicked me with wet.

Good, eh?

Last time. I’ll aim for his breadbasket

this go Carefully, carefully.

GOT HIM!

Mrs Bowen the Champion, she

should have said. Twice I’ve won now, I’m the Champion,

I’ve never won many things in my life, but I’m

the Champion here.

There it comes over me

again

faintness

won’t last

long

not long

It just takes

some time before you’re

back to yourself again.

Auntie Mary did leave me something in her will.

They were good like that, remembering. It was very

little. They didn’t used to give pensions to their

staff however long they’d been there, they left a

lump sum in their will, the sisters. Fat

comfort to some.

A little use to me now, I can buy myself the odd

Guinness if I can find anyone to go out for it for

me. They had their own

bread, we baked every other day. But no brewer,

though, they were teetotal, very strict. Not Chapel,

church, but very teetee just the same. They

knew the gardeners drank ale with their dinners,

but woe betide anyone who brought it into the

Hall! I did once, felt ever

so guilty. I was low at the time and I bought

myself a small bottle of gin from the Bear. Normally

I felt so safe in my little attic room, well,

it was not so little, it was a reasonable size,

but all the time I had that bottle in the room I

felt as though I were a criminal. My little

room. The washstand with the plain green jug

and bowl, the window, quite big really, looking

down on the lawns and across the bridge to the

warren. I had some happy hours there, it was not

all hardship. Most of the time I didn’t have to

share it, only if we had Company and they had

servants. My bed

along one side, and an old easy chair, the high-

backed sort with wings, donkeys’ years old, a

picture Miss Eirwen had painted herself, brown

lino on the floor. I was content — no, at the

time I hated every minute of being a servant,

only now does it seem

pleasant.

The lilac

curtains, my own flowery jerry under the bed,

but clothes behind the curtains in the alcove.

They may be like it still, the Hall is still there,

I should think, but now it is probably a guesthouse

or something like that, perhaps they’ve sold it to

build houses on, chopped down all those lovely

trees. Everything changes,

nothing gets better.

I was going

to read myself, but daren’t now she’s given Ivy

a taste of her tongue. But I’m

not going to watch this filth again, why she does

it baffles me. Surely she can’t think it stirs

us up?

Summer we would go down the

bothy, where the single gardeners lived, next to

the walled garden and the greenhouses. They’d grow

all sorts for the sisters there, figs and peaches

you didn’t get anywhere else in the county, or so

they said. A boilerhouse

in the basement of the bothy, coal down a chute,

the long winters. I can remember it exactly, why

can’t I remember what happened yesterday?

My friends would say I was forward,

just because I used to look men right in the eyes.

None of that shy retiring for me. That’s what men

and women’s eyes are for, I would say to them.

They knew what I meant, they would giggle.

Rabbits were common, we

had trout out of the stream, too, poached, the

sisters did not make a fuss about that sort of

thieving like some of the gentry around those parts.

Why trout were thought so special I could never

understand, anyone who’d had them as often as I

have would prefer a good fresh herring any day.

Listen to her!

No, doesn’t matter

George Hedbury age 89 marital status bachelor sight 10 % hearing 15 % touch 25 % taste 20 % smell 10 % movement 15 % CQ count 2 pathology contractures; incontinent; advanced inanition; chronic rheumatoid arthritis; Paget’s Disease; advanced senile depression; muscle atrophy; fibrositis; intermittent renal failure; among many others.

.

Lame

source

unfr

.

they’ll

for

why?

oughter

eh!

schools

.

consuls

how are you? in the

pink

straining

.

Cox’s Orange pippin!

No matter if the future’s dim

keep right on and suffer hymn

.

Work! work Fancy, aaah

crêpe paper, crêper crêpep crêper

crêp

crêper

crêper?

crêper!

.

crêper, yes

Stick she says? Eh?

crêper

glue little round

Sweeties are they?

.

glass

spitting spitting spitting

maybe, ah

Thorban, thorban

seal

floors

.

with

full

continued

of, of, of

some

gilli

grim

at

point of

in

does

there are

in does

in does

.

will

sake

best

my

my

.

hoarse

which

to

.

still

my

name Eh! anger at me,

she no more! no more meat and gravy

and? oh. it’s oh dear, what have I

been doing? she goes

there

there

a mess, yes . but she’s not no

fear

cheek

.

when I get better

Package

for me pass, parc

what?

.

quite

three and six nine and six fifteen

name it

moving moving!

everything’s moving!

?

.

moving

.

stopped good

what’s this?

jerk

moving this

stick

ooooooooh!

splashash what was? smell

mop not this mop

what?

aaaagh!

shoulder!

blank

aaaaaaaaagh!

.

.

.

.

No, doesn’t matter

Rosetta Stanton age 94 marital status not known sight 5 % hearing 10 %? touch 5 % taste 15 % smell 20 % movement 5 % CQ count 0 pathology everything everyone else has; plus incipient bronchial pneumonia; atherosclerotic dementia; probably ament; hemiplegia (with negative Babinski response); to name only a very few.

.

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.

noddwr

Teg

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geirwir

arabus

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iachus

Hael

uchaf

.

grymus

hwyliog

eofn sylfaen

.

Math

addien

reit

.

gorwych

anianol

rhyw

ethol

ter

.

Huawdl

uchelryw

graslawn

.

hoyw

eirian

serennu

.

Afal

llu

uned

.

nesaf

Teilwng

egniol

gris

arlun

.

ieuanc

Hogyn

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