READING about the stalwarts of the Derbyshire Infirmary League of Friends last week sent my mind whizzing back about 26 years when I began my nine-year stint as a volunteer helper with the League.

It all came about because two years earlier my husband, Horace, died suddenly at the age of 55 and I was bereft.

He was an expert at making home-made wine and so, to be near him, I kept drinking the wine he had made and I slept with his dressing gown snuggled into my arms. But he wasn’t there any more and the wine didn’t help when I was trying to vacuum the carpets or clean the windows, and my speech was slurred when I answered the phone.

I had to get out among people again.

Reading in the Telegraph about writing classes being held at St Helen’s House, I felt that, as this was his old school, I might feel close to him if I just was there in the same places as he once was.

So, I joined a writing class run by a lovely lady named Betty Irish and it was there that I made many contacts and many friends.

I can’t recall all of their names now but among them was John Young, who wrote The History of Chellaston, and Elsie Goodhead, author of the history of The Old West End, and so many others, including the lady who introduced me to working at the DRI. Her name was Eileen Dixon and she helped in many organisations. She was a tireless worker.

On my first day, I was asked to help at the tea bar in what was then the ambulance drop down and pick-up point. It has all changed now.

The lady in charge asked me what I wanted to do and, because it was all so unfamiliar to me, I offered to do all the washing-up; I was used to that. The cups, saucers and plates came in an endless stream and so my back was to the public for a very long time.

Eventually, the stream slowed to a trickle and I caught up with the flow, so I turned round to face the counter while leaning my aching back on the front of the sink.

“Don’t stand there doing nothing,” said the boss lady.

“But there is nothing more to wash,” I explained.

“Well,” she said, pointing to a list on the wall, “memorise those prices while you’re waiting.”

I felt that I was back at school for a moment, but it didn’t put me off going back another day and, eventually, I worked two half-days a week and served at many tea bars. But, mainly, I helped to wheel a huge steel trolley around all the wards so that the patients could still do a kind of shopping from their beds. I believe that we provided almost everything a patient might need from a toothbrush to a birthday card.

When I was in the corridors of the infirmary recently, I couldn’t help noticing the ultra-modern, lightweight trolley that the ladies take around the wards nowadays.

It brought back memories of when the lifts hadn’t quite stopped level with the floor and we had to manhandle the steel trolley on its way with a certain amount of crashing of steel and clattering of glass bottles, with the packets of sweets doing a rumba along the shelves.

Oh happy days! Such lovely people! Marjorie Townsend and Joyce Parker were also members of the bowls club that I used. I was sad to hear that Joyce was no longer alive. We first met at Slix Swimwear in the 1960s.

I would just love to have a go at that new trolley, but, sadly, my back won’t let me.

• DRI: Happy days as a friend of the DRI
• HAPPY DAYS AS A FRIEND OF THE DRI

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This article is from the Derby Evening Telegraph and is reproduced online here.

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