Don’T Be Shy, Nurse!

Don’t Be Shy,

Nurse!

KAYE CARADOC

AuthorHouse™ UK Ltd.

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© 2013, 2014 by Kaye Caradoc. All rights reserved.

No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted by any means without the written permission of the author.

Published by AuthorHouse   03/17/2014

ISBN: 978-1-4918-8004-3 (sc)

ISBN: 978-1-4918-8005-0 (e)

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Treasured Photography (Blaina, Wales, UK.)

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Table of Contents

Prologue

My Dedication

Chapter One: Days Of Starch And Wonder

Chapter Two: Getting To Know You / First Lessons

Chapter Three: A Visit / Anthony Arrives / First Ward / Christmas

Chapter Four: Pallow / Spiritual Enlightenment

Chapter Five: 1St Year Nights/ A Frightening Experience/ London.

Chapter Six: A Serious Interview/ Don’t Be Shy/ Summer Hols

Chapter Seven: A Mild Flirtation/ Another Lesson Learned /Paddington

Chapter Eight: Dialysis /More Of Ward 5/Chosen Again

Chapter Nine: Perfume And Crosswords/ Cardiac Arrest.

Chapter Ten: Up And Away/ A Brush In The Snow, At Main Branch.

Chapter Eleven: Countryside / A Fairy Tale Castle / Wall To Wall Men.

Chapter Twelve: A Flood, An Escapade And An Accident.

Chapter Thirteen: Smoke Rings And Key Rings

A Grinning Cat

Chapter Fourteen: A Walk On The Wild Side/ It’s A Long Way To Tipperary.

Chapter Fifteen: Dreaming In My Dreams, Again /The Loss Of A Dream

Chapter Sixteen: Oh To Be In Oakwood Now That April’s Here. The Gang’s All Here.

Chapter Seventeen: Troublesome Tonsils The Death Of An Elderly Loved One

Chapter Eighteen: Third Year Nights.

Chapter Nineteen: Mini Skirt. Too Much Rain. The End Of The Rainbow.

Chapter Twenty: A New Home/ A Rocking Chair / Some Brussells Sprouts Wind Bells

Chapter Twenty One: We Did It./ Or Did We./ Not So Shy Now Nurse

About The Author

Prologue

As I pulled up my car, a little wide of the curb, due to the recent fall of snow, I glanced into the wing mirror. I had spotted a well-dressed man trying to pick his way along through the slushy mess, lying on the side of the road. He was looking ever more familiar as he drew even closer. I blinked and stared harder into the mirror, before turning to get a better view and dropped down the window, before, very slowly realizing, that it was David.

‘It’s been a long time,’ he said, stopping and smiling in surprise. ‘How is my daughter these days?’

Back at home as I took off my damp district nurse coat and hat, I glanced up at my bookshelf and there sat Anthony; just as he always did.

‘I don’t need any advice from you Anthony,’ I said. ‘even though you are old and wise, and still indeed, a very, very handsome bear, with your suit now a bit ragged around the edges. It was knitted especially for you by that lady on my first ward. Do you remember how insistent she was about knitting a big yellow T into the jumper? A bit faded now isn’t it and a bit grubby too… I know—tomorrow I’ll give it a wash.’

I made myself a cup of tea, sat on the sofa and put my feet up, as——yawning I drifted off.

Don’t Be Shy, Nurse!

How can friendships seem so real, or memories mean so much, but fond thoughts travel down lonesome roads when people are out of touch.

Have you ever dreamed that you were dreaming?

Then you’ll understand . . . .

For those friendships travel the lonesome cavernous depths of lakes, in dreaming,—waking state, and come alight in starry glowing night, in many a long year.

Like golden shifting sand.

My dedication

To Geoff. Without whom this manuscript would have been in the bin. Thank you for taking the time to read it and to encourage me.

To all the girls in my set, (particularly RW) beautiful and amusing memories of you all have travelled with me.

Last, but not, indeed, least:—to David. Of course, most of all, to our beautiful daughter Davinia; thank you,—for you too, (as was your comment on this book) are ten out of ten.

CHAPTER ONE

Days of starch and wonder

And the voice of my dreaming ear, seemed to melt away into those drifting sands of time, where the past and the future lie, locked forever, together.

Y oung hooligans!!’

The two cleaning ladies spun around and stared at the sight of 11 nurses, chasing a clattering trolley propelled by two porters down the hospital corridor, early in the morning. Lying flat out on her stomach and holding on for she all was worth, was Renie, screaming her head off, whether in terror or delight, no one was really sure. One of the porters was wearing her cap, and the other her cloak. We must have made a big impression on the chaplain as we almost ran him over. All he said, however, with a twinkle in his eye as they ceremoniously lifted Renie down and reassembled her uniform, was,—‘hmm, I see they’re showing you who really runs this hospital, nurses.’

We all sat in the chapel, and I smiled, as I recalled the incident. It had been an exciting morning, and it seemed to me, that a long time had passed since I had been awakened out of one of my dreams by the loud banging.

Bang, bang, bang, bang. The noise progressed along the corridor.

‘Six o’clock, nurses, six o’clock, nurses, six o’clock,!’ someone shouted extremely loudly.

Bang bang, bang, bang, echoing in the cold morning air. The broomstick bashed on each door in turn, accompanied by the loud bellowing voice, ‘six o’clock, six o’clock, nurses, six o’clock!’

I dragged myself unwillingly from my lovely dream and jilted my mind into action. Nurses? Nurses? Who does that mean? Can’t be me surely, I’m not a nurse yet! But the banging and shouting continued.

‘Six o’clock, six o’clock, six o’clock, nurses. Six o’clock!’

It then faded slowly away, only to return a moment later, the banging and shouting the same as before, but now, on the other side of the corridor.

At last it stopped as suddenly as it had begun. I gradually regained consciousness, still grieving for the loss of my lovely dream.

I heard doors opening, muffled voices drifting towards me. My new colleagues were coming to life and sounded just a bit too lively.

Someone bashed very hard on my door and then the one next to it, and the one next to that too. ‘Come on, you lot in there, get your togs on.’

This someone was obviously a morning person.

Rolling over, I dropped my feet onto the lovely soft bedside rug, that my mother had given me.—

‘A special present, something nice to put your feet out onto on cold cheerless mornings.’

And this was certainly cold and cheerless. How right she’d been. Gratefully I pushed my feet into it, feeling the soft, fluffy texture and at the same time stretching my arms above my head.

I could hear the girl in the next room running water into her basin and tried to picture her, and remember her name, but couldn’t.

Frightening!

Then, a little voice in my head said, ‘come on now Katie.’ I smiled thinking of David and how he always said this, whenever I needed chivvying along. It did the trick, though. Suddenly, I found myself washing and brushing my teeth, in blind panic, before turning my attention to the uniform, which had been laid out for me on the dressing table. It had been made to measure and I was keen to try it on for size. Approaching it, I gasped. It looked just like a pile of cardboard boxes awaiting assembly. Certainly the white aprons did! The dresses looked perhaps, a bit more like articles of clothing, but only because of their grey and white striped material.

I stared into the dressing table mirror at my white, frightened, doll like face and pulled the brush through my tangled hair, while throwing off my pink baby doll pyjamas. I began to dress as fast as I could, but ever the coward, I was too frightened to look at the clock, knowing full well what little time I had. After getting into my underwear, thickly ribbed stockings, held up by suspenders, and laced up shoes, it seemed that I faced a mammoth task, but suddenly feeling cheered, I remembered my cap. I had assembled it the previous evening—with some difficulty, even though I had been under the supervision of a straight—laced senior staff nurse. There it was; I’d put it neatly on the window sill. Reaching over, I picked it up, while trying not to spoil the carefully made folds. I put it onto my head and clipped it, with the white hair grips provided. I just could not wait to look the part!

As I clipped it into position, it flopped and slid pathetically sideways. Oh dear. Whose idea was this? I wondered as I stared at myself in horror. The rest of the uniform was rock solid with starch, while the cap, which surely was supposed to be solid enough to stand up on its own, could in no way be persuaded to do so. Struggling furiously now, I just about managed to get it to stay in one place, but it still flopped about absurdly; disappointing me beyond words, as I surveyed myself in the mirror, standing in just my petticoat, shoes, stockings, and floppy cap.

Nevertheless, now I had to turn my attention to the apparent, cardboard boxes. Sighing in frustration, I began to peel what appeared to be a dress, from the rest of the pile, the starch making a thin mist into the air.

Now, all I had to do was, to somehow, peel the back from the front,——oh, for heaven’s sake! How would I even get my arms into the sleeves, let alone get the dress down over my body, while trying to avoid the razor-sharp edges?

Putting it over my head, I forced my hands and arms through what seemed to be the armholes and took a deep breath, stretching and wriggling inside it, while the heavily starched material made peculiar creaking noises as it moulded itself to my shape. I then turned my attention in panic, to the buttons and discovered to my horror that they were embedded into the material, with a thick layer of starch. I struggled on, attacking the collar, which felt like a carving knife and had to be bent into shape, go around my neck and be fastened with the fiddly studs.

By the time I’d finished, I was trembling badly and felt as if someone was sticking little daggers into my neck; but I was too worried to care by now, being particularly aware of the noise and commotion going on outside of the corridor.

My new colleagues were obviously assembling in what sounded like a frenzy of high spirits, and, I felt, must certainly have been up long before me!

I grabbed my cloak from the back of the door, threw it around my shoulders with a glance into the long mirror, and then at last checking the time on my big copper alarm clock, noted that it was just six-forty.

Outside I was greeted by what seemed like a small army. These were the girls who only last night had looked so wild and casual in their mini-skirts and boots. Now what a different sight met my eyes. They looked absolutely spectacular in their calf length dresses, with their brightly polished flat black laced up shoes and beautiful cloaks; dark navy, the bright red linings, showing with the excited movements of each now, very elated young nurse.

Feeling overcome with pride, I thought ‘gee-whiz! I wonder if I look like that?’

‘Has everyone got their aprons?’ a voice shouted from somewhere.

It seemed that many of us didn’t. A murmur went through the group as we discussed this issue.

‘Do we need them today,?’ a few voices piped up. Anyhow, most of us agreed that we did. It was a unanimous decision, which sent several of us dashing back to our rooms. I fumbled frantically for my key, and, back in my room, in panic, I peeled off what appeared to be the top white cardboard box and made a hasty retreat, with the apron now under my arm. Locking my door again, with difficulty, I joined the others who were now making their way towards the staircase. What a noise they were making though.

‘Heyho, heyho, as off to work we go,’ someone was singing loudly at the front, and we all joined in with, ‘heyho heyho heyho heyho heyho heyho heyho heyho heyho heyho OOOOO!,’ as we headed along the huge echoing corridor, which looked very unfamiliar, with its high ceilings and stark white walls, relieved only by the bright yellow, painted doors, each, as I now noticed for the first time with the name of its occupant on a plate.

As we reached the top of the stark wide stone staircase a freezing breeze rose up in a gust, prompting everyone automatically to hug their cloaks around them.

The breeze brought a shrill scream from the ones at the front, followed by giggles from all those of us following behind. It was thus that we descended to the corridor below, to begin our first day as real nurses.

We reached the ground floor, almost falling headlong over one another, as the ones at the front stopped suddenly, for a passing trolley.

Now we were greeted by the sight of the main corridor in all its morning glory. Last night it had seemed just a little menacing, perhaps, but now it looked an even larger, colder, draughtier place than I remembered. The morning fog swirled in from the outside, through the big double doors, which were held almost continually open by porters pushing trolleys, cleaners, clanking buckets, doctors and medical staff, nurses in outdoor uniform, nurses in indoor uniform, and all sorts of other people who were completely alien to us. Doors were being flung open at intervals down the seemingly endless corridor as far as we could see, giving the busy thoroughfare the look of permanent frantic movement. We now attempted to manoeuvre our way along, trying to keep together. As for me, I just couldn’t take my eyes from the groups of immaculately turned out nurses, some with their cloaks falling loosely around them, others hugging them tightly, against the morning chill, but all with their beautifully starched caps (unlike ours) looking like tiaras, set upon immaculate hair styles.

The corridor continued to look forbidding, with the fog hanging in the air and the flagstones and walls seeming to echo with the noise from the trolleys, buckets, and general commotion, but through all the mist and activity, a wonderful smell of breakfast crept towards us, from somewhere not so very far away.

Passing a group of porters, who seemed to be lounging at the entrance to one of the smaller corridors, that led off to a ward, we were amused to hear wolf whistles.

‘Good-looking lot hey Charlie?’

‘Yeah, not bad at all.’

‘Morning, nurses,’ said another as we all giggled, whispering, ‘nurses, nurses,’ in disbelief.

Then came a few more wolf whistles, and then, ‘good luck, girls, don’t you worry, you’ll be okay.’

Then, ‘Break a leg.’

At which we realized that they had been lying in wait for—us!—the new Preliminary Training School girls.

‘That was nice, wasn’t it?’ someone remarked as we all held up our heads a little bit higher.

Then, as we passed the kiosk selling sweets, newspapers, and cigarettes the lady behind the counter in the Womens Voluntary Service overall called out to us, ‘good morning nurses.’ There it was again——nurses?!

We all smiled proudly now, but it still shocked us, as a few of us called out ‘good morning, good morning’ in return.

We continued on our way through the fog, which continued to steal in through each set of doors as we passed, and the delicious smell of breakfast crept even nearer.

Quite suddenly, we were outside the dining room, and saw tables spread with bright, white, starched cloths, and laid with shining silver cutlery.

On one wall was a shelf, holding two big double toasters. Beside these stood several huge packets of thick sliced bread. There was a queue of nurses, waiting nearby for their turn to make toast, and all eyes now turned towards us, as we entered, obviously looking very new, very nervous and very, very inexperienced, in our floppy caps, trying not to limp in our stiff new shoes, and looking unaccustomed to our calf length dresses and heavy-duty stockings.

At one end of the room was a big table, upon which everything seemed to be laid out, but my attention was immediately caught by the absolutely giant, white enamel teapot, which seemed to take pride of place and behind which stood, a hatchet faced lady. She had slate grey hair, very straight and clipped back on one side with hair grips. She was wearing a stiffly starched white overall and stared at us over the top of her glasses, taking in every physical characteristic, with what seemed to me, to be, one long, rather cynical, look.

‘Queue along the counter nurses,!’ she said in an acid voice.

NURSES! . . . . Shocked again, but all beginning to get quite used to it by this time, even though once again, we suppressed giggles.

The room was filled with the noise of scraping chairs and chattering voices, as we collected our tea and bowls of cereal from the big table, before returning to our seats.

As we did so, the sun now began to show itself, on that beautiful autumn morning. The damp fog was suddenly lifting, leaving the room bathed in a beautiful silvery light, which streamed in through the leaded windows, lighting up the shining white table cloths, displaying their glittering cutlery, so that we all had to turn our heads and shade our eyes to avoid the glare.

I sat down amongst the others, smiling to myself as I remembered one of the promises I’d made to my mother;—to eat as much as possible, hopefully putting on some weight. The other promise, that I’d made to her, was never to mix my drinks, but as there was no alcohol present, spotting the lovely golden crusty rolls, in the centre of the table, I thought I would start as I meant to go on and so helped myself, to not just one, but to two of them. Returning to the counter, to collect my cooked breakfast, I again decided to help myself to almost everything in sight. It was then that I heard it, from further up the table, ‘doesn’t Kathryn eat a lot,’ I was flattered to find that someone even knew my name, and even more flattered to hear another voice saying, ‘yes and she’s so slim too isn’t she.’

I had always been described as painfully thin. But now, suddenly, I was glamorously slim.

As we all chatted nervously with the group of strangers who were to become our close friends, I was secretly listening to the conversations going on around us. One rather loud nurse was regaling her companion with the dreadful telling off she had received from her ward sister the day before.

‘Oh, I know what she’s like,’ came the amused reply, ‘she can be an absolute tartar. Just you wait until you put the daffodils in the same vase as the tulips; your life won’t be worth living for at least a week. And make sure you don’t put roses in too, or it won’t be worth living for a month.’

I was amused to hear someone else pipe up, ‘oh no, don’t tell me that she’s got her teeth into you already; you can certainly watch out from now on then. Not worth living for a month, did you say! My life wasn’t worth living for the whole three months that I worked on there.’

They all pulled faces at this and groaned, then, roaring with laughter, away they went, baskets over arms, cloaks over shoulders. What experience they must have, I thought, as my mind went back to the previous afternoon and my arrival at the hospital.

I’d been accompanied by my sister, who had been on her way to university outside London. When passing a room clearly marked, Staff Nurses Sitting Room, we saw that it was occupied by three or four, (to our eyes)—rather elderly looking staff nurses. My sister unable to keep her mouth shut, had stopped, turned and stared. Pointing in at them, she had blurted out loudly, ‘just look at those, they’re staff nurses, you’ll be one of those one day.’

I’d recoiled in the most terrible embarrassment. How could she have shown me up like that?

‘Surely,’ (I’d thought,) ‘it must be perfectly obvious to them, that I will never be a staff nurse.’ Little did I realize it, but that time was not so very far away at all. However, I do hope, that when it did come around, that I bore absolutely no resemblance at all to the ladies who were sitting inside that room on that day.

The chairs scraped the polished floor again, as we all grabbed our cloaks and headed for the door. We were bound for the chapel and the start of Preliminary Training School.

We strolled along, trying to look confident and at ease and my first chance came to size up the others. Most of us were straight from school or college. I had taken a pre-nursing course and had proudly passed an exam, normally taken 18 months into general nurse training. I knew that some of the girls had been in jobs. Glancing at them now, I tried to remember who was who, but my mind was blank. I couldn’t even remember any names. I wondered who that was, walking just ahead of me. I knew she was in the next room to mine, and also, that she was Welsh and I struggled to remember her name. Oh yes,—Sonia, was it? Her dark hair was pushed not very neatly behind her ears, and the uniform didn’t fall too well over her rather stocky frame, but she certainly seemed to have a twinkle about her, I thought. I suddenly became brave and tapped on her shoulder on impulse.

‘Is your name Sonia?’ I heard myself saying. She looked at me surprised, but seeming pleased; she smiled at me, as she said in a strong Welsh dialect,—’Yes, you’re right.’

Under one of her arms, she was carrying one of the biggest paperback books that I had ever seen.

‘What are you reading?’ I shyly enquired. She turned the book towards me and left me staring at the cover of War and Peace.

‘Oh, just a little light reading,’ I laughed, as her eyes twinkled back at me and she put the book solidly under her arm and wrapped her cloak around it. I began struggling to think of the names of any of the others, when just then, I heard a breathless voice beside me.

‘Oh my shoelace came undone. I felt so embarrassed, having to stoop down in the corridor to do it up, with everybody watching me.’

I looked down at a sincere round face, from which shone large brown eyes and a big smile framed by an immaculate dark brown bob.

‘My name is Kathryn,’ I told her, gladly offering the information. I didn’t know it then, but this girl was destined to become my closest friend and future flat mate. But for now, I was rather taken aback by her beautiful voice and cultured dialect; as she became very red in the face and put her head in the air, then, immediately, took off like a ship in full sail, taking larger than average steps. As I looked at her, I couldn’t help thinking, ‘she’d be ever so pretty, if only she’d lose some weight.’

It was then that the two porters had appeared out of nowhere, barring our way, and without warning, had made the lunge for Renie.

CHAPTER TWO

Getting to know you/

first lessons

A few notes are worth a cart load of recollections

N ow, even though inside the chapel, Renie was still mopping the tears of laughter from her cheeks, together with her eye makeup. The girl beside her was frantically digging into her pockets, and I soon realized why,