Honouring the Most Important Women and Influences in my Life

Yesterday was International Women’s Day and we will have read post after post about surrounding ourselves with ‘certain types’ of women, celebrating the successes they have reached from other successful women and citing authors, executives and professionals (including coaches!) And lavishing in the women they admire. OF COURSE - these women are fascinating!  But we are surrounded by women all the time; holding cloths over escalator handrails, chipping chewing gum off pavements, sweeping hair of salon floors. Not to mention we are surrounded by women who are masking their depression, anxiety, addictions, menopause symptoms, menstrual issues, wild frustrations, or good old fashioned tiredness and exhaustion. Women are everywhere. We are surrounded by all kinds of women all of the time. They are EVERYWHERE and for all but a few, they are invisible. 

It goes without saying the key family members who were around me growing up were a huge influence on me.

My Mum, Aunts, Grandmas, Great Grandmas, Great Aunties, the extended Aunties, the non-DNA ‘Aunties,' older cousins. All of them somehow influenced me. Then there’s the friends and teachers over the years. The people at church (recovering Catholic over here) and mentors, sponsors, champions, coaches, therapists, counsellors, managers, friends and encouragers.

Yet who doesn’t get celebrated? Who isn’t in the public eye? Who isn’t receiving an MBE, OBE, Award, a magazine article, sitting on a board (although many are in unions or on PTAs) or speaking on a panel? Who are the invisible heroes of my life? Here is a non-exhaustive, very incomplete introduction to the women who supported and shaped me growing up. No less than any other woman.

Mrs Lyons

Mrs Lyons was my Grandma’s cleaner and I knew her from when I was born to when my Grandma died. 

My Nan ran a Post office and china and greetings card store, where the counters, fixtures and fittings were crafted from from the most beautiful wood (I often wonder what happened to that wood). The smell of furniture polish and wax will forever be the smell of Mrs Lyons, although she was not sponsored by Mr Sheen. She was kind and funny but wouldn’t let me be naughty, wore a floral overall, always had a yellow duster with red stitching around the outside in her hand, and worked for our family for years.

My Nan and Mrs Lyons were old-school; they called each other Mrs Lyons and Mrs D right up until close to the very end, when they finally used each other’s given-names. 

Mrs Lyons would visit my Nan in the nursing home until Nan’s death and would take her granddaughter with her every week. Her young granddaughter would call my Nan ‘The Lady’. “When are we going to see “The Lady”? She would ask. Mrs Lyons walked everywhere and I can see her grey hair, big brown eyes and the layout of the post office to this day.

She was an integral part of the family business. There was real love there. She was an integral part of the family.

Cath, the hairdresser (and all the hairdressers)

Cath was my first hairdresser, around the same age as my Mum she is STILL my Mum’s hairdresser, which I find remarkable. She was my hairdresser until in my teens, I wanted to go to the more expensive salons and get the full on 80s styles and perms. Cath was part of the fabric of our town, with her salon in Wallasey Village, then working from home and making home visits. Going to the hairdressers was a lovey experience - they always made me feel pretty - telling me my red hair, which made me a target at school, was beautiful and looking after me so well. Hairdressers know all the stories and secrets, are skilled listeners and hold the community together - their service to the women in the community is vastly underestimated. Damehoods for all please!

Nanny McFarlane

When I was 8 I got Glandular fever meaning I had to take months off school. My friends Nan looked after me as my Mum had gone back to full time work teaching. So what happens when both parents work full time? In the 70s/80s you reached into your community. Nanny McFarlane, I can clearly remember looking after me in bed, when I was sick. My Mum and Dad kept Nanny McFarlane on to help out cleaning the house since they were both full time teachers, until she got a bit old and we asked Mrs Lyons for a recommendation.

Joan

Joan took over from Nanny McFarlane as the cleaner. She was a dinner lady at Mum’s school and also Mrs Lyon’s daughter! Keeping it in the family. Joan was a young and hot woman in her 40s who found new love later in life - I thought she was so glam with curly brunette hair and rosy cheeks. She had a baby in her 40s but also got epliepsy, which meant that she stopped cleaning, but recommended her colleague.

Doreen

My heart swells and my eyes fill with tears as I think about Doreen - my most beloved family cleaner, who was with us for years. I love her. She brought love and warmth to our house, at a tine in life when I desperately needed a zero-judgement adult in my life. And I am forever grateful for the chats while she ironed, the kindness and nurturing she brought to all of our family members and the incredible service and relief she provided to our very, very busy family unit. She put a tenner inside mine and my brother’s Christmas card every year without fail. She loved talking about her kids and husband and was indefatigably positive. Oh I raise a glass to this incredible woman - I don’t think she will ever know just how grateful I am for her wisdom, service and presence.

Dinner Ladies (All the dinner ladies)

Mrs Sprigg, Mrs Williams, Cook and ALL the dinner ladies who kept us safe and fed and cared for over the years. Invisible heroes. Mrs Sprigg was strict, slim, had sharp features, a sharp nose and beady blue piercing eyes. Mrs. Williams was soft and round with a kind face, brown eyes and brown hair. They smelled of face powder and perfume were never without a  bright Yardley lip. They wore scarves on their heads like the queen wore scarves on her head and their hair was always perfectly set. Cook - who we used to call Aunty Vera was a legend. She planned nutritious dinners for 300+ kids in my primary school. In secondary school the dinner ladies had many hundreds of kids to feed, monitor and control - they were amazing. My ‘Aunty’ Irene (her house backed onto ours) was a dinner lady; formidable, hilarious and she never let me get away with sneaking in the dinner line before my time. While we’re here - the school cleaners - the truly invisible people; after hours showing up to make the school safe and clean. I only knew them because I was on sports teams so was in school after hours - otherwise I would never even have know they exist, nevermind know their names. I forget their names…

‘Aunty' Betty - the nurse

All the nurses. Including my friend Rachel, a hospice end of life nurse.

After I got a huge piece of wood lodged in the sole of my foot running around our neighbourhood barefoot, I ended up in the hospital where ‘Aunty’ Betty cared for me, injected numbing into my foot, dug the bit of tree stump out of my foot and dressed it. I can only imagine the things she’s dealt with and seen. Her house also backed onto ours - her daughter Gill was one of my heroes - probably 5 years older. I loved it when she babysat me or let me in her bedroom to look at JAckie magasine - oh those older girls - they were so so cool. Her 3 sons shared a small room. Can you even imagine?

All the babysitters

Oh the community effort - the Aunties had a babysitting circle where they all babysat each others’ kids and circulated on a points system. I had a carousel of women babysit me throughout my childhood and learned so much from them - I loved getting to know all these different women. Then I became a babysitter. Aunty Gill would check the stitching on the cushions and curtains but loved to play games. Aunty Pat would fall asleep and I would dance around to Top of the Pops then put myself to sleep while she slept soundly. Aunty Dot wouldn’t take any of our shit and smoked relentlessly into the brown cut-glass ashtray!

The housewives

Reliant on their husbands for money, couldn’t sign their own checks, working in the home, keeping the village together. This one’s really for my Nan - I’d love to do this myself but I’m actually a rubbish houseworker.

Laura 

And all the other secretaries receptionists, assistants and VAs.

They sit in the background, doing the work that the visionaries, the executives and the entrepreneurs can’t or shouldn’t be focussing on. They facilitate every single that happens on the visible end of business. They are absolutely essential in every single aspect of life.

I have always shone a little light on Laura, even, perhaps when she didn’t want me to (making a speech in front of people - oops!)

None of these women are a Dame, MBE or OBE, have received an award, or appeared on a podcast, radio show or TV slot. They haven’t been in the paper, been featured in a magazine, or sat on a panel or Board of Directors, but they, like the other women (and men, but it’s women’s month) in background roles, are no more or less important, influential and essential. They are simply not visible. Simply not celebrated.

AND I CELEBRATE YOU FIERCELY AND HUMBLY ON THIS DAY