Taking a trip into town

If there ever was a day that she couldn’t go into town, if she had been poorly, she always asked me, ‘was it busy?’ She always went into town on market days.

I didn’t go far, as I didn’t have long for lunch, but I only work around the corner from the market.

I walked up to Marks and Spencer, to see if they still had any clothes in the sale, but walking through I found that they had none.

There were women all of my age, probably older, looking at the clothes in there.

Two ladies were looking at trousers and feeling the material, ‘they’re lovely, they are’ one said.

Lots of women of similar ages were walking around the clothes, a new season had been put out on display, such a familiar sight.

I decided not to get a sandwich from M&S and left the store from the back entrance, where the clothes were.

There were lots of older women walking past, with their friends or on their own, some holding on to walkers or shopping trolleys with the shopping bags at the front, just as they had probably once pushed their babies in prams and pushchairs.

I could not escape the thought that they should not be having to push their shopping around, why could they not have help.

They would probably have to go home on the bus with their shopping and push it all the way home, hopefully not filling the trolley too full that it would be too heavy for them to manage.

Then get it home, put it all in the fridge and make a cup of tea to watch the afternoon film on TV.

All women seem to do in life is push.

We push our dolls in prams when we are little, we push our babies when we are grown, we push trolleys when we go shopping, we push our elderly parents in wheelchairs when they become unable to walk, we push walkers and shopping trolleys when we can no longer carry our shopping.

That is when we know the end is near. Not much left after that.

One day we will no longer be able to push a walker or a shopping trolley, one day we will become the ones sat and watching the young mums in the street pushing their babies in prams or pushchairs, reminiscing when we used to go up to school to bring our babies home.

I decided to go to Greggs to get a sandwich. There were older women in there having cups of tea, looking so smart in their winter coats.

My mum always went to town in her best dark blue coat and red scarf. She loved her red scarf. She loved going to town.

I don’t think she would have ever have thought of Doncaster as a city. It was always, ‘I’m going into town, do you want anything?’

I can’t imagine her saying, ‘I’m going into the city, do you want anything?’ It just doesn’t seem right somehow.

I walked past the clothing stall that sold my mum’s favourite cardigans and trousers.

The stalls were not as they used to be, I remember them being so full and busy with people everywhere, I remember the stall holder that sold plates and had such banter that scores of people stood in front of his stall just listening to him.

The soul of the town has gone but once these ladies have gone, it will have gone completely.

They are holding onto it, just as my mum would have done. They will not let go of our town, it is their town, but not for much longer.

I went back to work, ate my sandwich and got on with my work.

Jill O’Mahoney

Doncaster