Library Job

I've mentioned the many and various jobs I've done over the years. Not always successful. Certainly not in any way related to my theatre experience, but one that does spring to mind was working for Bedford Library Service. I was employed to drive a library van, and as part of the job I was to visit local schools in and around  Bedfordshire, with a group of librarians, who would help stock the libraries of the schools we visited and, later on, do story time with the children. With my experience of working in theatre, as well as puppetry (having done schools touring with several puppet companies, which I have never discussed on this blog, but may do in the not-too distant future.) it seemed the perfect job for me. I would have been good as a story-teller with the children. It was this part of the job which appealed to me most when I first applied for the job.  However, there were one or two problems which didn't help. I had a perfectly clean driving licence. I had been driving for many years. No problem with that. It was the driving of the library van which was the problem. When I went for the initial interview I had to do a driving test in the vehicle. It was large and very cumbersome. As you would expect of a mobile library. I had to drive the thing around the carpark at Bedford County Hall. A great deal of crashing of gears and it was extremely difficult to see clearly when reversing. Also, I had to take it out on the roads of Bedford (with another person sitting beside me, it has to be noted.) Some of the one-way system in Bedford town centre (this was in the mid 1980's.) was extremely hazardous, particularly one junction from Caldwell Street into St John's Street. The traffic is supposed to merge, with no traffic lights to control the flow, so you took your life in your hands and judge when to move into the road. I had real problems putting the vehicle into gear. Not nice if you are standing still, waiting at a junction, craning your neck round to get a view of the road over your left shoulder and then attempting to put the thing into gear so the vehicle will move off safely. The thing was extremely large and heavy, so it took some time to gather speed so I could drive into the flow of traffic. I had real problems with all this. But, regardless of my driving test, I was taken on for the job. It wasn't just driving around the town in the one-way traffic which was the problem (actually, out in the countryside there wasn't a problem at all. It was the gears in the wretched vehicle and the size of it which caused the problems.) but getting the thing in and out of the garage at County Hall which caused the greatest problems. It was extremely narrow and you were expected to reverse this colossal vehicle in and out of an extremely narrow entrance. Also, without the help of any member of staff. Crazy, if you think about it. It would have made the process of reversing so much easier. But they wouldn't do this for me. It  might have been easier if they'd cleared out the boxes and other clutter which blocked the rear of the garage, because there was actually an exit, which, had it been cleared properly, would have meant you drove IN one end and drove OUT the other. But the staff would not do this, they were stubborn in their total refusal to make my life easier. I think there was one occasion when I probably scratched the side of the benighted library van, because of the very narrowness of the garage i was expected to reverse into. Probably merely inches to clear on either side. Also, as you reversed in from the carpark, you had to negotiate a loading bay, a large chunk of concrete, which was directly to one side as you reversed into this garage. An extremely difficult manoeuvre, to say the least. It probably would have been really easy if driving a car (which is what I had only ever driven, apart from vans and minibusses.) Which begs the question 'Why did they employ me to drive a vehicle so large, which actually required the driver to hold either a PSV or HGV licence, neither of which I held?' A really good question. It also didn't exactly help that, at the time all this was going on, the river bridge in Prebend Street was closed to heavy vehicles, which included the library van I was expected to drive. As the library service in County Hall, Bedford, is on Prebend Street, you can imagine the inconvenience if you were required to cross the River Ouse, you had to drive all the way round the town and use the main river bridge which leads into the centre of Bedford and then traverse the one-way system in order to avoid using the Prebend Street bridge and then the other way round if you were coming into the town from the north of Bedfordshire. Not exactly making my job any easier.

The rest of the job was really straightforward. Sorting books. Reshelving them. As I'm something of a reader, as you might have realised if you've read any of my earlier posts. Put me near a bookshop and I can spend hours browsing. Also, merely looking around this room you will see bookshelves simply heaving with books. So, the job was perfect for me. Also, repairing covers, using the special plastic material they use to give library books a clear, protective cover. Also, learning how to use the Dewey system of classification. Then, going out in the library vehicle and visiting all those Primary Schools in and around Bedfordshire. What could have been more perfect? Particularly in the summer months.

Needless to say you must have by now got some idea how this all ended. I got sacked. Which was a great shame, as I actually enjoyed the job. Certainly better than a great many jobs I've done. I think they probably realised that I wasn't suitable as a driver (yes, a driver with an HGV or PSV licence would have been ideal, but wouldn't probably have had my experience of working in schools or an interest in the story-time aspect of the job.) But the library staff's somewhat arrogant attitude as regarding helping with reversing into the garage as well as clearing out the garage so I could drive in one end and out the other. Also, they would sit inside the library van when out on the road and in particular when in school playgrounds, it could be difficult reversing, for safety as much as anything else. A total refusal to help was unnecessary and, quite frankly, quite unpleasant. I think they had a sort of 'we're librarians, and it's not our job to help the driver' attitude. Sorry, but to be honest they were rather stuck-up.

Unsuitable Jobs

I've mentioned jobs in earlier blog posts on here that I've done over the years, including my time working in stage management, most of them enjoyable, but there were times when I did some work out of necessity which wasn't so enjoyable, and, on reflection, from the perspective of some 30 years or so, were, quite frankly, totally unsuitable. I can't think how on earth I had either the temerity to apply, or why the companies or organisations offering the said employment would even consider me for employment. A bit like the Groucho Marx remark about resigning from some club or other, where he says 'I would never join a club which would have me as a member' or words to that effect, I could never see why anyone would want to employ me (in these particular roles) as I'm sure I was never actually suitable in the first place! Groucho is, by the way, one of my all-time favourite people. I could write pages and pages on here as to why, but won't at the moment. I may do in a future post.

I worked as a postman,  briefly, based at Bedford Central Sorting Office. On applying you have to fill in the usual application form, as you do. I don't think you had to give so much information as regards your identity as you would if you were applying today. Perhaps when I was applying there wasn't so much what is called 'identity fraud.' But with my background in professional stage management and puppetry, was that good experience for someone delivering mail? I can't think that it was. You had to go through a somewhat weird testing process which included some rather embarrassingly simple intelligence tests, none of which I can remember now. But, to tell the truth, honestly and simply, I didn't last long in the job. The idea of having to get up at around 4.30 a.m. in the middle of winter to go out and deliver letters to the people of Bedford in the pitch black streets on a bicycle with a very heavy bag of recently-sorted mail and attempting to read addresses on envelopes by the light of a not particularly efficient torch was not my idea of a great career move. Trudging the aforementioned streets of Bedford attempting to find a particular house number when the numbering system of a particular street was incomprehensible was not exactly inspiring. Probably to my bank manager, but certainly not to me. Why were the numbers of some streets so erratic, to say the least? It was and still is a mystery. Some property developer who was responsible for building some of the housing estates on the outer fringes of the town has a lot to answer for in regards to my sanity! But, saying all this, I think I can appreciate more fully from this experience the work and dedication of the staff of Her Majesty's Royal Mail. I have nothing but admiration for them, although I expect it's far more mechanised and the work simplified since I worked for the Royal Mail.

Another job was working for the education department of the Bedford Library Service and based at County Hall in Cauldwell Street in Bedford. I was taken on as a driver for the library van which went round local schools and the idea was that we restocked this vehicle regularly then visited schools, mostly primary, where we drew up in the playground and the children and staff could come on board and they could choose their books. We also delivered books to the schools own libraries as well as collecting books to return to the base in what used to be the County Library (now closed, but later merged into what is now the Central Library in Harpur Street. The old County Library building was or is used for storing books and the educational department was or is in the floor beneath the old library at County Hall.) Part of my job was going to include reading to the children, which I never got  chance to do because I left before having a chance to do this, sadly, as I enjoy reading aloud, I suppose being vaguely associated with acting and theatre.

The biggest problem with this job was the actual driving of the library vehicle. Thinking about it now it seems strange to think they even gave me the job. I had driven since getting my driving licence in 1969 and had only driven cars, so why on earth did they think I would be suitable to drive what was in actual fact a Heavy Goods Vehicle of about the size of a single-decker bus? Someone with either a P.S.V. (Public Service Vehicle) or H.G.V. (Heavy Goods Vehicle) would have been far more suitable. When I went for the initial interview for the job I had to drive this vehicle around the car park at the library and if my memory serves, around the one-way system in Bedford. I think I must have crashed the gears several times but it wasn't exactly a good driving test and wasn't going to show me as what you might call a proficient driver, and certainly not of a vehicle of such a size. A very cumbersome and awkward vehicle, to say the least. 

I began the job and we went out on several drives to some of the village Primary Schools, turning up in the playground or the road outside and we delivered boxes of books to the libraries within the schools. But the big problem was getting the library van back into the garage at County Hall at the end of the day. It was supposed to be reversed into this fairly tight space. If you visit this building I'm sure you'll see the garage which was where the library van lived and you'd see what a problem it was reversing into this garage. Some clever architect who designed County Hall couldn't have made it more difficult to reverse such a large vehicle into that space as well as providing a loading bay which stuck out so that you had to reverse around it making it doubly or even trebly difficult to make this manoeuvre without hitting it. Unfortunately, on one occasion, when I was reversing into this confounded garage, at the end of a day driving around the schools of Bedford, I managed to scrape the side of the library van. You'd think I done it deliberately, according to the head librarian. It was this which lead to me being sacked, which, on reflection, was somewhat unfair. Nothing was done to make the job any easier. For a start, as I pointed out, the garage was actually designed with two doors, one at each end, so, had it not been blocked up with piles of boxes and other rubbish, you could, in actual fact, drive in forward through one door and out the other end to get out. But nobody had the intelligence to see this, so you were expected to reverse in, one of the most difficult bits of driving imaginable and even more so  when driving such a large vehicle. The library staff were totally uncooperative when we went out to the schools. On several occasions when we visited a school and I had to reverse the confounded van they refused to help, just getting out of the thing and helping me reverse would have been useful.  But no, they seemed to think it beneath them to do such a thing.They would arrogantly sit in their seats and refuse to budge. No help at all. I am actually grateful to them in some respects because they have afforded me plenty of scope for my writing as I have filed all this at the back of my memory and they are the basis for material for my writing. As have quite a few of the people I have worked with over the years. Nothing is wasted and any or all of the jobs that I did over the years which weren't exactly great career moves have afforded material for my writing. So I thank them heartily. Where are they now, I wonder, and do they actually realise the stress they caused and the lack of cooperation they offered? I don't think they know. Perhaps and again perhaps not.