Thursday, July 16, 2020

Late 60's and I was running a Youth Club/Community Centre in St Helens Lancashire.




Back in the day ...........

Late 60's and I was running a Youth Club/Community Centre in St Helens Lancashire.

We had moved from our residential work with young offenders - 15 Manchester boys!
We were Houseparents in this special unit.
Joy was born there - pilchards for breakfast for all
INCLUDING baby Joy !
They all fought for her attention - oh what a life it was!

This new club was a YWCA Project in St Helens.
NOT YMCA - and we had a flat above the seven days a week centre.
**  ( Lots of stories in my first book called::
'Gutter Feelings' - search Lulu.com to view / buy)

ADVENTURE AHEAD::
We had never been on he continent - France etc..
So we bought a second hand mini-bus for £30 !

The club boys/men - all bikers - worked on the bus to make it ready to go to France Italy Switzerland and Austria !
The drivers door, that's me, fell off in every country.
It was an old Bedford with a sliding door - such fun.

We made France, through Switzerland to the Italian Riviera but never made Austria!

We discovered a campsite in Italy right on the coastline.
It became a regular annual trip with a different gang of youths each year.
The sun.
The warm sea.
The food!!! - we discovered that they had food there too - so we didn't need to take our instant mash-potato, tin beans/rice pudding etc ............

The Pipturesque above is when some of the team went to a local Italian Church and were welcomed in all the scruff we were.
We had no clue how best to dress for the South of France and Italy !!!!!!!
Camping - sweating etc..

GREAT memories. 

When we moved on from here after 5 years of Youth Work, to our first YMCA work (every place we have worked was residential - living on the job, I think, for about 38 years !

Then, leaving St Helens YMCA - in 1975 we moved to live and work in London -
Canning Town - London E16 ...................

To be continued - I must go and watch the NRL Rugby League on TV - live from Australia !!

I'm back
Great Game
I love my Rugby League
and
Come 2nd August our UK/Euro re starts.
Beef on the bone is back.
comeonyouSAINTS
No crowds
3 Games in the same stadium
Playing catchup on the season halted suddenly C19 !!

So my above was when we moved to Londons East End
Four of us plus cat and canary !!

You can read more about the 10 years here
by searching my www.pipwilson.com 
using guessed key words ..............

Stories Lots of stories good & Bad
What a life!!
More to come ......... life and stories that is .....


✅💲T🅰Y🅱eautiful   



BHP