Fifty years as a guiding star at the Sick Kids

The very first time I went in to the 'Sick Kids', not long before starting my residency in 2012, it was Cathy I met. From the reception desk she orientated me and calmed slightly jittery nerves as I waited for my interview.

In 2015, not only did she reach her 80th birthday, but 50 years in service at the hospital. Starting out on the telephone switchboard, she's been in that little room dealing with enquiries, post, and confused visitors ever since.

Within my first month as a writer in the hospital, National Poetry Day was inviting everyone to celebrate 'stars'. As well as getting patients to write a poem for their personal 'star', I wrote a poem for my own: Cathy. I updated it slightly this year, Cate illustrated it, and I presented a framed copy to her last week. One of the great privileges of being a writer in residence is the opportunity to respond to important people and events such as this. 

Her delight at being celebrated was very evident, as she immediately pointed to Cate's drawing of the woman on the switchboard, and said: 'That was me!' 

And here's the poem:

Cathy

Like our own North Star

you help us find the way,

brightening the day

of every visitor

with smiles and wise advice

from your fixed point

at Reception.

In your early days at work,

they sent you down a teapot in a dumb-waiter,

and a bucket of coal arrived

to feed the Reception hearth.

Switchboard girls twinkled in your orbit.                                     

The car park outside your window

once bloomed as a rose garden;

and you teased the children of doctors,

now doctors themselves.       

After fifty years

you know each stone of the hospital,

caring for its memories

as jewels in a starry casket.

And you watch over us as this big red ship

prepares to set sail

across the seas of South Edinburgh

for Little France.

Filming the Mail Porter

A familiar sight as you come into the Hospital is mail being sorted behind the reception desk. The porter, John, then circulates the Hospital at high speed (he gets fit by hill-walking and marathon-running too!), delivering and collecting mail as he goes. His job, perhaps more than anyone else's demands a thorough knowledge of the maze-like site, its linking passages and quirky corners. Having shadowed him on his rounds, I wrote a poem about his journey, using the rhythms of WH Auden's 'Night Mail'. 

Instead of starting with: 

This is the Night Mail crossing the border,
Bringing the cheque and the postal order,
Letters for the rich, letters for the poor,
The shop at the corner and the girl next door.
my poem begins:

This is the mail carried by the porter

bringing get well cards to son and daughter
letters for a doctor, letters for a nurse
letters that are long, letters that are terse.

Auden's poem was written for the film ‘Night Mail’ (1936), and so we decided we should make one ourselves! The purpose is to help create a celebration of the current Hospital site in a creative way, capturing something of the character just before it moves to a contemporary purpose-built site in 2017.

He leaves a pile, collects a pile, goes on his way,

bag dangling by his knees, gathering weight.                                       

Like a black-cab driver or a blinkered horse

distractions and chat cannot turn his course.

His route’s set in stone through secret doors,

banisters that coil between Victorian wards.

Earlier this month, film-maker Sandie Jamieson began filming and taking audio recordings. We're very excited that as she starts to put the footage together, we have Derek Williams to compose and record a score for it and a wonderful reader for the poem with a highly distinctive Edinburgh voice!

See more here