The laughingly named 'Careers Advisor' came to school and sat opposite me, your typical baby boomer, eleven plus failure and branded thicko, and gave me his most unctuous smile.
Him: 'Is there anything you enjoy doing?'
Me. 'Writing.'
Him, sniggering: 'I don't think you're going to earn a living at that.'
He looked at a card on the desk in front of him, picked up the phone and made an appointment for me. It was with a local hairdresser. If successful, I would be apprenticed and paid nineteen shillings and sixpence a week (that's just under a quid) plus tips. I can only assume he considered this paltry sum a 'living' for the likes of me, who'd just go off and get herself up the duff by a local layabout and be married in a couple of years anyway, at which point I'd stop bothering the employment market.
I got the job.
I didn't do the other stuff.
And he was probably right, in that I would never have set the world of literature on fire, but I'd have been content to start off with the births and deaths page on the local newspaper, something like that. But I was fourteen. I'd no idea how you went about getting a job. That's why I still harbour a grudge against that smug, disinterested bloke who failed to fulfil the 'advisor' bit of his job title.
Not that it was all bad. I was a sheltered child, quiet and naive by nature, from a buttoned-up home where sex, or any matters pertaining to the body, were banned from conversation. In that salon the blanks in my education were swiftly filled. The youngest of my colleagues were in their late teens, and they all knew loads more about stuff than I did. Even the forty-something manageress, Lindy, was at it. As the most junior employee it was my job to open up the shop and prepare it for the day ahead. How well I remember the morning I let myself in and happened upon Lindy pleasuring the shampoo rep in the backwash chair. I'd wondered why he slipped us so many free bottle of conditioner with our order.
Then there was the day our senior stylist, Carol, assisted by Lindy, ended an unwanted pregnancy in the staff room, during the lunch break, which might be a fine example of the work ethic as not a perm or trim was cancelled. Exactly what the mysterious procedure involved I never knew, as I'd been sent out to get fish and chips, presumably by way of celebration. It must have been a success because Carol, who was usually a moody cow, was remarkably cheerful for the next day or two. She was even nice to me. Normally she was telling me I was fat or didn't pass her the rollers fast enough. I hated her. I didn't know then about bullying in the workplace, but if ever that girl got the chance to make my life miserable she grabbed it. I wasn't sorry when she developed an allergy to perm lotion and had to leave.
I may have been shocked to my prudish core by all these goings-on, but it was a timely crash course in the ways of the real world.
And, generally, things were looking up. I'd hardly been there a month before I'd been taken in hand. My hair had been styled and coloured. The other girls had grabbed their make-up bags and sat me down to introduce me to the mysteries of of eyeliner and lipstick and, even more usefully whilst transforming me into a painted Jezebel, they whispered the secrets of birth control, before setting me up on dates with their brother's mates. I was a willing pupil.
Having been metamorphosed from a mousey child into a long-haired, short skirted minx I would dash home to cast off my dye stained, nylon overall and prepare to hit the fleshpots of the nearest town. I drank coffee out of glass cups in smoke shrouded cafes. I danced in grubby, dark basement clubs and learnt that, with a little perseverance, I could acquire a taste for the alcohol that was banned from my home as the work of the devil. I snogged in bus shelters, letting the last bus pass me by, thereby enraging my mother. And I took to smoking, just to add to my sophisticated allure. It was the best possible fun. But I was careful. I'd listened. I didn't want to be like Carol.
And there was music. Another discovery. I just loved that noise. And that's the thing about the teenage years. You start as this empty kid and get filled up with new experiences and the freedoms of the adult world you're transitioning in to. And sometimes it's wonderful and sometimes terrifying, and you find the things that help you make sense of it and get you through. For me it was books and music, and I still think it's not a bad combination.
I didn't love that job. It gave me varicose veins from all the standing and I got cracks in the skin of my hands so deep that they bled, from washing towels in cold water because the heater wasn't working again, and there was no washing machine. And the money was shit and the hours were long and the reps always tried it on and the poshest customers were the worst tippers. Actually, the best tip I got in that place was how to hide hickies with a carefully arranged chiffon scarf. Chiffon scarf manufacturers must have cleaned up in the sixties.
But I grew up in that salon. I met some lovely people who are still my friends and I got to chat to so many different customers, just in the course of a single day, which was heaven for a nosey girl like me. You'd be amazed what women will confide to their hairdresser, it's like the confessional but with a blow-dry thrown in.
And, eventually, I'd sort myself out, return to education, get a couple of degrees and have jobs that I chose and enjoyed.
Not that there's anything wrong with hairdressing. It's a fine, creative, essential profession and the skills of a good stylist can be transformative. But it wasn't what I wanted to do so I wasn't very good at it. I think back with shame to the lop-sided cuts and patchy dye jobs I sent out into the world.
But, I'd learnt some valuable lessons, and I'm even grateful to nasty Carol. Thanks to her, I always tried to be kind and supportive, to all my colleagues, but particularly to those a bit lower in the pecking order than myself. So maybe Mr. Whateverhisnamewas, didn't do me such a dis-service afterall. However, I really hope today's school leavers get a better deal than I did and that someone listens to them a bit more closely.
Most of us end up spending an awfully big chunk of our lives in the workplace and it's so much nicer if we really want to be there.
Bye the way, I can still do a half decent fringe trim, if anyone's interested?
Thanks for reading.
