Yes Sister, No Sister

by Jennifer Craig

  A glassed-off room at the entrance holds a switchboard, hanging clipboards, several dirty mugs and Jim. Jim, the senior hall porter, is part of the institution, and rumour has it that he was hired when the foundation stone was laid. As this was in 1868, he would be over 80 years old, which he clearly is not. His job is to answer those internal calls that seek someone such as a doctor or a sister, buzz the beeper of that person, and then tell them where they are needed when they phone him back. He is also in charge of a small army of porters who manoeuvre patients on trolleys, oxygen tanks, food canteens and equipment around the hospital.

  Jim directs us to the dining room. ‘Go up them stairs and turn right onto the main corridor and then you’ll see an arrer pointing to t’dining room at t’other end. Aye, it’s grand to see such bright young lasses and I hopes tha’ll be right happy.’

  The main corridor of the hospital is about a quarter of a mile long. Its linoleum surface stretches into the horizon, and with hardly any people in it at this time of the evening, it reminds me of the yellow brick road in the Wizard of Oz. There is a distinctive smell about the place, a warm smell with a mixture of boiled cabbage, furniture polish and disinfectant.

  We find the dining room without difficulty. It is the size of a gymnasium and filled with tables for eight. The chatter ceases as we enter. Everyone stares at us, and no doubt, at our limp caps. The room is full of young women, most in uniform like ours, but one or two are in mufti. A mass of purple at one end of the room attracts my attention. Three tables are for permanent staff nurses – perms – who wear purple dresses with long sleeves ending in stiff cuffs, small purple capes like army nurses and caps like ours.

  We are surprised to find that we are served by waitresses rather than having to line up at a counter. If this first supper is a sample of the meals we are to be given, we will certainly not go hungry. Three courses, beef barley soup, sausages, baked potatoes and peas, followed by steamed pudding and custard arrive quickly, one after the other. Although most foods that were rationed during the war are now freely available, we still need coupons for butter and sugar and we have to carry these around with us in small tin containers.

  Everyone in the room seems to be eating hurriedly and they barely finish before they are scraping back their chairs to leave.

  ‘We will only get 20 minutes to eat by the time we’ve walked to and from our wards,’ Judith says. ‘That’s why we learn to eat so fast.’

  ‘The food’s good anyway,’ I say.

  ‘They have to keep the slave labour going or we’ll collapse and so will the hospital,’ Judith says.

  I sit between Judith and a girl called Marie Chart. Marie seems a serious type who doesn’t smile much. Attractive dark eyes and olive skin give a hint of her Italian ancestry. She tells me that her childhood sweetheart is a medical student in another city and, after completing their respective training, they plan to marry and become missionaries.

  ‘We want to start a hospital or a medical clinic in a country where there is a lot of leprosy,’ she says. ‘Both Charles and I believe that we have been called by God to serve lepers.’ I hear Judith draw in her breath but she doesn’t say anything. ‘Do you feel you have a calling?’ Marie asks me.

  ‘No, I can’t say I do. I really wanted to be a vet but at school we were told women aren’t strong enough. In fact, the three choices for us were teaching, nursing or secretarial work.’

  ‘Not strong enough to be vets but strong enough to hoof 20-stone patients around,’ Judith says. ‘Amazing isn’t it? You see pictures of women from other countries carrying huge loads on their backs but we are not strong enough to do what we want to do.’

  ‘Well, after all, a woman’s place is in the home beside her husband,’ Marie says.

  ‘Don’t be so bloody silly,’ Judith snaps. ‘I suppose all you want out of life is to have lots of snotty babies and bake cakes.’

  Marie is indignant. ‘Babies are not snotty, they are beautiful. They are God’s gift to us.’

  ‘Canting fool,’ I hear Judith mutter as I quickly ask Marie how many brothers and sisters she has.

  ‘I am one of nine but Charles is an only child so we will be a real family for him. In fact, that’s how I got to know him. My brother Paul used to bring him home from school as both his parents work and he was on his own.’ She holds her knife and fork correctly, cuts her food into delicate pieces and chews the prescribed 20 times.

  ‘When will you marry?’ I ask, as in contrast, I stuff large pieces of baked potato into my mouth and talk with my mouth full.

  ‘When we’ve both finished training, which will be in 1956. Charles is two years older than me so he’s started medical school.’ I am tired of asking Marie questions and as she doesn’t respond by asking me about my life, I turn to Judith.

  ‘What are you going to do when you’ve finished training?’

  ‘God knows. And if today is anything to go by, I may not finish. If all sisters are like that Thornton woman, I will never survive. Did you see her face when I asked her why we have to wear uniform to come here just to eat?’

  I laugh. ‘She looked as though she was going to have a fit! “Nurse, you are now a nurse of the Leeds General Infirmary and as such you will appear clean and neat at all times”‘ I say, imitating Sister Thornton.

  ‘Completely irrational. She didn’t even answer the question. I wanted to ask why we can’t be clean and neat in our own clothes, but I didn’t dare. Look around; there’s lots of people in mufti. And I don’t see why we should wear cotton dresses when it’s freezing. It’s warm here but there we are walking in the streets and sitting in rooms with no heat…’ She doesn’t finish but takes a gulp of tea. ‘Not only that, she had no business frightening us all by saying we could kill a patient. Most of what we will be doing is routine menial jobs if it’s anything like orthopaedic training.’

  ‘What was it like in orthopaedic training?’

  ‘Much more relaxed. Has to be. The patients are there for months at a time. Poor little kiddies in casts and splints to correct congenital deformities. Some of them have to lie in body casts for weeks and weeks.’

  ‘Did you learn much that will help here?’

  ‘Well, we had to know the skeleton pretty well and I expect a lot of the ward procedures are the same. Bed making, bedbaths, that sort of thing. But we didn’t get any acutes or emergencies. And most of the patients who weren’t children were young. So this will be very different.’

  ‘Come on, Sheila’s getting us all up to go.’ I say. ‘This is a damn nuisance – having to carry tins of butter and sugar everywhere we go.’

  ‘I think it will be easier to give up sweetened tea and buttered bread, don’t you?’ replies Judith.

  Despite the rain and cold we endure as we walk back up the hill to Hyde Terrace, I am so happy I could sing. I am with a group of girls my own age and we are going to be nurses. I feel proud in my uniform. Even though the stiff collar and starched apron are uncomfortable, I love them. They fulfil my image of a nurse – competent, caring, a figure to be relied upon in any emergency.

  Yet I have an unfamiliar sense of unease as Sister Thornton’s words come back to me. I had been so excited about starting training and the thought of failure had never crossed my mind. Judith said she might never finish if the sisters were like Thornton. Surely they couldn’t be? Sisters must be the most skilled, the most kind, the most caring of nurses, or they wouldn’t be sisters. They will be eager to help us become like them and will show patience as we struggle to learn.

  I know the work is hard but everyone says it is very rewarding and worthwhile. No, I am not going to be put off by Thornton; I am going to be a really good nurse and, one day, I will be a sister.

  Chapter 2

  N THE BUS to Roundhay Hall I sit next to a goofy-looking girl with the unlikely name of Hermione Blinkr. She tells me this apologetically and says that she is usually known as Blinks. Large glasses that distort her eyes above her slightly buck teeth give he
r a gormless look; but when she smiles she has that certain attraction some ugly people possess. I am drawn to her as one who is drawn to a sad-eyed spaniel. I feel protective as I sense she cannot stand up for herself.

  ‘I live in Newcastle,’ Blinks tells me, ‘but I came to Leeds to get away from my mother and sisters. They tell me all the time that I will never survive nurses’ training. I’m determined to show them.’ She takes off her glasses to polish them with her handkerchief and gives me a big grin. ‘According to them I’m not good for anything except serving fish and chips in a lorry driver’s caff. I don’t want to go home on my days off to that.’

  ‘What did you do before this?’

  ‘I stayed at school in the sixth form.’

  ‘Did you like it?’ Going into the sixth form had been an option for me but I could hardly wait to leave the boredom of school.

  ‘Well, I didn’t have much choice.’ Blinks paused for a minute. ‘I’m the youngest of four girls. My older sisters went to university, one’s still there, but I didn’t get high enough marks.’ She turns to smile at me. ‘So here I am, the dumbo of the family.’

  ‘Marks don’t mean everything,’ I say. ‘One girl in my form never did well and now she runs a dance academy even though she’s only 19. Did you really want to go to university?’

  ‘To he truthful, I don’t know what I want to do. This is the lesser of several awful choices. I was told that nursing is great preparation for marriage.’

  We both laugh. ‘I was told that too.’

  ‘I can’t see myself getting married whether I become a nurse or not. Who would propose to someone like me?’ Blinks laughs as she says this; I can see that she has no self-confidence.

  ‘I don’t see why not,’ I say. ‘I’m sure you’d make a wonderful wife.’

  Blinks pulls my arm from under my cloak and holds her own alongside it. ‘Look at that,’ she says. ‘Look how strong you are and how scrawny I am. My sister says I would blow over in a breeze.’

  ‘Men don’t marry women because of the size of their arms,’ I say, laughing. ‘They like to be mothered.’

  ‘They also like to look at a nice smile like yours.’

  ‘Ah yes, but I’m not the sort to pander to a man. My mother said I should never beat a man at sports because they don’t like it. Well, tough tatties I say.’

  The bus turns through a gateway of stone columns supporting lions rampant that look lonely without their wrought iron gates. I expect these were removed in the war effort. Roundhay Hall had been a minor stately home before it was donated to the Infirmary. A square, grey stone building set within several acres of lawn and trees, that, to me, seems far too dignified to house a preliminary training school for nurses. At this time of the year the trees are bare and the grass gleams with ice. A chill wind lifts my cloak as I descend from the bus and nearly whips my cap off. Are we going to freeze in unheated rooms here? I will never survive. I have been cold ever since I arrived back in England from India.

  Two Sister Tutors meet us. They wear grey dresses and straight caps like American nurses but with a frill across the top. Sister Uprichard and Sister Downes are to be prominent figures in our lives for the next three months so we examine them carefully. Sister Uprichard is plump, with a large bosom and a round, cheerful face. Sister Downes is small, bird-like, with a walk like a penguin. This particular walk propels her along at a tremendous rate – soundless and efficient.

  Up and Down, as they are naturally dubbed, show us round. The main floor holds a lounge, classrooms, a practical room, kitchens, including one where we will learn to cook, and a large, cheerful dining room. Upstairs are to be the bedrooms where future generations of probationers will sleep. There is central heating, thank heaven.

  Our first instruction is how we are to address sisters. We are to stand when spoken to and stand when they enter a room. We are to say ‘Yes Sister’ or ‘No Sister.’ We are to realise that, in comparison to them, we are on the same level of the biological scale as an amoeba.

  When Up and Down finally leave the room we all relax and carry on with getting to know each other. Suddenly Sister Downes re-enters. Well-trained at Leeds Girls High School, I stand up along with about two others. Down looks around and leaves the room, only to enter once more seconds later. Again only I and one or two others stand. Everyone else continues to lounge in her seat and chat. With a frozen face, Down leaves again. She returns with the same result as before, but this time she claps her hands and says ‘Obviously we have a group here who cannot follow directions. You have only been here ten minutes and you have already demonstrated that you are incapable of listening and learning. I fear for the future of nursing.’ With this, she leaves the room, re-enters and the entire class springs to its feet.

  ‘Be seated. Now I will explain your timetable for the time you are here. You were late this morning but in future we expect you here promptly at 8.30am.’ She stands at the front of the class holding a sheaf of papers. ‘You will have classes until one o’clock, an hour for lunch and then leave at six o’clock. There will be two short tea breaks, one in the morning and one in the afternoon. Some afternoons you will be out, either on the wards or on a field trip. I will now hand out individual timetables as you are not always together.’

  She passes out sheets of paper. We are together for lectures on anatomy and physiology, nutrition, hygiene and care of patients with a variety of diseases. We split up for cooking, time in the practical room and experience on the wards. There are also several field trips planned.

  All this time, Up has been sitting to one side. When Down has finished she comes to the front of the class. ‘Now, Sister Downes and I would like to know your names. I want you each to stand up, tell us your name and where you are from. We will be writing down your names as you go round.’

  There are 32 of us. The previous evening there had been 33 but one girl was so homesick she left this morning. ‘How ridiculous!’ I said to Judith when we heard. ‘Can you believe that someone would apply, go through an interview, arrive here and then leave because they miss their mummy?’ I feel contemptuous. I am the one whose parents are far away while this girl lives nearby. If I leave it will be for a reason far more important than homesickness.

  After the introductions we are led into the practical room. It is set up as a small ward with eight beds, a sterilising room and a sluice room which houses urinals, bedpans and a bedpan hopper that washes bedpans and urine testing equipment. At one end is a cupboard containing numerous enamel bowls, instruments and linen. Dummies occupy two of the beds. A skeleton hangs in one corner, metal poles on wheels and with hooks on them are clustered in another corner, and in another are stainless steel, two-tier trolleys. Large, colourful anatomical maps decorate the walls.

  ‘Now nurses, I want you to watch carefully while Sister Downes and I make a bed. Afterwards I will ask you what you observed. Nurse Horsfall, would you please time us? Start counting from when I say “go”.’

  Up takes two chairs and places them back to back at the foot of one of the beds. ‘Go,’ she says, and she and Down move as though they have suddenly been switched on. In unison, like professional ballroom dancers, they strip the bed, one sheet and blanket at a time. Each piece of bedding is folded in three and laid over the two chairs. Then they make up the bed again.

  ‘How long was that, Nurse Horsfall?’

  ‘Two minutes, 45 seconds, Sister.’ We are awed.

  ‘What did you notice?’

  ‘That you moved together as a team,’ says one girl.

  ‘Yes, you are to strive to work exactly together. It is faster for one thing but also much easier on your back. What else?’

  ‘The counterpane hangs with the same amount on each side and the corners are an exact triangle,’ replies another.

  Down strokes the counterpane of the bed they have made. ‘The ward looks neater when the beds are well-made and a neat ward is a sign of good nursing. What else?’

  ‘The bottom sheet is as ta
ut as a drum.’

  ‘Yes. Wrinkled sheets are one of the main causes of bedsores.’ Down takes on a grim tone. ‘Bedsores are due to poor nursing care – nothing else, despite what you may hear to the contrary. What else?’

  No one answers.

  ‘We shook the blankets and sheets as little as possible to avoid creating dust in the air and so spreading infection. We will make it again more slowly and point out some of the things to watch for. Then you will work in pairs to make a bed.’

  I work with a girl called Wendy Sandstone, or Sandy. We are hopeless. When she is at the top of the bed, I am at the bottom. It takes us a good ten minutes to strip and make the bed and the result is lop-sided and the bottom sheet has wrinkles in it.

  Up comes over. ‘Never mind, nurses, try again. You will soon get the hang of it. Start at the top of the bed then you’ll have enough sheet to make good corners. Here, Nurse Sandstone, let me show you.’

  We try again with a slightly better result but still the counterpane is crooked. This time we have Down check us. ‘You obviously have no sense of balance. Nurse Ross, can’t you tell when one of you has more counterpane than the other? Do it again.’

  Finally we make a presentable bed and are allowed to go for dinner. Sandy loves to chat. She prattles on about whether the peas are cooked properly, have I seen someone or other’s cap and isn’t it funny folded that way, whether it is the number six bus that stops outside the front door of the hospital or the number eight, aren’t the flowers in the front hall pretty, will her shoes last a year, and so on. She has a crush on June Allyson, the film star, and writes to her asking for autographed photographs which she pins up on the inside of her wardrobe.