By Colin Barnard
On November 5th 1957, I was invited to attend a youth club in Forty Hill, Enfield. A group of lads were forming a Skiffle group and wanted a mem-ber who could sing and play guitar. After a session and as it was Guy Fawkes night, the evening was ended with a bonfire and fireworks. Our newly formed “Dell Valley skiffle group” were late as-sembling outside and as a result all seats were few.
I found a seat next to a friend I knew. sitting on the other side of me was a beautiful young lady, Barbara. I was immediately captivated by her shy-ness and her beautiful auburn hair. I don’t recall much conversation that evening, but the next week I asked to walk her home. It was a long way out of my way but I was delighted when she accepted.
We spent most of our leisure time together. When I was able to buy a motor cycle, she was always my pillion rider. We recall many weekend trips to Clacton on Sea. We also attended youth club each week and joined in the production of a review which was performed for all our parents and friends.
We planned to be married on February 6th 1960. It was a cold frosty but sunny day. The bride’s dress was a chic modern style from Guilders of Oxford Street, and my father made our wedding cake and iced it. For our honeymoon we went to a show in the west end, and stayed at an aunt’s flat in Wim-pole street, London. To us it seemed like a posh hotel. We began our married life in two rooms in a house in Islington. We worked hard, myself as a Bakery salesman and Barbara, who had trained as a comptometer operator worked at British Rail in the invoice checking office. We had our first son in 1960, so Barbara ceased working.
We had saved enough to buy our first house in 1963. It was a three-bed semi, at £2925.00. Just as we moved in, we had our second child, a daughter. I worked several jobs as well as my bakery career, while Barbara concentrated on bringing up the children and the home. We had a second son in 1965.
Those years flew by, with Barbara supporting me in the advancement of my career. It was a very busy period but we always found time to support the children’s schools and a local charity for which I was Chairman of fund raising .
When our second son was 13, Barbara took up a new career as a receptionist at a local doctor’s sur-gery, where she remained until retirement. My career was very successful where I became bakery general manager and finally a sales director.
In 1989 we decided it was the right time to under-take our own business. We bought a rundown bak-ery with scope for development. With long hours and hard graft, we successfully developed the busi-ness, and were able to retire in 2003. We passed the business to our son who had worked in it with us for many years.
We are blessed with 7 grand daughters, all doing well, and our eldest grand daughter is married with three children, who are delightful great grandchil-dren.
The secret of a long and happy marriage is working together as a partnership, always take account of each other’s feelings and be prepared to compro-mise, and especially have fun!