I recently caught a virus that was doing the rounds. This developed into a nasty throat infection, and being stuck at home feeling rather sorry for myself, I decided to turn my thoughts instead to Laura.
After Laura’s funeral we were asked if we had photos and happy stories for her children’s Memory boxes. A Memory box is a keepsake full of photos, letters, and mementos of a person who has died. It can be particularly helpful in assisting the grieving process, particularly with children. Laura’s children are very young (8 and 6) and although they will have many memories of her, as they get older they may have to ‘borrow’ from others who knew her well, so that they can grow up with a real sense of the person she was. This is where I come in.
I have loads of memories of Laura as a child growing up, but they wanted a few of her late teens, early twenties, so I picked this amusing one. I think her children and family will enjoy reading it as much as I did remembering it. I share it here with you on my blog:
One of the amusing memories I have of Laura, is when she worked at Wimbledon during the famous tennis tournament, it was somewhere around 1998/1999, when she was still at university.
If you studied at either St Mary’s College, Strawberry Hill, (me and my sister) or Roehampton College (as Laura did), it was everyone’s burning desire to earn some much needed cash by working at either the Rugby at Twickenham as a steward, or at the tennis at Wimbledon. We all talked about it, but Laura was the only one who bothered to actually do it! When I asked her what she would be doing, she proudly (whilst trying not to giggle too much) replied to me that she would be a toilet attendant. I too, stifling a giggle, congratulated her on this job (wondering if being a steward would be somewhat more glam..). But she was very quick to point out that it wasn’t just the normal toilets she would be in charge of, but the players’ toilets – a great honour; to be replenishing soap and towels.
So there we all were picturing Laura hard at work, folding fluffy towels and refreshing posh soap dispensers, when the BBC Six O’clock news came on our TVs. One of the top headlines was Wimbledon of course – being that the Championships were in full swing. But imagine our surprise and to our great amusement when who should we also see on screen too, but Laura – right up at the front of the queue of fans! It’s traditional for players to sign a few autographs for their fans on their way off centre court, and Laura couldn’t resist being amongst that crowd, apparently – seeing as she was actually there! I can’t quite remember who the player was, but it was either Pete Sampras or Greg Rusedski, someone top anyway.
The next time I saw Laura, I playfully scolded her, and asked her who then was actually attending her toilets, whilst she was busy mingling with famous tennis champions, and appearing on the BBC News? She just grinned back at me in the normal cheeky way she used to.
I love this memory of Laura as it reminds me of how laid back she was; never work shy, but always full of fun, childlike, and a bit quirky.
Laura you are gone from our lives but never ever forgotten.
Jane x
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