Surprising stories from Alveley

You never know quite what you’re going to hear when you start chatting to members of Age UK Shropshire Telford & Wrekin’s popular day centres.

For example, the unforgettable day when she met her future husband for the first time under the clock in Kidderminster is just one of the heart-warming stories told by an Alveley day centre regular in a series of BBC Radio Shropshire interviews conducted by broadcaster Jim Hawkins.

She had arranged to meet not one but two young men that day. When she got there, one was standing on one side of the street, the other on the other side of the street. From a distance, she looked them up and down and decided to herself that, of the two, she preferred the one she knew to be a paratrooper. She asked her sister’s boyfriend to go down the street and ask the paratrooper to come up and meet her. The paratrooper was delighted to follow instructions, and that man became her husband for 54 years.

‘What happened to the other fella?’, asks Jim Hawkins. The lady laughs and replies: ‘I don’t know. I didn’t care!’

Jim was interviewing Alveley day centre regulars after having heard about the original artwork that has just been created by local artist Katy Alston, a painting that captured some of the most cherished memories of the day centre members.

You can hear the interviews here:

Interview clip 1 (MP3, 7.3 MB)

Interview clip 2 (MP3, 3.4 MB)

Interview clip 3 (MP3, 1.4 MB)

For more information about Age UK Shropshire Telford & Wrekin day centres call 01743 233 123 or email enquiries@ageukstw.org.uk