"I would have been the best at whatever I did. If I'd been a street sweeper that street would have been the cleanest damn street in America" - Muhammad Ali

My Mam was a cleaner

I went to pick up her last paycheck after she died, my Dad sent me. I can never forget the many people in the large office all very sad as I came in the door. They knew who I was of course as I'd been to the Races many times with my mother, she was like Muhammed Ali, she was just a cleaner. No, she was the best cleaner, funny & fearless too, just like Ali.

She had the keys to everywhere in the whole racecourse. On big race days she let me into the Queen's box, when the Queen wasn't there of course, told me to keep my head down so no-one would see me.

The racecourse painter & drawer of the horses & jockeys at that time adored my mother. He made a few drawings of mam with a mop in her hand. I remember one was of Lester Piggot returning from the track with the moon shining over head, Mam mop in hand saying, "Where the hell you been?"
What I would do to have those drawings back, they got lost over the years.

What the hell though Mam, you can't be forgotten.

You were the best at whatever you did.
Doncaster Racecourse was the cleanest damned racecourse in the world.

30th November 2023 • on the Eve of Advent-ure, in celebration of all mothers, for love of the capricious & all-powerful threefold Goddess Mothers & the end of Patriarchy.