josie’s story

With Covid I missed the face-to-face contact of befriending.

“I retired when I was sixty-two. And it was probably the year after, probably when I was sixty-three and the building for Age Concern was on Moor Lane then, where they had the café. And I went in there one day and I said I was interested in volunteering. And that's when I met Jill for the first time, who did the befriending. And she said, “Do you fancy doing it?” and I said, “I'm not sure, I'll think about it.” A couple of weeks later, I met my sister in Bolton, and we were in Boots in a queue. And there’s an old man stood at the back of us and I'm on about this befriending and saying to her like, “But I'm still not sure whether to do it.” I said, “I don't know if I’d be all right doing it.” And this old man tapped me on the shoulder. He said, “Listen, love”, he said, “You've not shut up since you got in the queue.” He said, “Just do it” so I just rung Jill and said “Yeah, I’ll do it”, you know.

I started volunteering as a befriender and visited the same lady for thirteen years. until she sadly died earlier this year.

During the pandemic, obviously we went to phone calls, and I phoned her every week, you know. And I had a good chat with her. With Covid I missed the face-to-face contact of the befriending. But by the time everything was lifted, she’d got so used to just the phone call. I said, “Do you want me to come and visit you again?” And she said, “No, I'm happy with a phone call.” I liked befriending, it was like going to visit a friend, or ringing a friend up, because I'd been going that long. I haven’t taken another on. I'm not sure I want to, you know. Maybe next year I might change my mind. But now, not at the moment, no.

I volunteer at the tea afternoon once a month at the moment. I make all the sandwiches in the kitchen. I probably started the tea afternoons soon after I started befriending. I like doing sandwiches because there's quite a lot of people that come now. And they all appreciate the sandwiches, you know. So it’s rewarding in that way.

Covid never really bothered me because we had that glorious summer that first year. And we used to walk through the park and back. And then we’d sit on the front in the garden because after tea, you get the sun there at night. I used to walk over to Asda, do all the shopping and then walk back. I used to do a lot of knitting and so I started knitting again, more for the great-grandchildren, you know.

I think Age UK is important as it’s something positive for older people. Instead of sitting at home on their own, they can come to somewhere like this. I think it's even busier now than it was before Covid. I would say we used to have around thirty here for afternoon tea on a Thursday. And now, it's forty-eight that are coming. There's always entertainment on and then they have their sandwiches, cakes, and drinks.

I think most people think we've gone back to normal. There will be some of course that think about how they were in Covid, whether or not they lost somebody, you know. Everybody’s experience was different.

I going to carry on volunteering for now because I feel fit enough and it’s very friendly here.”