tanguerra
Moderator Emeritus
I have been piecing together the pottery shards of my WWII life for some time and think I have large parts of it worked out now, so it is maybe time to write it all out in order.
I first had an inkling of this life more than 20 years ago. All I had was one scene. I was leaning up against a wall, on a cold wet night in London, during the war, in a thin dress (low cut of course), smoking a horrible cigarette (ah! The War! Rationing!) and coughing uncontrollably - perhaps I had the flu or something. I knew my name was Carol, I was blonde, quite pudgy and unhealthy, in my mid-30s and a prostitute. I had to be out 'working' and I was feeling very miserable indeed. Now I am pretty sure that was towards the end of that life.
I was born in England, not London, but a smaller city - somewhere up north, like Manchester perhaps. I know I had some kind of provincial accent. To this day I like the Manchester accent, but also sort 'look down on it' for no reason. My father was killed in WWI when I was only a little girl. I don't really remember him, but I remember when he was killed I might have been 6 or 7 or so. I remember being very sad about it but I remember it was an absolute disaster for my mother because we were never wealthy, but now we were very poor indeed. I had a younger brother and sister I think. I was always very, very pretty. I remember preening myself in the mirror and thinking I would be a movie star. I was absolutely enraptured by the movies. I had my dreams of saving the family from poverty, getting away from it all and being a big star.
When I was about 16 I met a man who seemed much older than me - maybe he was in his 30s. He had a thin moustache and wore a sharp suit and had like a panama hat (which looked dead dashing to me at the time) and he said he would get me into show biz - the old story! He took me to London, but before long it was obvious (even to me) that the sort of work he had planned was not on the stage. I remember working in dance halls as a 'taxi dancer' dancing with men for money and probably doing a bit of prostitution on the side - which was sort of glamourous in its own way, at least compared with Manchester and the poverty and living with my depressed mother. At least I had some money and pretty dresses. I probably had some idea that I might turn this into a showbiz career given the right opportunity.
I remember going to Paris on a boat with this man, because Paris between the wars was absolutely booming and there was a lot of money to be made. I don't remember much about that, but I do remember dresses with beading, bars, dance halls, lots of drinking and exhaustion. Looking back it ought to have been terribly exciting, but I probably didn't appreciate it at the time. I remember looking at a woman singing jazz on stage in a beautiful blue dress and thinking whistfully I could never aspire to that sort of glamour. My mother became ill, maybe died, and WWII was coming so I went back to London. I had fallen out with my 'mentor' by this time - he used to beat me and I remember a lot of rows. Now I was on my own, and had given up my dreams of a show biz career.
[Doing the math - I'd have been born about (say) 1910 so when WWII broke out in 1939 I'd have been 29.]
I remember there was a bar in London I used to always hang out in and lots of servicemen of various persuasions - a sea of uniforms. It was a comparatively jolly time, really, despite the war, but I was pretty depressed and very worldly by this time and during the Blitz, I used to just keep working (business was brisk!) and hope that a bomb would come and put an end to it all. I was beginning to lose my looks by this time and drinking heavily - but so was everyone.
Two men stand out in that period, both in the air force. Two were upper crust sort of chaps and I believe I had some idea one of them might marry me (emotions ran high during that time with bombing raids and people not knowing if they were going to live or die any moment - perhaps various wreckless promises were made). One of them got killed (the one I really loved - X) in a bombing raid and I blamed the other because he was the leader of the squadron or something. I had told him to take special care. Perhaps I'd had some kind of premonition? I had some idea he did it out of spite, but probably not. (X has been killed young and tragically in more than one of my lives! Terribly accident prone, (or something!))
I told the survivor I was pregnant and wanted him to marry me but he just offered me money and I never saw him again (of course!). I remembered lying on my bed, crying hysterically over this after a furious row we'd had just before he stormed out throwing money at me.
I ended it all eventually, in the bath tub with a bottle of gin (an old wives method of dealing with such an inconvenient situation). My feeling is that I may have got half way through the bottle of gin and thought 'To hell with it!' and cut my wrists instead.
All terribly sad and sordid really. It took me a long time to come to terms with all that, but I can see aspects of my character in there - mostly aspects I have studiously tried to overcome in this life - weakness, self-pity and so on.
I first had an inkling of this life more than 20 years ago. All I had was one scene. I was leaning up against a wall, on a cold wet night in London, during the war, in a thin dress (low cut of course), smoking a horrible cigarette (ah! The War! Rationing!) and coughing uncontrollably - perhaps I had the flu or something. I knew my name was Carol, I was blonde, quite pudgy and unhealthy, in my mid-30s and a prostitute. I had to be out 'working' and I was feeling very miserable indeed. Now I am pretty sure that was towards the end of that life.
I was born in England, not London, but a smaller city - somewhere up north, like Manchester perhaps. I know I had some kind of provincial accent. To this day I like the Manchester accent, but also sort 'look down on it' for no reason. My father was killed in WWI when I was only a little girl. I don't really remember him, but I remember when he was killed I might have been 6 or 7 or so. I remember being very sad about it but I remember it was an absolute disaster for my mother because we were never wealthy, but now we were very poor indeed. I had a younger brother and sister I think. I was always very, very pretty. I remember preening myself in the mirror and thinking I would be a movie star. I was absolutely enraptured by the movies. I had my dreams of saving the family from poverty, getting away from it all and being a big star.
When I was about 16 I met a man who seemed much older than me - maybe he was in his 30s. He had a thin moustache and wore a sharp suit and had like a panama hat (which looked dead dashing to me at the time) and he said he would get me into show biz - the old story! He took me to London, but before long it was obvious (even to me) that the sort of work he had planned was not on the stage. I remember working in dance halls as a 'taxi dancer' dancing with men for money and probably doing a bit of prostitution on the side - which was sort of glamourous in its own way, at least compared with Manchester and the poverty and living with my depressed mother. At least I had some money and pretty dresses. I probably had some idea that I might turn this into a showbiz career given the right opportunity.
I remember going to Paris on a boat with this man, because Paris between the wars was absolutely booming and there was a lot of money to be made. I don't remember much about that, but I do remember dresses with beading, bars, dance halls, lots of drinking and exhaustion. Looking back it ought to have been terribly exciting, but I probably didn't appreciate it at the time. I remember looking at a woman singing jazz on stage in a beautiful blue dress and thinking whistfully I could never aspire to that sort of glamour. My mother became ill, maybe died, and WWII was coming so I went back to London. I had fallen out with my 'mentor' by this time - he used to beat me and I remember a lot of rows. Now I was on my own, and had given up my dreams of a show biz career.
[Doing the math - I'd have been born about (say) 1910 so when WWII broke out in 1939 I'd have been 29.]
I remember there was a bar in London I used to always hang out in and lots of servicemen of various persuasions - a sea of uniforms. It was a comparatively jolly time, really, despite the war, but I was pretty depressed and very worldly by this time and during the Blitz, I used to just keep working (business was brisk!) and hope that a bomb would come and put an end to it all. I was beginning to lose my looks by this time and drinking heavily - but so was everyone.
Two men stand out in that period, both in the air force. Two were upper crust sort of chaps and I believe I had some idea one of them might marry me (emotions ran high during that time with bombing raids and people not knowing if they were going to live or die any moment - perhaps various wreckless promises were made). One of them got killed (the one I really loved - X) in a bombing raid and I blamed the other because he was the leader of the squadron or something. I had told him to take special care. Perhaps I'd had some kind of premonition? I had some idea he did it out of spite, but probably not. (X has been killed young and tragically in more than one of my lives! Terribly accident prone, (or something!))
I told the survivor I was pregnant and wanted him to marry me but he just offered me money and I never saw him again (of course!). I remembered lying on my bed, crying hysterically over this after a furious row we'd had just before he stormed out throwing money at me.
I ended it all eventually, in the bath tub with a bottle of gin (an old wives method of dealing with such an inconvenient situation). My feeling is that I may have got half way through the bottle of gin and thought 'To hell with it!' and cut my wrists instead.
All terribly sad and sordid really. It took me a long time to come to terms with all that, but I can see aspects of my character in there - mostly aspects I have studiously tried to overcome in this life - weakness, self-pity and so on.
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