Legacy
Legacy
Please note: this post is 96 months old and The Cares Family is no longer operational. This post is shared for information only
Social club regular John had an amazing childhood at the sea – and his career and curiosity has taken him from printing posters for The Beatles to rubbing shoulders with Mr Men’s creator in Guernsey. At 78 he still loves to learn: he’s about to embark on a blacksmithing course. John's been coming to South London Cares’ social clubs for two years: he’s found that like him, his younger neighbours are curious, passionate and keen to meet people. We caught up with him to find out more about his love of learning and what social clubs mean to him.
John has always been adventurous. He joined Sea Training School at 13 (he’s the back right hand boy holding the flag), and there learnt all things navigation: signalling, Morse, semaphore and flags. He also discovered a talent (and love) for playing the drum, performing in many a local carnival.
He continued his career with the forces into the mid 1960s, but his ambitions of becoming a pilot were unexpectedly and devastatingly dashed when he failed the medical for being colourblind. “I was mad about flying. But it wasn’t to be”.
Not to be deterred from adventure - and with characteristic positivity, in 1965 John embarked on a colourful new career in commercial printing. His work allowed him to live all over the world, from Cyprus to Swindon. He's also lived on a canal boat in Oxford!
A spell living in Guernsey even saw him becoming good friends with his next-door neighbour, the Mr Men creator, Roger Hargreaves. It was also in his Guernsey local that he secured his next big career change: “I was chatting away to a guy in the pub and he offered me a job in the insurance business just like that. I had no real experience, but life back then was all about community connections." He's since found that community in London: both in his days working for TFL on the buses, and more recently, through South London Cares' social clubs:
“[They're] all about chatting to people… interaction is a vital part of life and when you’re not working, you suddenly realise it’s much harder to meet people and facilitate any kind of conversation.”
John is a true believer in the power of community, and emphasises it’s always been at the centre of his approach to life. Some of his fondest memories are of the safari style dinners he organised with his friends in Guernsey. “We used to have parties where you had a starter at one house, the main at another house, the sweet at another house and then finally a drink (or two) at the last person’s house. It was just brilliant.”
After attending SLC's tech workshops, he’s also a keen part of the online community: “I’m on Facebook and I often see comments on South London Cares posts from my daughters – they’re quite jealous of all the activities I get up to with SLC."
John's the first person to root out his Bob Marley top for a reggae social club or don his favourite Hawaiian shirt for one of our summer celebrations. Outside of social clubs, John is also a keen baker (he even baked SLC a birthday cake last year!) and is currently busy writing his life’s history.
If you can’t wait for the book to come out though, why not come and get to know John at a social club soon?