Audio Description

Nicola’s Selby Connection

Journey from feeling like an outsider in her childhood and difficult relationship with parents, to feeling of acceptance in adulthood.

Nicola’s Selby Story

‘I Wasn’t Lost, I Just Hadn’t Found Myself’

My childhood: was very insular, we had a close family. Schools and friends were transient. Dad was there but very involved with work, Mum was unwell a lot of the time.

My adolescence: involved too many changes, a lot of loneliness and fear. I had difficulty making friends and keeping up at school. School friends didn’t believe I came from Hong Kong. There was pressure to go to uni but I didn’t want another upheaval so I deliberately failed my exams so I wouldn’t have to. 

I had met my husband by this point so he became my world. My parents were very angry with me and saw me as a failure – I disappointed them.

My adulthood: Tony and I grew up together after we met – our lives started again. We made our own way despite disapproval from parents. He had come through a very difficult time. Pink Floyd’s Wish You Were Here is a song we both resonate with. 

We married and had five children. More disapproval from my family. Although there has been SO much disapproval levelled at me and Mum and Dad said I would never achieve anything, I have brought up five kids without any help. Tony worked away a lot. 

I sat with my dad when he was dying, looked after mum and sat with her when she was dying too. 

I looked after my mother-in-law and she lived with us for six years. I also cared for her when she was dying. 

I feel I have found my way in life. 

I was lost and found my way through family. 

In fact, I wasn’t lost, I just hadn’t found myself.

Coda: I’m really excited that I am arriving at another stop on this journey homeward, what seems like a simple thing has helped me to explore feelings about myself and the past fifty years since arriving in Selby.

One part of my story that I haven’t shared yet is how after many years, well into my mid-forties, I finally found my voice and how singing has allowed me to express myself.

When my Mum died in 2012 I wanted to give a parting gift that reflected some of my feelings, like so many things in life there is a much more detailed picture that emerges as one looks.

As part of a music exam my daughter had to sing the title song from the Jim Steinman/Andrew Lloyd-Webber musical Whistle Down the Wind. As she continued to practice the song became a bit of an ear-worm so it was implanted somewhere in my brain.

My Mum took ill very suddenly while at hospital for a minor operation and so her rapid demise was a shock to all the family. I found myself waiting at her bedside as she entered the final stages of her life as I waited in turn for the arrival of my two brothers travelling from the North-West.

Mum was heavily sedated but I knew from previous nursing of a dying person – my Dad – that it is said that hearing is one of the last senses to fail and I instinctively started to sing Whistle Down The Wind to her.

My Mum was not a spiritual person and neither are most of my family – unlike me – so a religious aspect to her funeral would not have been appropriate. However, I wanted to share something with everyone that could convey my feelings.

I knew that I wouldn’t be able to hold it together at the service but my husband organised a recording session and a very good, very musically talented friend accompanied me.

If you listen carefully you can hear some of the recording in the music for this piece.

The strange thing is that, although I only found out in later years, the term ‘whistle down the wind’ means ‘to let things go to their own fate’. How fitting for what had been a difficult relationship in many ways.

After reflecting on all of this again, I can see it’s a journey not only in a physical sense – moving from Hong Kong to Selby – but also a journey where I have tried to understand my Mum. In a roundabout way I think it was only in her old age and illness that I finally got her approval.

Character Sketch and Collage