Sellers Revisited.
I once worked at a place called Sellers Engineers which is a often described as “An Oasis Of Happiness In An Unhappy World” and is situated down Chapel Hill from Huddersfield about 500 yards on the right.
It is a major manufacturer of Textile finishing machinery and other bespoke items, in fact from my experience they could design a machine to do almost anything, though if you take each individual character there in isolation you would be unimpressed.
It is one of the few companies that seems to have a hive mentality, that is the sum of the efforts of all its employees greatly exceeds the sum of each individual, which is perhaps just as well.
I myself started work there in the summer of 1988 when I was a student at York University doing a degree in Theoretical Physics, I was in between year 1 & 2 of the three year course and my dad, Wonderwood managed to get me a job working initially in the joiners shop under the small empire of Chuckles/All But Smithy and his assistant Dashing Dave.
Anyway I started work full time there as a Laborer in the Progress Department as a subordinate to Darth Vader and Disappearing Derek in April 1991 just as the appropriately titled Madonna Song “Rescue Me” was peaking in the charts at No3.
Looking back I was suffering from clinical depression which had gradually got worse from 1987 until 1991 when I started at this place of refuge and it was really this safe haven that saved me.
I worked there a total of 9 years and still consider them to be some of the best memories I have in my life, I still have very vivid dreams of being chased round the works with a bloke who would soon to become my new boss called “The Balloon Warden” and later “The Failed Fitter”.
I also had two other companions in the lowest of the low the progress, these were “Born 2B Wild” who has since passed to the spirit world and “Mr Myoyghi” who I seriously owe amends to but have never been able to track him down since I wrote “Life After Sellers” about him.
But the main thing about me that made me stand out with my head above the precipice was my obsession with writing “Stories” and “Newsletters” about the company which were initially actively encouraged by the hierarchy and then subsequently put up with.
My first major success was “Tour Of Sellers” in February 1998 and after this I usually spawned another title every week which were encouraged and read by just about everyone on the shop floor.
In October 2000 I produced my last title called “The Precipice” and after that two things occurred, my hard disk crashed on my old decrepit computer loosing the entire catalogue and secondly due to the gradual shift from the lightness of my old stories to the darker and more sideous nature of my later ones the then directors had decided enough was enough.
I was made redundant November 20th 2000 by Captain Beaky and Captain Morecambe and was left in a long slide ionto the depths of despair and alcoholism.
In the following four years I managed somehow to find another job at Marshalls but I suffered every imaginable dark emotion and the ultimate depths of alcoholic despair as I handed my life over to the Dark Gods of Alcohol and Cannabis.
This all culminated in me admitting defeat and raising my white flag and joining the wonderful AA on 30th August 2004 to start a journey to a life beyond my wildest dreams.
Anyway now its September 2006 and I am happily employed as a Despatch & Purchasing Administrator for Hansons – one of the biggest companies in the world at one of their many sites situated at Swillington, where I keep a Daily Blog of the Daily Grind at http://madmickstories3.blogspot.com/
So what is the point of this quick diversion in to my history during the last 20 years of my life, well on Saturday 23rd September 2006 I revisited Sellers in order to collect a ramp for my dad (Wonderwoods) shed.
You see my 9 years working there was only a fraction of my dads 30 plus years as an employee and he was trajically struck down about ten years ago with Parkinsons Disease and lost is job as a result (probably) of this the same time I did.
He finds no a days he is not too good on his pins and uses a mobility scooter to get around but was having a few problems getting it in and out of his shed in his back garden so had asked the 168 hour man if he could make him one.
On first driving into the grounds I was astonished to find that All But Smithy’s Joiners Empire had thrived against all comparison with the rest of the departments, the entire tin shop was taken over with timber spilling into what was once the main car park.
Surely in this day and age people were moving away from wood as a raw material but all the evidence said otherwise and was further backed up when I poked my head through the wicket door which acts as a side entrance to what was once the Machine Shop where I had spent many happy hours playing when Wally gave me the keys to the toybox.
I just could not believe it, the entire tin shop and machine shop were packed in like sardines displacing what was once the Tele-tubbie Paint Shop completely.
I had brought my dad, Luke (my now 12 year old son), Miss Boley (my five year old labrodor) and The Committee (my 13 year old niece) along with me for the drive and Luke and The Committee accompanied me on top of the steps as I shouted to a nearby Tin Snips if it was okay for us all to come in.
A feeling of intense deja vue came over me as I spied my old boss The Failed Fitter wondering over to what looked like the new Fabrication Office with his hand still glued to his much greyer head.
The Failed Fitter seemed determined to pretend not to notice my presence and I never saw him again after he entered the little office, presumably he was hidden below the level of the windows on his hands and knees praying that my visit would be brief.
I think in retrospect over the 9 years I was employed there maybe 8 ¾ years he was my boss as he took over from Disappearing Derek only a matter of months after I started my employment and Derek disappeared into the drawing office to gradually get thinner.
The feeling of nostalgia got more and more pronounced as me, Luke and The Committee wondered from cubicle to cubicle looking for the 168 hour mans cubicle and we saw Mutley, Barny Rubble, Red Riding Hood and my dads replacement Step Reebok before we found The 168 hour man hard at work dreading the next few weeks when the clocks go forward and he can only manage to work 167 hours in the space of a week.
The 168 hour man even carried the heavy plate out to the car with me where we found my dad having an attempt at a conversation with Tin Snips which was being rudely interrupted by Miss Boleys complaints that the guy my dad was talking to had not yet had the initiation ceremony to be part of the pack.
I left my dad chatting while me, Luke and The Committee went to seek out the works Gossip Queen, aka Renta Gob the one and only Laa-Laa though he had quite a variety of pseudonyms in his past.
Laa Laa was one of the few people who talked to me in my early years at Sellers when “The lights were on but no one was home” so I always feel a strong affinity with him, he is a really caring person and could almost me described as a woman for the multitude of emotions he exhibits and his gift of the gab.
He immediately reminisced about how Luke and The Committee had grown since he had last laid eyes on them which must have been some eight years previous, as he approached me covered in bits of Silver and green paint from his spray booth.
He had now found himself cooped up in a new building that was hastily assembled during the re-opening of the canal which I just missed out on witnessing the end of.
He told me how times had changed since I had left and how the order book was at its most healthy for over ten years with lead times of nine months being quoted for new machines.
He said the last machine Sellers had built was flown out on a military cargo plane for carrying tanks at a vast expense of $155,000 it was wanted so urgently and that soon the entire works was to be moved to a location that is surrounded in deep mystery.
He added that the workforce had shrunk dramatically and Tinky Winky had retired long since to end his years switching the channels of his TV remote control but Poe (also known as The Crow, John Ballcock and a member of the magic roundabout which escapes me now) was due to retire imminently but is staying on into his retirement.
I told him I was now employed at Hansons Plc at a site in Swillington and even showed off my Hanson Credit Card which I added can you ever imagine old Captain Beaky letting me loose with one of these.
I told him how Sellers and Alcohol had brought me literally to my knees and I was reduced to waking at 4am and swigging a couple of cans of extra strength lager before heading off to my new place of work and how the Sales director had to bring me back home on numerous occasions when I was found wondering round the quarry in a drunken stupor.
At this point we were joined by All But Smithy who was en-route to the refuge skip on my old electric truck and I felt transported back far into the past like the 6 years in between me leaving my heart broken and today had never happened.
I could feel that insane Sellers Grin taking over me and also my son Luke and The committee were finding themselves enveloped by it, we discussed my very early days at Sellers when I was a rather severely depressed student.
All But Smithy agreed he could remember very vividly this extremely weird and self conscious individual coming to work for him and Laa Laa agreed that when I worked in the Paint Shop I never talked to anyone and would spend all day grinding castings before sitting and having my dinner “on the trestles” in all the muck.
Dipsy was next to join us, you know the West Indian Chap who was a failed member of the machine shop and was lost in his own world before discovering a whole new world in the fumes of gunwash, he is in fact the third current member of the Teletubbies under Laa Laa as a subordinate.
I was first alerted to his presence by a insane sounding shout of “Michoooool” from the vicinity of the River Colne which runs adjacent to the side of the works a greeting which had been earlier echoed by Laa Laa.
I made polite excuses to Laa Laa and All But Smithy and me Luke and The Committee joined Dipsy for a tour of the Fitting Department, a quick glance back at the car assured me my dad and a grumbling Miss Boley had plenty of company from my dads old subordinates.
Dipsy took mke over to the notice board in The Fitting, which had lots of photos of current employees that had been altered using “Funhouse” software to increse, the size of certain features of their face and they were absolutely hilarious.
The Committee my 13 year old niece enquired where Magicman was and was very disappointed to find that he very rarely worked Saturdays now a days.
The Fitting department looked virtually empty, and was probably severely undernourished with parts due to the massive bottleneck caused by the huge increase in size of All But Smithys Empire squeezing all manufacture into the machine shop.
The Incredible Hulk came over to join Dipsy, myself, Luke and The Committee near the notice board to fill me in on any more details about the history of what had occurred since I had been dismissed on that cold November day back in year 2000.
He said that the Supreme Captain was now back at the reins of the company after the brief attempt by Morecambe and Wise to run the show and he allegedly went up the wall across the ceiling and down the other side when he found out they were quoting 9 month lead times on there new machines.
He immediately started advertising for new labour and added that if I wanted my old job back it would be gladly given to me for three main reasons;
a)
It was very difficult to get anyone to work with the Failed Fitter for very long before suffering a nervous breakdown and since I had managed it for over 8 years I was well qualified for the job, the post is now filled “temporarily” by Phil Collins who is well on the was to acute schizophrenia now.
b)Other than such labourers as “Born To Graft” and co producing wobbly pictures of a selected number of characters there was very little in the way of entertainment round here anymore and he feels that if I returned the place would be instantly rewarded by the ultimate medicine – laughter
c)Finally that even Captain Beaky who I had just missed is getting bored with the carry on, he has no one to complain about for coming in late and inebriated and could really do with someone to keep him on his toes.
Indeed Captain Beaky had been in that very morning, the last time I saw him was in the Pack Horse Centre in Huddersfield where we hugged each other like old friends before he regained his Big Brother like composure and asked me if I had stopped smoking yet.
Just before I left to go back into the real world The Incredible Hulk made sure that Luke and The Committee were looking after me properly.
On arriving back at the car I found The Chairman Of The Mass Debating Society and Tin Snips trying to keep my dad calm and assure him that I had probably just got a bit lost and would make my way back shortly and sure enough I returned looking a little starry eyed having been catapulted back in time six years.
I told The Chairman Of The Mass Debating society I was now treasurer of the AA at Thongs bridge church in Holmfirth and was actively following the twelve steps to heaven and other than that and my daily medication I was nearly fully recovered from my addiction to this crazy place.
However like any addiction, just one hit can bring it all back and for the last two nights the crazy dreams have returned and I keep waking up sweating from a mind in turmoil as pictures from the past have returned to haunt me.
But seriously I am glad that the place continues to survive, it certainly brought me back from the pit of depression and made me able at least to pass for human in the craziness of the real world.
