Edna Foster // Tracy Vincent

The 1970’s 

We run into the washing area and chase each other in and out of the sheets and clothes hanging on the lines that are assigned to each household. We hear the creak of the aluminium window frame as she opens the window and our pulses surge. “Get out of the washing area!”, she shrieks and we all leg it. 

Our game continues and I for one don’t want to be caught by Edna Foster, Mrs Foster, or just Foster as we knew her. Patrick can’t help himself and returns to the sheets. We’re all laughing and engrossed in our game and I’m enjoying, from a safe distance, the thrill of the risk that Patrick is taking. Then we hear the slap, slap, slap of her slippers on the lino tiles of the staircase as she descends from her maisonette. Anna and I shout to Patrick, “she’s coming!” but Patrick is still wrapped up in the sheet as if it were a tent. 

Anna and I retreat to a safe distance and watch as Foster marches into the space, the shouting bursting out from the confines of the hallway as she explodes from her door, causing Anna and I another thrill as we hid behind the wall at the end of the block. A tirade of chastisement ensued, “Patrick Stokes, how many times have I told you?! Get out of the washing area! I’m going to have a word with your mother!”, plus much else that I couldn’t make out, maybe even some expletives. A flamboyant, continuous word stream of annoyance. We were all scared of Foster, but also couldn’t help ourselves in our desire to wind her up. 

Patrick was marched up to his own front door. Tony, his Mom would listen to Foster and then issue a high pitched telling off, meant to deter us all from ever doing it again. We would be temporarily subdued. 

Later on, we would return to the quadrangle gate quietly. We would all be whispering and sniggering and daring each other to look. We would poke our heads around the corner and look to see if the window was still open. If it was, well we knew better than to “poke the dragon”, but we sometimes did just for the thrill, but today we waited until the window was closed before we ran through the washing again. 

The 1980’s 

I remember many, many times as a teenager returning home, having forgotten my key and being locked out. The first few times I would just sit on the doorstep and wait for my Mom to get home but then Mrs Foster spotted me one time and invited me to wait at hers. 

I remember as an awkward teen feeling uncomfortable at being invited into the sacred space that even as a child, I had not been permitted entry to. She would make me a sandwich and some juice. 

I can’t remember any of the conversations we had, but I can vividly remember the comforting sound of her voice. I was clearly in my very, very self-conscious phase and was mostly preoccupied with getting out of there the moment my Mom’s vehicle pulled up in the croft. I was probably in that phase where I had no opinions or confidence to express myself, so always found these encounters excrutiating. 

Mrs Foster was stoic in her kindness and generosity. I’m sure she understood. She never took my ingratitude personally and was always keeping an eye on me for the next time; which turned out to be many times, that I forgot my key so she could call out of the window for me to come and sit in the warm. 

2015 

Mom is chatting through the gaps in the fence with Foster who has come to the corner of the washing area and climbed up onto the ledge so that she can see Mom through the two-inch gaps between the slats. 

I go over to chat and after chewing the cud about life and kids for a while she questions, “How old do you think I am Trace?” I know that she is at least 10 years older than my Mom, so I do a quick bit of maths in my head and then I knock a few years off in case I get it wrong. I don’t want to offend her for thinking she’s older than she actually is. “Seventy?”, I reply, thinking she is probably mid 70s. “I’m 89 Trace!” she declares. “Bloody Hell!” I say whilst peering through the narrow gap at her smooth, silky, brown face, all plump and soft, some white hairs prickling her hairline that is mostly the deepest darkest brown, so as to appear almost black. “You have NO wrinkles!”, I blurt out, I had way more and I was in my mid-forties. “Black don’t crack Trace!” she replied. 

That was the last time I saw her. 

In loving memory of Edna Foster, forever in my heart. 

Tracy x