Going the journey.

A play in one scene.

The scene takes place on a Northern bus en route in County Durham.( Some Durham Dialect is used. Translation is available upon request.)

Cast
Kitty. (No description required.)
Old lady #1 Annie. (A large lady with a blue rinse.)
Old lady #2 Flo. (A thin lady with a knitted hat.)

Scene 1
Kitty is seated at the front of the bus. Behind her sit the two old ladies. Kitty is looking out of the window.
Kitty thinks to herself (voice over) “If I was to take a swab of this seat and hand rail, I wonder what bacteria would show up in the lab.?” She takes the alcohol hand gel out of her handbag. She scrubs her hands in the same way a surgeon would.

Old lady #1 Annie.
“I say, Flo?”

Old lady #2 Flo
“Aye, hinney?.”

Old lady #1 Annie
“How’s your Eddie doin’? Last time I saw you he wasn’t all that canny, was he?”

Old lady #2 Flo
“ Nah! Eee, pet, he hasn’t been all that clever since he had that operation. He’s never been reet since. It’s his hips y’knaa? He had a hip joint seen to in January. They said he’d never walk reet again?”

Old lady #1 Annie
“ He’s never had much luck, poor lad!”

Old lady #2 Flo
“ Nah! Well, he has that diabetes an’ all. He can’t see because of it, it made him gan blind.Too much of that sugar! I put him on a diet, but he’s so fussy, he wouldn’t eat it. I said to him..C’mon love, you’ve gotta try. He just refused.”

(Kitty settles back into her seat. She is listening intently to the conversation behind her. Her head is tilted slightly to one side, so she can hear better.)

Old lady #1 Annie
“ Never! How is he now?”

Old lady #2 Flo
“ Well, he’s had trouble with his...Y’knaa..his...water-works. His plumbing isn’t what it was, put it that way. He get’s ever so embarrassed aboot it, like. He can’t help it. He can’t make it up the stairs at night either. I tried to help him up, like, but it was too much for him in the end. He’s taken to sleeping on the couch in the living room.”

(Kitty feels a pang of sympathy for Old lady #2 Flo...and thinks...”I wonder if I should offer some advice from a medical point of view, poor love needs some extra help. I wonder if there is someone that she can be referred on to.”)

Old lady # 1 Annie
“ Eeh! Flo! That’s terrible! He’s gone doon hill that fast. Mind you, they say that a creaking gate hangs on the longest!”

Old lady #2 Flo
“Knaa ,hinney! It’s not lookin’ so good for him, like.”

Old lady #1 Annie
“Eeh! Pet! Whatcha ganna dee, like?”

Old lady #2 Flo
“I’m thinkin’ of helping him out of his pain..if y’knaa what I mean...”

Old lady #1 Annie
“Never in the world! It’s come to that, like has it? It’s that bad?”

Old lady #2 Flo
“ Aye...I’m takin’ him to the Vets the morrow, he’s gettin’ put to sleep...after all, he is 14!”

(Kitty thinks...Stuff the germs!...and presses the bell...”Next stop please!”)