I like the beach and the coast….I’m a coastal girl really
I’m Val Norman, we moved to Tynemouth when I was 5 and when I was about 17, I was very quick to get me own place and that’s when I started living more inside North Shields. I was on Scorer Street, I’d finished college and I was working for a firm of solicitors, shorthand typing. I liked it because it was a council flat, it wasn’t like todays living, it was one bed little flat with me little kitchen and I loved it.
I mean neighbours were fine and it was a nice quite little street, people used it as a cut through to get to Hawkeys Lane, but it didn’t bother you because at night it was nice and quiet. Handy to get into Shields and shopping too.
I’ve got friends who live in a village outside Hexham and I love it there, it’s so peaceful, but the point is I like the beach and the coast. So it’s nice to go for long weekends to Hexham, but I’m a coastal girl really. I often get the bus to St Mary’s lighthouse and walk as far as I can back, because it’s all seats you can sit and rest, it’s just something about the sea, I can’t explain it I’ve always loved it.
North Shields Fish Quay © Ernest Storey
I like the fish quay. There’s just something about the atmosphere and the buzz. It’s not like it was when I was growing up, its very sort of elite now. But back in my day when you had all the fishermen and the smoke houses and the smell, I cannot go down to the fish quay and not get that memory in me head you know.
We need more retail shops, I can see it down Bedford Street in me head, that was the Gas Board that was the Co-op you know you got your Green Shield stamps. I would like to see more come back, Bonmarche, people like that, maybe a little supermarket.
I come here [The Meadows] because I originally worked here and I’ve stayed because I didn’t want to lose the links with the staff and friends. I really fought against retirement I didn’t want to lose this centre or people around me, and it took a while, but I realised I didn’t have to lose it I just had to get the bus, they’re here, they’re not going anywhere. Because before coming to the centre I didn’t really have a name, I just saw meself as a raggy doll didn’t really fit anywhere, but coming here I really found myself, they’re good people.
Val was interviewed as part of the North Shields 800 Voices project.