Key Workers

I am a key worker. This is something of a technicality rather than an accurate definition of the role I play. I work in the transport industry, so I am automatically swept up into the category of essential workers required to keep society functioning. I even have a letter from the railways to produce should I be stopped by the police.

When the applause starts up for key workers, please don’t feel that you need to produce one extra clap for me. As a ticket office clerk, my presence really isn’t crucial in ensuring the safe running of the railway. My roster shows that in the first four weeks of lockdown, I worked just two shifts.

Even then, to say I ‘worked’ is a bit of a gross overstatement. I dealt with just one customer each shift. Ticket offices are now open three days a week and every other Sunday. This week I have three shifts. Next week I might have anything from none to three shifts.

There are benefits to being a key worker. If I’m in uniform, I need not queue to enter supermarkets. I can go straight in. But even if no one else is to know what a trivial part I’m playing, I’d feel too much of a fraud. So whether I’m in uniform or not, I join the queue.

Yesterday I drove a hundred metres up the road to get the laundry put through the laundrettes driers. I parked in the car park and went to pay my pound. Then I saw the sign. My hand wavered, my fingers unsure of what to do with the coin.

I put the coin back in my pocket. I might not be crucial, but I am getting out of bed at 5am three mornings a week. Car parks at the moment are all 90% empty, so I’m not depriving any genuine key worker from grabbing a spot. I’m allowed one treat aren’t I, in these troubled times?