Teaching held no fascination or excitement for me. I wanted to travel. I wanted to learn all the things I knew I didn't know for a full life rich in experiences. And I wanted it quickly. I'm a Gemini personality after all and we don't do things slowly.
A teaching diploma took four years to attain whereas a secretarial diploma took one year. Do the math. I opted to do the secretarial course.
It didn't last long though. Maybe five minutes. I knew I wasn't teacher material.
Off I went to learn typing, bookkeeping and shorthand. I have never regretted learning to type and can still work up quite a heat with speedy touch typing. I find it fun to type without looking and see how fast I can retype something without errors. My shorthand knowledge serves me well even now, but it murdered my used-to-be-neat handwriting. I haven't the patience for longhand anymore.
This is the type and age of typewriter I learned my skills on. The keys were fairly springy and stiff to press down which actually helped for better accuracy. You had to get the pressure correct so that the letters didn't come out either too light in colour or too dark with a ghost letter. Tipex ruled the day. Computer keyboards are a whizz to work with in comparison. They're light to the touch and speed is far easier to attain. Oh, and the delete button on computer keyboards is just magic!
When it became clear, in my second-to-last year at school, that I was to be a secretary I charmed both my father and headmistress into letting me give up mathematics and take bookkeeping instead. The problem was that I would have to study and pass four years of bookkeeping knowledge in less than eighteen months. I did it with the help of extra lessons once a week. It was an excellent decision because by the age of twenty-three I was running my own business and that knowledge was very valuable.
My lot was not all bad. If I had been able to go to University I would have studied law. My grandfather had been a Judge and my father an Accountant who thought like a lawyer. Being influenced by my father's way of thinking in official matters, I was attracted by the challenge of fitting all the pieces of relevant law together to make a final outcome, different in each case. Luckily for me, I got the first job I applied for as a secretary at a firm of attorneys. I was on my way to learning a bit about legal procedures and information which have served me well to this day.
Life in an office has changed incredibly since the early '70s when I walked into the first job I applied for. Fax machines hadn't made an appearance by then, let alone computers. We didn't need a knowledge of various computer programmes for us to function well on typewriters and I don't think electrical typewriters had been around for that long either. I was set to work on a manual typewriter and only progressed to an electric typewriter when I became a personal secretary to one of the junior attorneys a couple of months after joining the firm.
I was over the moon with my one hundred and thirty Rand monthly salary and started saving immediately to go traveling. These days I am sad to find out that ZAR130.00 is less than €9.00 and just over $10.00.
Being the eager beaver that I am, I wanted to join my cousin and his friends on his planned camping trip around Europe the year after I began work. That gave me sixteen months to save enough money and my salary at the attorney's office was not going to do it alone.
For that year I worked at five jobs. Apart from being an 8am to 5pm secretary, I modeled part-time (ah, the days of slim eighteen year old figures); using my aunt's portable typewriter, I typed up a book manuscript for an aspiring author; worked as an evening teller at a Golden Egg fast-food restaurant; and as a Sunday receptionist in an estate agent's office. Those were the days of youthful high energy.
Me in May 1974 in Edinburgh, a month before my 20th birthday
I did it. In those sixteen months I managed to save enough money to join my cousin for an incredible few months traveling Europe. I worked in London and Scotland as well ... but that's a story for next time.
Au revoir
Lynda