Eileen
featuring
Sinead McConville
written & produced by George Moorey & Shane Young
artwork by Zariq Rosita Hanif
Eileen is an incredible octogenarian. She retains a sharp wit and keen intelligence that have served her through a life well lived. She grew up in Croydon and I grew up in nearby Wallington so when she told me of her life as a child I knew everywhere she described. I can see the wonderful person she is now in the smile and sparkle in the eyes of the little girl in the photos. The test audio in the earlier post today is from “Eileen"
She talked about digging an allotment with her mum and dad during WW2 and a German plane dropped a bomb on it killing their neighbour. That incident was the start of her mum's unravelling mental health. Her dad worked for the British government so wasn't conscripted. They built an Anderson shelter in the garden where they spent many nights during the Blitz. Eventually she was evacuated to Wiltshire to stay with her uncle, aunt and cousins while her parents stayed in Croydon.
I commissioned an artist friend Zariq to illustrate each song. In the artwork Eileen's holding a chicken because she had a phobia of feathers and in the song we included a lyric about her cousins playfully locking her in the chicken shed when she was evacuated from Croydon to The countryside around Swindon. You can see the Anderson shelter behind her where her family would go during air raids. She's also holding lots of books, more about those later….
Eileen has written and self-published many books - as illustrated in Zariq's sketch - on all sorts of subjects. Very few people buy her books now, but she says that doesn't matter so long as it keeps her mind nimble and curious.
