5.45: Woke by birds.
5.55: Alarm clock rings and husband gets up to make tea – gas means no waiting about. I wonder whether I look fat and think about how much husband hates his job. After cup of tea make husband’s lunch.
6.40: See him [husband] off to work.
6.50: Eldest son wakes up followed by the twins. Arrange flowers and send youngest back to their room to keep them out the way while I do house jobs but, better let come done and not whine, say I.
7.05: Sent Norman, my 9 year old son, to get milk from the dairy.
7.45: Start ironing. Must sandwich this in somehow with all the other jobs to do.
8.20: Eldest son goes to work.
8.30: Finished flowers, in between ironing and cutting bread and jam.
10.00: General tidying upstairs.
11.00: Clean dining room.
11.30: More ironing. Friend comes with fried fish for lunch, she [her neighbour] has made the last few years bearable.
12.20: Himself [her husband] comes home and demands his tea – but he does help with tidying.
1.05: Eldest son comes but I forgot he has to be back at work for two so had to rush some fried fish to the table and bread and jam for his afters. Tell him he can have pudding for tea. He says ‘O.K’. Good job he’s good tempered. Gives me his wages.
1.45: Family sit down for lunch.
2.20: Clear away lunch and husband washes up. I tidy dining room. Hectic scramble to wash twins. Wash and dress the children in best clothes.
3.10: Mother arrives.
4.00: Wash and change my clothes. Send Norman to get biscuits for tea as I have no time for scones as planned. Husband goes to local town.
5.30: Clear up tea, mother washes up and then asks for clothing that needs mending.
7.00: Put son’s friend on bus to take him home and put twins to bed.
8.00: Fly along to little general shop for last minute shopping. Meet him [her husband] coming back from Bromley on bike.
9.30: Mother goes to bed, followed by Norman.
10.00: Go to pub with husband for one drink. Get home and have supper at same time as eldest son arrives home.
In contrast to 2000, where people talked in terms of hot and cold spots over which they have some capacity to manage and re-order practices, the diarists of 1937 present temporal rhythms that were dictated by the requirements of paid and unpaid work. Leisure and consumption fitted around work practices on all days; by 2000 there was a sense that leisure and work have their own rhythms which have equal weight or significance in the temporal organization of daily life.
Re-ordering Temporal Rhythms
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