This issue features the Everall family, specifically Lorin Everall who, although born in Nottingham City Hospital, grew up in Barrow with her parents, Linda and David Everall, before buying her own home in Poppyfields. Lorin has spent much of the past year volunteering at a Covid testing station.
Lorin told me that she when she moved out of her parents’ home, she knew she wanted to stay in Barrow because “it’s a lovely place to live and I already felt settled and at home in the village”. She continued, “I really like living on Poppyfields, everyone is friendly and there’s a nice community feel”. She also knew that she wanted to get a dog and realised it would be helpful to live near to her parents who could dog-sit for her whilst she’s at work. Linda and David say they both adore Bramble! You may recognise Lorin from the ‘Which Pet? Which Owner?’ quiz in the Christmas issue of Barrow Voice. Bramble was the gorgeous honey-colour cockapoo.
Moving through Fourfold, to Hall Orchard, winning a place at Loughborough High School, Lorin went on to Newcastle University to study history. After graduating she successfully applied for a temporary recruitment administrative job at Boots’ head office in Nottingham, working on the recruitment of staff for Christmas, 2017. She was then offered a permanent role in retail recruitment of customer assistants; store managers and also No 7 beauty advisors; working her way up the corporate ladder and taking secondments to work on Boots’ partnerships with charities like Children in Need (which, she says, she absolutely loved); Macmillan and The Prince’s Trust. In January 2020 Lorin moved back to the Boots recruitment team and became a Recruitment Researcher. This means that she headhunts talent for roles across the organisation.
When the pandemic hit, Lorin initially moved to the Boots team that helped ensure that pharmacist vacancies were filled as quickly as possible then, at the end of May, she was furloughed but given the option of volunteering. “I knew I wanted to do my bit to help during the pandemic and to keep busy while I wasn’t working, so I said yes and was redeployed to the Birstall Park and Ride testing site at the beginning of June 2020”.
Her role at the testing site was to carry out Covid-19 swab tests on those that came in with symptoms. She was nervous on her first day but was trained to a high standard and the trainer made sure that all volunteers were really confident in conducting the tests before beginning to carry them out.
Lorin told me about her work:
“Whilst working we had to wear PPE in the form of an apron, a mask, a visor and gloves and there were strict rules to follow about how often to replace the items (for example gloves had to be changed after every test, and you had to sanitise before putting a new pair on). Overall, the PPE was fine as I got used to wearing it quite quickly, it was a bit uncomfortable on really hot days but there was air conditioning in the cabins we worked in which helped! My shifts were 07:30-14:00 and I would work for four days, then have four rest days, then four days on, four off etc.”
I was proud to be doing my bit to help support the NHS during the pandemic, and I was proud of how quickly I got to grips with the test. Some people were understandably a bit nervous, but after the test they would often say it wasn’t as bad as they thought it was going to be.
She returned to her ‘proper job’ in October but has been working from home. She misses her time and colleagues at the testing centre partly because of “the range of brilliant people working there”. Everyone, she told me, was really friendly and they all looked after each other.
Not to be outdone by their volunteering daughter, both her parents, Linda and David also volunteer. Linda, at the community library in Barrow, has been involved in delivering the click and collect service and home deliveries. Normally she also volunteers at the LOROS hospice in Leicester, but during the lockdown they have had to be very strict with who is going into the hospice. David volunteers at a LOROS record store in Leicester which really suits him as he’s passionate about music but, again with lockdown regulations, they aren’t currently open.
Life for Lorin has got back to a bit of normality and her main activity these days is walking with Bramble but if Covid regulations allow, she hopes to be trekking the Great Wall of China to raise money for Macmillan Cancer Support and the European Organisation for Research and Treatment of Cancer (EORTC). Her fundraising page can be found at: https://uk.virginmoneygiving.com/LorinEverall
Karisa Krcmar
Thank you to the Lorin Everall and her parents, Linda and David for their time and for agreeing to be Barrow’s second Featured Family.
If you would like your family to be featured, please do get in touch with the editor@barrowvoice.co.uk.
You may have been in Barrow for generations or have moved here recently. You may be a big family or be just one or two. It doesn’t
matter. You live in Barrow and it will be fun to build a picture of everyday families in the village.