Thursday, 1 February 2007

Feeling better

I had a good night’s sleep and Jackie let me have a lie in – waking me at 7:45 with tea and a hot bath. Bobby again accompanied me on the journey and we listened to Nirvana Unplugged.

Sue called during the journey to say we still hadn’t received a letter from the Big Lottery. I arrived at the office at 10:00 am and immediately called up Fiona for her confirmation that our bid had failed. Fiona wasn’t available. I groaned and left a message for her to call back. I thought: “I can cope with failure, its hope I can’t stand” (surely there must be a grander origin to this quote than John Cleese).

Feeling much better

Fiona rang within just a few minutes. She said that we had made it through to the “second round”. I was rather slow to absorb this news saying, “Oh, that’s very nice”. I think Fiona was a bit disappointed, and felt obliged to cheer me up further by saying what a very good application we had put together. Eventually I mustered some enthusiasm and managed to say how happy I was and then to ask what “round two” actually meant: was our chance of being funded now one-in-four? Or one-in-eight? Fiona told me that provided we completed the business plan and everything was satisfactory, we would almost certainly receive funding for our new project. I was of course delighted but I know this didn’t communicate itself very well to Fiona.

Fiona told me that in future I would be dealing with another grants officer as she was off to do two years with Voluntary Service Overseas. I wished her well and suddenly felt that I was losing a close friend.

After putting down the telephone, I informed the other WCVS staff and everyone was delighted: the grant represents job security, a stable platform for growth, improved services for our members, and a significant advance for Watford. Why wouldn’t we all be delighted?

My next concern was to tell, or not to tell. I knew that Three Rivers CVS had been successful, but how had the other CVSs in Herts fared? A few quiet telephone calls revealed that south west Herts had swept the board in the county. Everyone else had drawn a disappointing blank. Lottery rules forbid any “publicity” about the award before the Lottery themselves issue a press release. Surely a private blog can’t count as publicity?

For the rest of the day, there were smaller things to deal with: a briefing from Steph for next week’s HIC meeting, a discussion with Andrew Burt about Herts Compact, a talk with Sue about Fire Safety, an e-mail exchange with Linda at the Disability Law Service about the intriguing web-site https://implicit.harvard.edu/implicit/, and preparations for the evening’s trustees’ meeting.

The trustees’ meeting went superbly. Of course trustees were buoyed by the news from the Lottery, but even allowing for this it was a remarkably well-run meeting. We agreed a new membership policy and I have acquired a new Treasurer - Sylvia from the Womens' Centre. Pam managed to complete the business in 75 minutes: it was a masterclass in the art of chairing.