Stewart Wellings, outdoor instructor & key worker

“With what we’ve learned, we can build a new inclusive society for all”

Moving to the Shropshire countryside 18 years ago, my Latina wife Liliana and two Anglo-Peruvian toddler children Ali and Matty grew up here, the first (and still only BAME children) in the area.

I had met my wife whilst working as a trek leader in South America but then 9/11 happened. If I was serious about being a father and a husband, I had already realised this work was unsustainable: you can’t be away for months on end. With more training I became a freelance outdoor instructor.

The work was brilliant – working in the landscape with children and young adults ‘at risk’ who learned what they were capable of as they journeyed through the Cairngorms; or ‘Three Peaking’ with charity challenge groups; or weekday climbing sessions at Llanymynech only 25 minutes from home.

The work-life balance was there now: there was time and energy enough too that our children grew up knowing the outdoors – camping, bothying, walking, cycling and climbing. The outdoors was our friend and protector, facilitating our leisure and allowing us to grow together as a bi-cultural, bi-lingual family that really, just like everyone else, just wanted to have fun.

And this was how things continued. I stayed, precariously, as a freelance outdoor instructor seeing income shrink after the 2008 crash but always being prepared to take on any additional casual work available. Then illness and injury left me with a new hip, knee and shoulder. Physiotherapy and rehabilitation meant adapting, juggling, compromising and working hard.

Keeping a dialogue with and having employers that understood meant I could still play my full part. Liliana kept us strong and assimilated well into the community, working for the NHS. Ali gained a scholarship to a local international school and then university and Matty blossomed into a fine young man.

And that’s how we continued as we grew up in Britain. My 2020 diary was full, things were looking peachy. However, as we all know a government announcement regarding coronavirus on March 17th proved otherwise. Two days later was my last day of outdoor instructing, the centre had to close. I was laid off and paid off for what I had done, all other work canceled too.

These big problems made managing stress and anxiety a difficult trick to do. The pent up energy for the coming season had to be immediately channeled differently. I’m used to applying for jobs and in that first scary week many applications were sent out and an ear kept to the ground for what was available locally. But within a week I was successful. “I can start now if you like”, I said.

I was now a ‘key worker’, a delivery driver for Morrisons. Literally loads to learn. I remembered skills are transferrable: lifting boxes in and out of the van required not only strength and agility but also dexterous handheld keyboarding skills to keep organised.

The route was now an orienteering challenge with a deadline! Tact and diplomacy with the customers were the soft skills. I sold it to myself – I was getting paid and serving my community: another pair of eyes and ears helping keep people safe. I felt part of something positive and daily we adjusted to our ‘new normal’. Always, though, in the back of my mind is the thought that this is temporary, that ‘we’ would ‘win’ and that my mad precarious freelance existence would return.  

Maybe it will and maybe it won’t. Bad things and good things are both temporary. Resilience and strength of character are hard-won personal traits and will carry you through, but can they be learned or are they hard-won, over time?

I have always told my kids ‘we are all stronger than we realise’. They have proved me right, despite their own disappointments this year (A-Level exams and finishing a degree in Law) they’ve stayed pragmatic. But, as BAME have they felt marginalised? As humans their lifelong learning from the outdoors has kept them strong, centred, empathetic, but ambitious.  Their hopes and dreams (and mine) are still alive!

All together now, I believe, with what we’ve learned from this, we can rebuild a real new inclusive society for all.