Doodlebug

As a little boy my grandfather talked to me about the Second World War and about living in South East London. He talked about the doodlebugs. The German V1 rocket was first launched against Britain in 1944. You could hear them coming, the whining jet engines driving them across the sky. He said that no one was bothered until the engine stopped and it all went quiet. It was only when the noise stopped that you knew that they were going to fall to earth and your life might change for ever.

That was how it felt at work today. When I came in the corridors were piled with boxes and junk for disposal. There was a strange and subdued atmosphere with an underlying hint of tension. A lot of people were going on holiday after today, and talking about taking winter clothes with them on Easter breaks. I thought of Eliot's Journey of the Magi: "a cold coming we had of it". Through the window the sky was heavy and the river Mole looked grey and swollen.

I went out with my old team for one last lunch and afterwards there was the final organisational briefing or stand up as we called it. There were presentations for a charity challenge, flowers for the Chief Executive and some reminiscence about the 6 1/2 years of the organisation. There were smiles and nods but as the group broke up they dissolved like petals on a wet spring day.

We did a small separate presentation for a team member going off on a different direction to the rest of us. She cried. Walking out, I came across another colleague in tears with yet more flowers mourning the loss of things she had worked hard to build, now discarded. Groups stood around looking shell shocked, realising it really was now nearly all over. Two and a half long years of graft with little sense of achievement. But people have tried so hard and been so professional. You wanted to weep for them.

We've been so terribly busy, too busy really to be anything but stressed, tired and angry. Today, briefly, the noise stopped. It was a day of flowers and hugs and short goodbyes. Today for a while it all went quiet, and we were sad.