Chapter One
The Donkey Derby
Without a Christmas number one my life would be meaningless. I have them all. From the very first day my life changed forever. Vinyl discs of unlimited joy. They comfort me.
‘Long haired lover from Liverpool’ - Jimmy Osmond - Christmas number one for five weeks -1972.
Mother said I was ready.
‘Doesn’t he look lovely, it’s this month’s colour. That Ted Heath’s got wonderful bone structure you know and what a fabulous chuckle. It’s more topaz than anything else. I’m thinking of having the kitchen done out in it’
Mother dressed me in beige. Beige shirt, beige vest, beige socks, beige trousers, beige pants. I suppose I can count myself lucky that my lunar landscape had been lit up with the aid of a pair of my cousin’s orange Gola trainers. Were it not for them I would barely have been visible to the naked eye when clambering into the back seat of our mustard coloured Austin 1100.
Father sat motionless, a flaccid Park Drive hanging down from his lower lip; Sister gurgling to herself and dribbling Cow and Gate carrot and Beef Casserole; Mother her tube of Yardley Lavender hand cream firmly in hand, sucked in what little air remained from our oven on wheels and began to conduct Father through a maze of A roads and road side cafes, whilst lambasting him for slouching and not sitting up straight.We were leaving the safety of home and the threat of everything beige and heading to a world that laughed in the face of topaz. As Father remained silent whilst being berated for loosening his tie and removing his Harris Tweed sports jacket, Sister continued to regurgitate and Mother barked orders in between coming up from her Readers Digest, I tried to free myself from the one length leather back seat that my buttocks were sticking to, dressed as I was in my one hundred percent polyester David Attenborough Safari number that the manufacturers had neglected to install outlets for ventilation.
The sun shone directly into my eyes for the entire three hours and twenty seven minutes that it took Father to navigate his way to the Promised Land. A pained look of constipation etched itself across my creased and overheated face; the sun relentless in its disregard.
‘If you soil yourself again William…. Denys sit up straight’.
Mother was far more anxious about the damage I may cause the polyester and what people might think if they caught a glimpse of Father not sitting at exactly ninety degrees than any overwhelming concern for the state of my bowels. As we entered through the towering gates I wound down my window and stuck my head out just enough to hear tranquillity shattered. Exhausted, a little constipated (as yet unsoiled) and with my arm about to drop off due to the exertion needed for operation window release, my ears were suddenly invaded by an overwhelming array of metal tannoys that sprouted from every tree and building flowering with the vigour afforded mother’s prize Begonias. Through these shatterers of silence came a man singing about tying a yellow ribbon round an old oak tree. People were swimming in a pool with windows built into the wall pressing their faces against the glass distorting their chlorine filled red eyes even more like seals desperate for their next meal. Children running free from parents who were otherwise preoccupied chasing men and women dressed in coats of Crimson. The lunatics had well and truly taken over the asylum. I had crossed the threshold into a world where normal service had been removed. Children’s utopia was alive and well and beige was on the list of things never to be mentioned. The sign by the pool side guided me to my new world order;
‘NO BOMBING OF FAT PEOPLE. NO HEAVY PETTING AND NO BEIGE...EVER!’
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