My girlfriends and other animals

Now owning a sex pistols record doesn’t give you automatic entry into the Kings Road Punk chapter but what made me, in my eyes, a bona fide, couldn’t give a toss, anti-establishment rocker was when I asked mother if she wouldn’t mind popping along to Timothy Whites to pick up some zips of assorted colours and lengths. Mother was more than accommodating as it was on her way to the British Home Stores cafeteria where she was meeting Mrs Dudman and Mrs Cameron for their fortnightly sojourn to discuss the shortcomings of Mrs Smart and Mrs Baker who were likewise rendezvousing  on the first floor of the Littlewoods cafeteria to discuss the shortcomings of Mrs Dudman and Mrs Cameron. Mother very kindly sewed them onto my freshly pressed corduroy trousers. Blue, yellow, red, green you name it I had it, all sown on far too neatly.

With Fiddlers party rapidly approaching I squeezed into my sisters mohair jumper (four sizes too small) and raided Mothers sowing basket for safety pins that I could link together and with the aid of some fabric plaster covering one of the pointy ends attached them to my ear, the plaster acting as a protective barrier to my virgin lobe and giving the illusion of someone who had obviously had his ear skewered with a knitting needle. Now if that didn’t make me Johnny Rotten and Sidney Vicious I don’t what did!

I was ready to smash Fiddler’s parents’ home up real bad. Gillian had warned me to take my shoes off in the hallway as Fiddler’s Mum and Dad had just had a new cream shag pile fitted. I could do that. I’d smash it up later, when the carpet was a little more worn.

My girlfriends and other animals

          Fiddler’s parents were away caravanning for two weeks and a few select guests were invited round for an evening of Sham 69 and the Angelic Upstarts. Before my lavatory flusher friend Wayne had left school I wouldn’t even have heard about Fiddler’s party let alone get an invite, but obviously my new haircut, loss of milk bottles and newly acquired dramatic confidence had begun to open new doors.

Who was I kidding? The only reason I was allowed within a two mile radius of

Fiddler’s soiree was entirely down to Gillian, wondrous slow motion Gillian who had inexplicably persuaded Fiddler that I was almost human and might be kind of fun to have around. Fiddler was a hard as nails piss off punk rocker which was a bit of luck because so was I, in a kind of new romantic ,jazz funkster Leroy from Fame sort of way. The minute Gillian told me I was invited I asked mother if she’d buy me a Sex Pistols single.

‘A sex what dear’?

‘Pistols Mother. It’s a band we’re studying in music. Mrs Catchpole says it could be the difference between winning or losing chorister of the year.’

How on earth I managed to get a copy is still a mystery. Having picked up six

Coffee and Walnut cakes and two multi packs of beige braided pants from British Home Stores Mother strolled purposefully into HMV and summoned the nearest unsuspecting store assistant and proceeded to enquire as to the availability of a single by a group that had Sex and Piss in its title. To Mother’s eternal credit I was presented with ‘Friggin in the Riggin’ and quickly tucked it into the sleeve of my Disco Inferno LP away from Fathers gaze. Late at night when Mother was absorbed in last February’s copy of Readers Digest  and Father had nodded off to radio Luxembourg I would retrieve my anti establishment vinyl of filth and slip it onto my high fidelity turn table. Head phones the size of saucepans with sliding volume controls on each ear allowed me my own private comfort and the chance to dream of Fiddlers party, slow dances with slow motion Gillian and whispered moments of sweet cherub promises. Sidney Vicious also serenaded me with soft sweet tales about a Captain with a daughter who fell in deep sea water delighted squeals revealed that eels had found 'er sexual quarters.

My leg warmers really had to go.

My girlfriends and other animals

My new friend Robert, a physics genius who had recently burnt off all his eyebrows when sticking a hairclip into an electric socket was leaving with his family for their annual pilgrimage to their chalet (garden shed on stilts) in Great Yarmouth.

‘Will, last week at Richard Flange’s party I got off with Gillian Feelgood. I mean really got off!’

‘Bollocks. She’s going out with Fiddler ’

‘Chucked him.  I’m telling you, my old fella’s flashing like a belisha beacon’

‘Everyone’s feels like that the first time’

Of course, I had no idea what it felt like the first time as I’d never done it the first time.

‘I’m going down to the chalet tomorrow’

‘Shed’

‘Funny, and I want to give Gillian this rose.  Will you take it round to her’?

‘Are you serious?’

‘This rose, like you, forever true, my love unbound, it cost me a pound’

‘You’ve got to be kidding’

‘It took me ages to think up’

 ‘It cost me a pound – is that all she’s worth?’

‘Well it did cost me a pound’

 ‘It may well have, but you’re not going to get very far if you tell her that. How about my love like saliva, it cost me a fiver?’

 ‘Very bloody funny. She’ll think I’m a dribbling idiot’

 ‘As opposed to just an idiot’

 ‘Look do this for me and I won’t tell anyone about your Christmas number one collection’

‘Tomorrow you said?’

My newly acquired sixth form confidence had brought out in me a dramatic side I never knew existed. Years of playing peacemaker to Mother and Father had fine tuned my spontaneous improvisation techniques to such a degree that I had now been chosen to play the lead in the school play. Les Cenci by Antonin Artaud, a Sado-masochistic tyrant who rapes his daughter and holds her captive. Mr Sycamore, our drama teacher, said he’d seen something in my audition that disturbed him to such an extent that casting me as the lead was a prerequisite to the show’s success. He also wrote to Mother asking if everything was alright at home.

‘My love unbound, it cost me a pound. He’s bloody nuts’.  I gently tapped on Gillian’s front door praying she wasn’t in so I could return to the normality of the drama studio and the tying up of my daughter to a thirty foot wooden wheel of torture. No such luck, my heart began to quicken as her silhouette drew closer. As the door opened the light around Gillian turned to soft focus, her hallway wasn’t a hallway anymore, but a field of brilliant red poppies. Fluffy, cotton tailed bunnies hopped out of the doorway, two doves of peace whiter than white hovered above my head and Gillian tossed her head to one side, her long flowing hair following a split second later, as hair always does when you toss it in slow motion.  A young couple were lying  on a tartan picnic rug sharing a glass of Asti Spumante whilst sucking the juice from an overripe strawberry. The stylistics popped up from behind a golden syrup coloured haystack and began singing, ‘I can’t give you anything, but my love’.

I knew what I had to say.

‘This is the first my friend. I can hardly contain my joy. Betray them both and let us begin’

And with that I stepped over the threshold and the world changed from ten pence bags of sweets on a Saturday morning to lavish five course lunches at the Ritz.  It was then I knew that although I may not make it through to dinner, I was damn sure I’d have a bloody good lunch.

My girlfriends and other animals

Chapter three

My love unbound

‘Don’t you want me’ – The Human League – Christmas number one for five weeks – 1981.

They were all at it. Every last sodding one of them. Since Le Frog I had added a further twenty five pathetic minutes to my relationship portfolio consisting of me man handling Katy Crabtree after social club down a pitch dark private road. I was good. I mean really good. The truth was I only touched Katy Crabtree on the outside of her pants, well alright, on the outside of her dungarees which were on the outside of her pants.  The fact that she had on a parka, over her dungarees, which were over her pants shouldn’t concern you.  Look, it was a step up from Gill in accounts and endless hours of self-gratification immersed in the shower section of Mother's Argos catalogue. 

Father came home from work, an antiquated Roberts radio held together with a roll of fabric sticking plaster and the long wave button permanently depressed; his only companion along with his beloved Park Drive and the odd second, third and fourth hand novella borrowed from the mobile libraries badly thumbed section. They must have been happy, once. Why would they have bought me from my other Mother if they didn’t love each other, just a little? I saw Father smile once, back in 1942, a sun faded and crumpled photograph. A Sergeant and two Corporals, sitting in a bar in downtown Cairo, his trade mark Park Drive limply attached to his cracked lips, a bottle of beer raised in silent salutation to some unknown hero. The three of them smiling, fighting for their country, ready to die at any moment, yet all three, smiling.

‘Tell your Father his pillows and blankets are at the bottom of the stairs’

They couldn’t even be in the same room as each other. If one accidentally stepped into an already occupied room, out went the current incumbent, unless of course it was a Saturday night and Mother was watching Dixon of Dock Green. Then and only then would she remain steadfast and resolutely swallowed up by the green sofa, a glare that told Father he better retreat if he knew what was good for him.

‘Did I tell you I never wanted children?’

‘You didn’t Father, sorry to have inconvenienced you’

‘It’s just that she wanted them, so I gave in’

‘Gave in’

‘Well you know, conceded to her demands’

‘In a good way?’

‘In a different way’

‘But what about me?’

‘You’re different’

‘I don’t understand’

‘Don’t ever tell anybody anything. If you do, you start missing everybody’

          Father went back to radio Luxembourg and his fourth hand copy of ‘Catcher in the Rye’.

My girlfriends and other animals

‘I’m home darling’. Bollocks – Le Frogs’ Mother was back.

‘In here Mummy’

‘In here Mummy. What do you think you’re playing at? I can’t find my pants'

‘Put mine on’

‘What!’

‘Hi Mummy’

‘Alright, alright – it’s just a piece of string’

            I left Le Frog via her bedroom window, a piece of string dissecting my buttocks as I shuffled my way back to school as quickly as my newly acquired undergarments would let me. My meeting with Aunty Veronica would have to wait just a little longer.

Mothers’ tube of Yardley hand cream was a welcome relief easing the probable irreparable damage caused by Le Frogs’ underwear of torture. For the next few days I just about managed to shuffle my way between classes with the excuse that I was suffering from severe chaffing due to an allergic reaction brought on by a new pair of polyester pyjamas. It was true I was experiencing a little irritation from them, but nowhere near as much as the open wounds caused by Le Frogs’ dental floss excuse for underwear. Why did I have to say pyjamas?

‘Mongers back’

‘I didn’t mean pyjamas, I meant boxers…and Monger is not back’.

Mother’s insistence for polyester had to stop. Le Frog had a lot to answer for and at the first available minute I would chuck her. Obviously I had already been chucked the minute I ran off wearing her underwear.

‘Please forgive me Gill? She meant nothing to me. Let’s snuggle on my bed and listen to St Winifred’s School choir”

My girlfriends and other animals

Like most long term relationships Le Frog and I had our disagreements, our moments of passion, our in depth political, religious and metaphysical debates. Le Frog and I were an item for a total of forty five minutes. The relationship blossomed when I inadvertently touched her front bottom whilst rummaging around for my metal work overall. Well not her actual front bottom but the vicinity of where her front bottom would have been were she not wearing the protective clothing Mr Lomax demanded in order that the entire class should produce an aluminium dustpan and ashtray set.

 ‘My mum’s at work, let’s go home during lunch and I’ll show you that thing you just touched’

               That thing! I was about to be shown the thing. Gill from accounts, you’re chucked. I was going to see the thing. What did the thing look like? Could you hold it, what colour was it, did it speak?

 ‘I’d very much like to meet your thing. Thank you so much for asking’.

I made the best dustpan and ashtray set ever. Even Mr Lomax who usually referred to me as Spazzer commented on, ‘a job of significant craftsmanship’

Le Frog and I ran all the way to her house. Our Golden ticket, Willy Wonka excitement unable to contain itself as she fumbled for the front door key.

Now the trouble here, having only undressed in front of Mother was that it became almost impossible to hide the fact my whole body had begun to tremble. Tremble, maybe to soft an adjective.  At this point convulsed would be more appropriate.  A bucking bronco would have looked positively geriatric compared to my involuntary spasms of downright bloody fear.

‘Are you cold? Hurry up; we’ve only got twenty minutes before mummy gets back’

‘Before mummy gets back?’

Not only was I wrestling with my brown and beige braided pants, which mother had bought from British Home Stores, but I now had a time trial to contend with and in all likelihood instant castration if Le Frogs’ Mother caught me.

‘That’s better…now, what’s this then?  I think Barry needs someone to talk to…’

‘Barry?’

             I could have understood, monster or weapon or perhaps untamed beast of the Amazon, but ‘Barry’. It was this use of another boy’s name, which incidentally was the name of the local ‘special ‘kid who licked metal railings that slightly unnerved me.  It didn’t look like a Barry, not that I knew which ones did look like Barry.

 ‘Hello Barry – you look like a little lollipop that needs sucking’

This was getting beyond a joke – BIG, HUGE lollipop that needs sucking thank you.

‘There we are all sticky and limp like a shrivelled Satsuma’

‘Right that’s enough.’ I pulled Le Frog away from Barry my small shrivelled citrus fruit.

‘I thought you said I could see the thing?’

‘Well here she is. Veronica’s been waiting for you’

That was it. Referring to my thing as Barry and her thing as Veronica was the final straw.

My girlfriends and other animals

My entire Comprehensive existence was spent fending off Wayne Dawkins and his cohort of monkeys thanks to Mothers insistence that two magnifying glasses be attached to my face.

‘Mr Magoo stinks of poo time to shove him down the loo’

Face pushed into bowel by Wayne, flush executed by one of his chimps, hold breath as long as possible, toilet paper wrapped round head and sit crumpled in heap for the remainder of break time. And so it went on for six years. Wayne did show a glimmer of human kindness by removing my glasses before submerging me into the shit hole and I thanked him each time and by the end of it I actually managed to hold back the tears. The truth was I had run out of them. They had become so hardened over the years that they had solidified into a huge impenetrable concrete mass that sat steadfastly and resolutely behind my bulging eyeballs. By the time I eventually reached sixth form Wayne had already left School to pursue his vocation in the pharmaceutical Industry as predicted by his careers advisor. Trafficking Heroin and Cocaine also enabled Wayne and his baboon’s time to enjoy a much earned break at her Majesty’s pleasure. Gill from accounts was still my only visual aid to my impending blindness and Mother and Father were now unable or unwilling to spend the same time together in the same room. In fact they had lost the art of direct communication altogether.

‘Mary’s boy child’ – Boney M – Christmas number one for four weeks – 1978

‘Tell your father his tea’s on the table’

‘Tell your mother to stick her tea up her arse’

‘Tell your father to stick his tea up his own arse’

 ‘Tell your mother she’ll have to retrieve breakfast and last night’s dinner from up my arse before I can fit tea up it’

‘Tell your father to piss off’

‘Another brick in the wall’ – Pink Floyd – Christmas number one for five weeks – 1979.

With Wayne pursuing his new career path I was a little lost for things to do at break time.

‘Hey, Joe 90 over here’

Break time was nearly over and I was in the middle of finishing off my third packet of pickled onion monster munch.

‘It’s your old friend, from the Donkey Derby. It’s been a while I know. Sorry for the wait, but I had to be sure you were the one. Wayne did a good job I see and now Mummy and Daddy are fuelling the fire. It warms my heart to see a plan come together so beautifully. Time to leave Gill alone and move onto pastures new. Take those Hubble telescopes off and get some contact lenses.I hear they’re all the rage. You need to look the part if we’re to pull this off. Remember the innocents need your filth to survive. Only you can help them through this. Now go forth my son - show them the light’

‘There’s no one quite like Grandma’ – St Winifred’s school choir- Christmas number one for two weeks – 1980.

Sixth form was fanbloodytastic. I had new contact lenses, my hair was really trendy, all brushed over one eye like the Human League and a girl had actually spoken to me once. The only small downside was the uniform. It was as though Mother had been employed as Secondary Modern fashion consultant  and I had progressed from a life of beige to an even more horrideous life of brown. Brown suit, brown shoes, brown socks, brown tie and this really was taking the piss, brown shirt. They called it brown but I knew what this bastard in disguise was really masquerading as – BEIGE. This tiny vogue irritant however counted for little as the girl who had spoken to me once was about to speak to me twice.

We called her ‘Le Frog’ because her mouth went from one side of her head to the other, no cheeks in between, just one long, never ending mouth, and when she smiled her face became a dentist’s paradise. Teeth jutted out from every angle, every shape, every size. I say we because since Wayne’s departure and  my new makeover I had acquired friends who for the first time actually spoke to me rather than make mentally handicapped noises as they walked past me or stuck notes on my blazer with the words ‘Monger ‘written on them.

My girlfriends and other animals

Chapter Two

Le Frog

The rest of the holiday became a blur. Possibly because I spent most of it barricaded in my chalet bedroom twitching to images of Gill’s wondrous hallelujah’s whilst listening to the New Seekers – ‘I want to teach the world to sing’.

‘I just don’t know what’s wrong with him.’  Mother was discussing my Howard Hughes like reluctance to leave our Chalet bedroom with Mrs Musgrave and the rest of the Coffee and Walnut cake brigade. ‘I mean have you ever been before, it’s so much fun, of course you have to maintain standards, but there’s so much to do and it’s all inclusive, as much as you like’

As much as you like. That’s it mother, as much as I like. Returning to the land of beige didn’t seem anywhere near as depressing now I had my new companion. Gill and I would spend all of our free time together hidden away from the rest of my classmates in the child friendly concrete tunnel that had until now only claimed one council kid’s life. Each child psychologist agreed that my ‘imaginary’ friend was just that and I would soon grow out of it. Slade’s ‘Merry Xmas Everybody’, Mud’s ‘Lonely this Christmas’ and Queen’s ‘Bohemian Rhapsody’ afforded me only a modicum of comfort during my years of psychological therapy. It wasn’t until the Christmas of 1976 when Johnny Mathis started singing about Children being born that Mother decided enough was enough. Imaginary or not, psychologically disturbed or not, I needed a pair glasses and a new record collection. Please don’t do it Mother. They said it was because I sat too close to the television. I knew however that Gill and I had spent far too much time together and  my eyes had spun round to the back of my head. Either way I was whisked off to Mothers optometrist for the fitting of two gold top milk bottles that signalled to the rest of the world that I was happy to be publicly ridiculed for the rest of my life. Years of therapy instantly eradicated. I blockaded myself in my bedroom, my space hopper and assorted piles of Shoot magazine my only defence against the inevitable incursion by Mother. Noddy, show me a sign. Les, guide me to the Promised Land. Freddie please tell Mother not to completely and utterly ruin my life. My futile attempts at seeking solace among my Christmas number one’s left me bereft of all hope. Even Mr McCartney and his Wings couldn’t offer me any respite and they’d been at number one forever.

‘Mull of Kintyre’ – Wings – Christmas number one for nine weeks – 1977.

My girlfriends and other animals

Boredom threshold was just about reaching its limit for a seven year old watching overweight office clerks shuffling around a field when hurtling towards me came a vision that would signal that monumental moment in all boys’ lives; tadpoles do in fact turn into frogs. As Gill from Accounts rose into the air clearing the oversized beer barrel with her newly adjoined twin, out they came. The theme tune to ‘It’s a knockout’ played from the monstrous metal tannoys, Stuart Hall couldn’t contain his laughter anymore and Eddie Waring punctuated the frivolity with ‘that’s a lovely up and under by Gill from accounts’. Bouncing up and down, side to side, free from years of male chauvinist restraint. Jellies on a plate, wibbling and wobbling, gasping for air. I was mesmerised by their power, their desire not to have me avert my gaze. They were crying out to me, engaging me in their silent communication. As Gill landed on the other side of the beer barrel out they came, her angel cakes, her baby pillows, her Betty and Wilma’s, my first glimpse of fully formed breasts reached out to me and begged for forgiveness. I ducked under the rope in an attempt to catch Gill and her metronomes but she and they were too fast. A Red Coat caught hold of me and told me to stay back as it wasn’t safe. WASN’T SAFE! This was my Shangri la, this was my moment of no turning back; this was his cue.

 ‘Hello my friend. I have waited a long time for you. Let us begin. So nice to have you at last. Shall we go?’

Back at the chalet of immeasurable fun Mother continued her monologue to Father that slouching was not acceptable and what would the neighbours think. Father was trying to finish his potato waffles whilst telling Mother we were in sodding Wales and if the neighbours could see him from their bedroom window then they’d be doing bloody well, sister had finished eating the buttons off the settee and I, well I was staring out of the chalet window overlooking the now deserted Donkey Derby Obstacle course, my once beautiful and unsullied mind now awash with images causing David Attenborough’s trousers to twitch and dance their own wondrous dance. Handel’s Hallelujah chorus drowned out Mother, Father and Sister now throwing up settee buttons. A smile, an epiphany, an enlightenment beamed across my face as the sun began to set and the last Donkey was led away back into its straw covered lorry.

My girlfriends and other animals

‘Welcome to Barry Island Butlins. You’ll be staying in Beige chalet number twenty nine. Just kidding, there’s no beige here. Red chalet number twenty nine located directly behind the donkey derby obstacle course. If you hurry you might just catch the three legged race for mums who want to have fun. Will you be participating madam?’ 

 ‘Drive on Denys’

Mother began to rewind the window as Father gently drove past the inanely grinning lady who oblivious to Mothers disdain continued with her over familiar and animated geniality. A knowing genuflection by Father at this deranged Cheshire cat of a woman alerted her that all was well despite the very real possibility of an horrendous death administered to her courtesy of Mother.  Window wound, we were trapped once more inside our volcano of torture. Donkey Derby?  What sort of language was this person dressed in red speaking of?  Ok, I knew what a donkey was and I had heard of Derby because Brian Clough was their manager but the two together, well it made no sense whatsoever.

Mother ushered Father laden with suitcases of varying shapes and size up the extraordinarily brightly coloured stairs venting her vitriol about the need for standards to be maintained even if he did think he was on holiday. Sister was by now fast asleep, one cheek super glued to the same sucker of human flesh that I had just retrieved my buttocks from and I was allowed to wander aimlessly and unnoticed towards the mysterious and unintelligible ‘Donkey Derby’.

Millions upon millions of people had gathered around a course made up of varying heights and levels of difficulty. The prelude to the main event, not that I knew what the main event was; a three legged race for women of child bearing age and hips. I pushed my way to the front and held on for dear life to a rope repelling the expectant throngs.

Now someone should have warned me there and then that my life was about to change forever, that innocence was about to be sodomised and buggered in equal measures, but my new friend wasn’t going to spoil the surprise by making his entrance too early, no, I would have to wait for that unwelcome pleasure.

Women of all shapes and sizes were shackled together giggling and looking paradoxically self- conscious as they approached the starting line that was to mark the beginning of the end for my innocence and a journey that would see the destruction of so many innocent lives. ‘Chirpy chirpy cheep cheep’ by Middle of the Road segued neatly into the main arena relegating any thought of tying Yellow ribbons round old Oak trees.

‘This is crazy in ‘it?’ giggled Gill from fourth floor accounts.

 ‘Absolute madness. If they could see me now they simply wouldn’t believe it’ chuckled Catherine from fifth floor photo copying.

‘Well we are on holiday. If we can’t let our hair down now when can we?’

‘You’re so right but I still think it’s just a little nuts – what a hoot’

‘On your Marks, Get Set, GO…’

And they were off, hurtling round the Donkey Derby obstacle course oblivious to the devastation they were about to cause this innocent of innocents. Saturday 14th June 1972 – 2:27pm.

My Girlfriends and other animals

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!’

I like my mum

Me and My sister don’t see my dad ever again. I guess he didn’t run at a thousand miles per hour past the witch’s house at number eighty two. Me and my sister don’t see my mum ever again. I try and explain that the witch at number eighty two has stolen them but they don’t listen to me. Me and my sister lie down on the grass and let the sun wrap itself round our faces. I hold my sisters hand and whisper to her. They want to take us to the shops where we have to wait to be chosen like my sister and my best friend the black baby. My sister and me aren’t going back so we tell them we need to get our teddies and go upstairs. I hold my sister so tight and she looks into my eyes. We kiss each other and tears trace happy memories down our cheeks. We climb the bunk beds where we used to wake at three O’clock on Christmas morning with more excitement than the world. I wrap my snake belt around my sister’s neck and loop my pyjama cord around mine. They’ll understand that we didn’t want to go back and let us stay a little longer. My sister and me smile and hold hands. They said I wasn’t ready the first time when my mum bought us potato waffles but now it’s different.  I don’t know where my sister is but I know we’ll be playing on our orange space hopper with the growth coming out of its head soon. I can see my mum and my dad and uncle peter and aunty Sheila and Goody Putnam and everyone I’ve ever known. They look so small and fuzzy like the telly when the national anthem is played and the picture vanishes. My mum is still in Liptons buying Potato waffles and my best friend the black baby is smiling and playing with some lego. My dad is sitting in a room alone with his new best friend, Johnny Walker. One day they’ll understand why we didn’t want to go back to the shops. One day they’ll understand that I loved my mum more than Count Dracula lollies that make your tongue turn black. One day I know that they will love me as much as I love them.

 I love my mum she let me stay up and watch Dixon of Dock Green and eat after eight mints.

I like my mum

Freddie Fuller smells because he lives on the council and his mum doesn’t have a bath. Smelly Freddie doesn’t come to school very often but the police must be family friends as they are always round his house having some instant whip. I not only get to see Jenny Schneider’s front and back bottoms but the whole of year two, three and four. Goody Putnam got two black eyes from Gavin Savage because he didn’t knock my arm when I flicked my last marble. My Cousin John says I can have some Whisky. I say I don’t want any. I don’t know what it is anyway. My cousin John says if I don’t have some then I’m a girl. I don’t want to go through what my sister went though at the hospital so I have some Whisky. My Cousin John tells me he wants to go to a party and do I know of any. I can’t speak because my mouth’s on fire. Cousin John says I’m nearly a man now. I just have to tell him where a party is. I splutter that Benda Carter is having one with a clown. My Cousin John tells me to call her and ask if he can come too. When I ring Brenda her brother answers and says No Cousin John can’t come. Cousin John grabs the phone and says he’s coming round. Brenda’s brother says don’t you dare. Cousin John dares and we go round to Brenda’s. When Brenda opens the door Cousin John says he wants to see Brenda’s brother outside and promises not to use any ‘shooters’. Brenda’s mum calls the police and cousin John gets sent to his bedroom by the same man in a wig that told my mum off. When my mum gets home from being told off by the man in the wig she and my dad start singing and flinging their arms about. I can’t hear anything because I’m outside on the swing with my sister. It’s nice to see my mum and dad enjoying themselves again dancing and singing. My mum smashes a plate into my dad’s face and now blood is pouring out all over the kitchen. I wish I had been able to tell my dad where the gold was buried, before he had his face smashed in.

I like my mum

At Cub’s we have to skin a rabbit and catch a trout. Each Tuesday night we get to hit each other round the head with a rolled up newspaper and raise the Union Jack and sing a song for the Queen of England. My Neckerchief wasn’t straight so our six lost 2 marks. Peter Granger forgot his woggle, Pencil, paper and a clean handkerchief so his six lost all the points in the world. I tied a sling with a sheepshank and two half hitches and played British Bulldog. My six is white six, Steven Mudge is in Blue Six and he’s got his bronze, silver and gold award. I’ve only got my cooking badge, but the Duke of Edinburgh has made a badge for me if I climb a mountain and sleep under some leaves for a week. I think I’ll just try and get my cycling badge first. My mum puts her foot on the accelerator pedal and drives into the back of another car. Me and my sister fly through the air and hit the windscreen. The man on the path has a heart attack and the ambulance takes him to hospital. We don’t go to hospital because we haven’t had a heart attack. The man on the path dies and my Mum has to see a man in a wig who tells her off and she is sent to her bedroom for a very long time. I’ve got one marble left and I have to hit Wayne’s blood or else ‘I’m going to get a new name. I close my eyes and flick my last marble.