Do you ever find yourself emotionally reacting to a song, or some music that doesn't connect to the present? It has just happened; Bonobo’s First Fires, from his North Borders album. I know it relates to a past event, but unable to locate it. It’s good to cry. This morning Sunday 13th December 2020, by chance my thirteenth post, Lonnie Donagon, ‘My old mans a dustman’ is playing. I chose an old playlist and imagine the dustbin man, the rag-and-bone man, climbing on a truck at 6am to pull peas and life in Featherstone 1970 style. Live and Let Die, by Wings now distracting me from moving to the next paragraph and beyond. This is not easy, and the tears are flowing. The song changes …
‘Take a look in the mirror, and what do you see? Do you see it clearer, or are you deceived… Don't ask my opinion, don't ask me to lie, then beg for forgiveness for making you cry. I'm only human, I make mistakes, I'm only human, I do what I can, I'm just a man, I do what I can. Don't put the blame on me’ I’m only human after all. I remember the Rag-and-Bone Man, he used to shout, ‘any old iron’ and sat on a cart, with a horse.
Don't put your blame on me…
I am sixteen years old, summer of 1970, my first proper job; Browns amusement arcade, the biggest in Bridlington. It spanned two streets, the Promenade and the Esplanade. I worked a seven day week, 0930 hours to 1900, for nine pounds seven shillings and six pence. I lived in mum and dads caravan in Southcliffe. A mate from school Peter Krlic, stayed with us and also worked at Browns. Above is the promenade entrance. It widens enough to have a Dodgems, a spinny thingy, bingo glass and steel cages where a penny slides onto a steel, and glass, shelf, half moves backwards then forwards, each time pushing the coins closer to the edge and … bugger that another twelve pence (one shilling) lost, If you nudged the machine with your hip an alarm went off. My first job involved stalking lost souls twelve pence to the worse, I would jangle my leather satchel, full of shiny new pennies, ‘twelve for a bob’ I would sing as jangling my bag. I was deadly boring and even being shown how to count twelve pennies into someone’s hand, yet only give them eleven, didn’t sparkle it up. By co-incidence, a lad left his job as roundabout attendant, halfway through the day, just as I was stalking nearby. ‘I would be delighted to take over sir’ left my lips just as his boss stopped saying, ‘shit, shit’. The roundabout held forty children, adults not allowed, horses on a pole – that went up and down- trains, boats and planes. Six pence per ride, same satchel but this time change for proper money. The arcade was a combination of two Victorian properties, each with land to the rear and thus meeting. Add some concrete, steel, wood, glass and then send in an electrician and surface wire (nothing hidden) a three-phase (420 volts) supply to run all the machines. Many similar burned down, particularly the ones built on Piers, this one did not, so there I was collecting sixpence pieces and managing the children onto the ride. The ride looked directly out onto the Esplanade, the original shop front having long been replaced with a steel and concrete lintel, supported by a reinforced concrete pillar. A steel pipe run down from the ceiling, with a massive electric cable inside. A steel box, grey with a red handle on one side, the master switch, on the front two circular slightly raised buttons, one red and one green. On the front of the column, a cash register supported on steel brackets and set on a wooden base. The keys, displaying pounds, shillings and pence were beneath a lid which hinged on a flap. One morning I had four children on my ride, two bob taken, flap lifted and two bob key plunged, like on an old fashioned typewriter. Next ride has four children; two bob in my bag, flap lifted but my finger missed the key and pressed the gap instead. Many afternoons the ride was full, twenty shillings, for four hours solid. I did get questioned once, ‘I didn’t see you log the last ride in the register’, I replied, so sorry sir, I don’t remember but I may have forgotten as it is so busy’, I also made sure my satchel was over by twenty shillings that day. I did get a bit carried away and for one hour lunch break I would, every day, visit the Sun-Wha Chinees restaurant and indulge in their lunch of the day for five shillings. One day I put my hand into a void above the pole on the horse ride… my gut it tight this moment recalling how close I actually came to amputating my lower arm. Maybe God reminding me not to steal other folks money, no matter how low the pay and shite conditions. Lesson understood. I would often chat to girls, one in particular led to snogging and heavy petting by the sewage outlet, in a tunnel under the esplanade.
My U17 year at Normanton did not start well. Lissie, the girl in the tunnel at Blue John caves, had started dating Howard Anders, which was devastating. Worse still, he was into Lad Zeppelin; he could afford their albums, wore a designer school uniform, black boots and had stolen the woman of my fantasies. What could I do, what could I say …
The following Saturday, say 8pm, I caught the North Circular -Castleford, Featherstone, Sharlston, Streethouse, Normanton – the opposite way to normal and went from Featherstone to Castleford instead. Another Victorian mining town with the added benefit of a working river, the river Ouse, bringing additional prosperity. I believe the site of the old mine now house the largest indoor ski slope in Europe? We went under the railway line, the Cannon cinema on the right where I will shortly hit their dance floor. I steep off the bus and walk into the Railway Hotel, a classic Victorian double fronted property with bay windows. I turn right into the lounge bar, never been here before, up to the bar and, ‘could I have a pint of John Smiths please’ leaves my lips. Pint in hand I find a seat, sip my beer. This trip needed to be a secret, I must tell know-one as Cas (Castleford) were the arch enemy (on the rugby pitch) and being seen fraternizing with the enemy would make matters even worse with the lads from South Featherstone.
“Slam [my name aged 16] how you doing mate, remember me Peter Beach, tha lived next door t me in De-lacey Avenue?” I hear, ‘Hello Peter, my brain flashing back nine years, great to see you mate, Just popped in as I am fed up with girls from school and thought I would try Cas”. I joined their group, I smoked my first cigarette, drank three pints of beer and met a girl.
Judith Dixon was almost two years older than me, not quite 18, slim attractive, a recently qualified SRN (State Registered Nurse) she smoked Lambert & Butler which made my opening line, ‘hello, I am Mr Lambert, my friend Mr Butler couldn’t make it’ work a treat. She lived in Smawthorne Grove and the North Circular stopped right outside her door. We met every weekend, I spent Xmas with her parents, we often baby-sat her younger sister and spend hours laying on her sofa, kissing cuddling and each week bathing in that yummy sexual energy only foreplay can provide. A bit like alcohol, each week going further for a bigger hit, and getting closer to loosing my virginity. Judith had no interest in sport, she loved walking, reading and Tamla Motown music. We danced for hours on the Cannon dance-floor opposite. I turn seventeen, we holiday together camping in Scarborough, yet we did not have intercourse, more my issue than hers, I couldn’t get turned on – no erection – in a tent in a field.
Its early autumn, I’m seventeen, a party White House pub, Pontefract Road South Featherstone. A few weeks earlier I had played sevens for them in a local tournament, we won and the party was our celebration, It seemed strange introducing Judith to all my rugby and school mates. We had fun, danced and drank too much. A girl from the grammar school, third year sixth and very, in your face, but sexy at the same time, Hazel Green her name, spoke to me a couple of times, telling me how she could, ‘make your dreams come true’. I walked Judith to the bus stop, opposite side of the road, the bus stop has a shelter. It's the one I used as a child when visiting my Nan, (mum’s mum) in Beech Tree Road. We kissed and hugged for a long time as early for the last bus. ‘I love you’ left my lips as waving her goodbye …Slam returned to the party.
Behind the bay window, to the right, first floor, is a large bedroom, it was a cloakroom on the night of the party. I remember her talking my left hand, with her right hand. Just before the bottom of the staircase, she swapped hands, taking my left hand with her left, she pulls me across her front, licking my ear as I pass, her hand is on my bum as she nudges me to climb the stairs. I stopped …
"Slam, you had been flirting with her all night, you do find her sexy and ever since the babysitter you have sought older woman" and "You do not have to do this, this will not help matters" screamed at me, loud and clear. The music changed; Roxanne by Sting, Roxanne, ‘You don’t have to turn on the red light’, Roxanne turned the light on. Slam you don't... Slam climbed the stairs.
Sting wrote Roxanne walking the streets of Montmartre Paris at 3am one morning after a failed gig. Slam's older self, Lambo, would walk the same streets eight years later at 3am, also looking for a red light, after a failed game in Paris, but that's for later.
Six weeks after the party, I met Hazel Green for the second and last time, just as I stepped off the North Circular (from Normanton on its way to Castleford) bus in Station Lane. She lived in Featherstone and was catching the bus. She smiled and said, ‘how you doing Slam, we are doing fine’, as she patted her belly and smiled. My gut still crunches at the memory of that moment. Om Slam.
Don't put the blame on us, we were only human after all, seems the best way to end for now as much worse is to follow. Slam is one very angry lad, he is angry with himself, “what the fuck were you thinking” and “you total piece of shit” became “shame on you, this was all your fault and guilt and remorse shall follow thee, all the day s of your life” stuff became part of Slams daily internal dialogue with himself. “Same as the fucking babysitter” Lambo has just screamed. I believed what I had done was wrong, or was it? Did I have a choice, or was Abraham Maslow right in identifying sex as a somatic need over which we have no control?
Food for thought.
I told Judith Dixon I needed to focus on rugby and school, so ended our relationship gently. We stayed friend and I had a drink with her, and her new boyfriend a year later. Om Judith.
The tears are still flowing many hours later. Om Slam, your brave.
No comments:
Post a Comment