We moved to St Judes when I was 5. It was close to my birthday. I was at Gran’s house for the day and came to the new house after we’d moved. I knew the house - it was my great Gran’s house. I didn’t like her too much, she frightened me slightly, like a ghost from a previous era, she was very much a Victorian. She smelled too, not bad, but a bit old lady, but also the cooking smells in her house had infused into her entirely. She seemed grumpy and old to me. After we moved in they continued to live on the top floor, and we lived in the bottom two. From my point of view his bacame the house I grew up in and Keyham faded to almost non-existence in my memory, except in dreams, when I was often back there.
Moved school but do not remember this as being a bad experience. At Keyham I'd eaten ants and orange peel, had my first homo-erotic feelings about another boy, envied those who used the swimming pool, looked forward to playing in the juniors’ playground when I’m big....never got there...instead went to a different school.
In the new school, an imposing looking three storey grey granite building, I remember a tree being taken away by a crane – we all watched, a boy who had to take his trousers down to have a pee, a boy called Steve who snogged girls, and made my first firm friends.
On Fridays we had clubs - slide shows, games etc. And we chose what room we wanted to go to. I rememebr seeing a slide show of duckie luckie, the duck who thought the sky would fall on her head.
Teacher, fat and female - asked me what the Gospel was, and was outraged when I didn’t know. I was embarrassed at the time, but now I think it's something my parents should be proud of. My parents took the decision that I should find religion for myself and this interfering biddy thought otherwise and teased me for it. Mrs Pomoroy may have been her name. She taught French when I was about 6 or 7.
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| sister aged about 5 (1973/4) |
My world view, as well as being shaped by my parents, was also being influenced by the media - John Craven's Newsround, Blue Peter - in fact pretty much only BBC. ITV, while not banned as such was looked upon extremely unfavourably by my mother. As such I was never encouraged to watch anything on ITV - and funnily enough, nor listen to the BBC's Radio One. In the case of Radio it was either Radio Four or - once it started, the new commercial station, Plymouth Sound. While the ITV thing has more or less survived intact to today, I soon slipped the leash with regard to radio. Once pop music had stuck it's claws into me, there was no going back, and Radio One was pretty much the only source for it, though there was the chart show on Plymouth sound and a little bit on telly - TOTP, Whistletest and short run series such as Riverside Studios, rock Goes To College, etc.
Concorde
http://news.bbc.co.uk/onthisday/hi/dates/stories/september/26/newsid_2539000/2539049.stm <-- covered by Blue Peter and live transatlantic link?
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