Tempus Fugit II

     On the Welsh coast somewhere near Aberaeron August/September 1991. We made a week long camping trip around the coast of Wales. Now I think there must be lots more pictures of that journey for we stopped at many castles and Kathy was still using her Nikon quite a lot. Here is a shot she took of me in 1982

Somewhere in the Santa Monica Mountains, California

Waking thoughts . . .

     Occasionally I get a friend request on Facebook from someone hoping to find a long lost cousin or friend. This usually leads to a brief exchange to establish that I am not the person they were seeking. I then thought of other encounters with people seeking a relative or a favourite teacher. The first that came to mind happened along Topanga Canyon Boulevard in Canoga Park. I was walking along minding my own business when a car drew up and a lady hailed me. I turned and saw disappointment in her face; she thought I was her estranged son. He must walk bouncily like I do . . .

     Even though most city streets in the USA have sidewalks they are not put to much use. Pedestrians are viewed with some suspicion especially in places like Beverly Hills or Bel Air. I've previously mentioned my liking for maps, haven't I? Thinking of LA got me browsing the 1979 edition of Thomas guide, the taxi drivers' bible, for Los Angeles county . . .

     The second incident is memorable because the person sought was English and it was some time into the telephone conversation before the caller realized I was not the Alan Richardson, a UCLA professor, he remembered. Did he live in Venice too? So not only is there some poor soul out there who walks like I do there is someone else who talks like I do.

Oxo tins and . . .

lunch for school. I never ate a school dinner.

     The last fun question on Radio 4's Any Questions this week concerned the nutritional value of the lunches that some parents pack for their children. The questioner asked the panel what they had in their lunch boxes for school. None of the panel had had a packed lunch at school but remembered some of the dismal school dinners they were served.

     I used an Oxo tin for at least my first year at secondary school in which I packed a sandwich, a banana and a Jacob's Club,  . . . mmmm I don't remember a drink. Cheese and tomato was my favourite sandwich or rather the one I remember most. Banana is my usual choice of fruit along with apple.

     Mum and dad kept a village shop when I was at primary school so I went home for lunch while all the dinner children walked in pairs along the High Street, past my house, to the old school house in Maldon road which served as the school canteen and venue for parties and the like. Only once was this pattern broken when mum was very ill with influenza. Rather than go with the other children for school dinner I went across the street and had lunch with Mrs Enion. Her twin sons were away at boarding school. I don't know what dad was doing that he couldn't look after me; my sister must have been working as a nanny at that time and was away too. I vaguely remember our teacher collecting five shillings (5/-) dinner money every Monday morning.

     I was used to having quite a bit of time to myself in the middle of the day. I could go for a walk and some times walked to the newspaper-shop at the other end of the street to by a comic although Arthur Mee's Children's Newspaper and Eagle were delivered to the house along with the Daily Telegraph. On Fridays I'd go to Mr Brown's for a nice piece of cod and chips.

Orphan post

     Singing has always been a part of my life. My mother had a small sweet voice and I always liked to sing and hum to myself on those long walks I took with dad on autumnal Sunday afternoons. Dad didn't sing but thumped away on the piano; listened to French radio and read Paris Match.  I would sometimes help him learn lines for a play . Evenings were spent by the radio listening to Journey into Space on the BBC Light Programme or me curled up in Dad's lap listening to him read Treasure Island. Mum knitted. I had lots of pullovers; I would help choose the patterns and the colours.

     Wednesdays were early closing so I knocked on the front door instead of coming through the shop when I came home after school. Wednesday four o'clock was the time Choral Evensong was broadcast on the Home Service and I associate the ethereal sounds of an anthem sung in some far away cathedral with home and a coal fire.

     Christmas was nearing when the bakery across the road began selling crumpets. Tea in the sitting room by the fire was a treat. My uncle Bill (Mum's only brother) and auntie Lee would pay their annual visit a week or two before Christmas. For several years their gift to me was the Rupert Annual.

     The one live Christmas tree we had, when I was about four years old, we planted in the garden and it survived and grew into a forty foot tree before being blown over in the gales of  . . . 1987 was it?

     I think the first Christmas carol I learned was the Czech Rocking carol, then Away in a Manger and the hymn Once in Royal David City.

What about now?

     Now? I sing and play the traditional Christmas carols I grew up with and raid the Oxford book of Carols for more from other seasons. Tschaikovsky's 'Legend' The Crown of Roses is one of my favourite modern pieces . . . And here is another New Year.

The story so far . . .

     Thinks: to save money on postage and to let friends and family have some idea of what I'm doing in England I'll start a blog. In the process of setting up the account I needed a name. Oh, what the hell: Thrupnybits. (I know, I know, stop sniggering behind your hand there) And a name for the blog? Mmm . . . how pretentious can I be? I don't think I'd browsed many blogs at this time I just jumped in. I can't remember now if I made a list to choose from. Mmmm . . . seeking something . . . how about epistēmē? Mmm . . . how can I have lived through so many years and still not answered the question "who am I?" or kept in mind the adage to 'know thyself'? Should I throw away all the books and start again? Pestered again and again with the question, “What do you want to be (or was it 'do'?) when you grow up?” I have the fuel (fertile? or mere wind-egg?); do I have the fire that consumes? 

     I can only know of my early life from what I have been told and the few pictures of me. I have no memory of that time; I do not have a memory of my sitting looking at the camera, only the memory that I was told this is a picture of me with Mr. Foster. My earliest memories, which are remembered as me being the centre of my universe, occur later as consciousness awakens. I do not have an eidetic memory. What about olfactory or auricular memory? The sense of smell, though the weakest of human senses, holds the key to many early memories: the smell of the kitchen on wash day; mum’s eau-de-cologne; the orangey-whisky-evergreen smell of Christmas at home; to this day I do not like the smell of gin as I took a swig of the stuff from a bottle I thought contained soda water, ugh! Sounds from childhood include the early morning crowing of cocks; the whining hum of the milk float; the swish of cars passing down the High Street; birdsong, particularly summer skylarks and evening blackbirds and thrushes warning ‘tchick’. So, of the first two years or so of my life I have no memory and therefore no knowledge but what I was told. I don’t know what my first words were; I never asked and wasn’t told. Boys are well known for staying mum until they are about three and then spouting complete sentences . . . does that mean by inference I think girls start off babbling and then never stop? I see pictures of me when little and I think I often look slightly puzzled viz:

2+ years old with Mr. Foster, our next-door neighbour, in Kelvedon, 1953.

 

Luvvies . . .

     Over the years I've participated in some community theatre (am-dram). Here's a résumé:

        School: 1966-8
                  Pirates of Penzance . . . . . .chorus
                  Mikado . . . . . . . . . . . . . . chorus
                  Under Milk Wood . . . . . . . .reading , various parts
                  Murder in the Red Barn . . . .Grandfather
                  Toad of Toad Hall . . . . . . . Policeman/ Front of Horse
                  Richard III . . . . . . . . . . . . Bishop of Ely

        Kelvedon Players: 1967-71
                  Murder in the Cathedral . . . 2nd Priest
                  Beggars’ Opera . . . . . . . . .Filch
                  Royal Hunt of the Sun . . . . .Filipillo

        Moonlighters’ Theatre Company: 1991
                  The Crucible . . . . . . . . . . Proctor

          Thetford Music and Drama Society 
         (Breckland Drama Festival 1992)
                  Deadline Dawn . . . . . . . . .Brother Luis

        Center Stage: 1992-96
                  Murder on the Nile . . . . . . Simon Mostyn
                  South Pacific . . . . . . . . . .Lt Harbison
                  Lion in Winter . . . . . . . . . Prince Richard
                  Cabaret . . . . . . . . . . . . . Cliff Bradshaw
                  Deathtrap . . . . . . . . . . . .Syndey Bruhl(rehearsed)
                  Real Inspector Hound . . . . .Moon
                  See How They Run . . . . . . Revd Toop

        Great Falls Performing Arts Center

                  Meet me in St Louis . . . . . .Mr. Alonzo (Lonnie) Smith

        The Malmstrom Character Company

                  The Red Lamp . . . . . . . . . .Bill Worth

        Quicksilver Productions: 1998
                  Oresteia . . . . . . . . . . . . . Agamemnon

What brought this to mind was tidying up a closet looking for some photographs and papers when I found a box of ephemera. Some of the plays and concerts I can't remember seeing but the ones I was in I sure do, especially as I have the video-tapes of a couple.

Is the boy father of the man?

Five years old and the book thing has started. I think the book must have been the property of the photographer. We learned to read from the Janet and John books at school. I not only learned to read but also that books are sensory objects. Paper in daily life is usually quite friable fragile like news-print; proper book paper is durable. I look as though I'm not quite sure about how I should sit; was the chair too high for my short legs? I hadn't yet become obsessive about holding a book firmly by the spine. Not so much smiling as squinting into the sunlight.

Big Mountain, Whitefish, MT. 1996

Forty years on I'm still squinting into the light but I have the beard I always wanted.

Breaking the 11th Scout Law

I don't know if there are still ten Scout laws; the eleventh was unwritten.

I keep browsing through the b-LOGOS-sphere. I spelled it with two Gs in a previous post . . . the sphere of a Mr A. Blogg. So many fresh and brand spanking new blogs.

I follow many anonymously. I made the mistake of commenting on a blog which was well written, was public and had a few public followers; I was quite surprised when the author tore me off a strip for lurking and promptly made the blog private. Live and learn.

That was then; this is now. I'm still very silent.

An overcoat? In August?

Kelvedon village fête at St Mary's Road 14 August 1957.

My only recollection of that day is that it was the first time I heard my recorded voice.
The vehicle, an Austin I believe, was green.