Sunday in Memory Lane (Episode 2)

Life's too short to have regrets, everything teaches us something....

Last week I told you about my friends, the Jocks and the Filthy Few and I promised to tell tales on them (they are mostly spirits now, so their secrets are ripe for revelation!)

We were all so young then…..

I am a very loyal friend. I seldom end my friendships, even if I never see them again. The friends I have had usually got very annoyed with me for clutching at my rose coloured glasses and not allowing bitterness or anger to smash them from my face. I could argue fiercely with my friends but the next minute, love them just as fiercely.

This helped me to love some of the toughest of men, the strongest of women and the most dangerous of dogs.

When I was young I wanted the simple things of life; Love, kids, a home of my own and health. I got all of that in abundance and I am very grateful.

The Jocks were my best friends from the day they arrived in our coastal town. They were teenagers like me, with their lives unplanned ahead of them. They were all drop dead gorgeous, fit and feisty. They played a lot of football on the large green in front of my Dad’s holiday home and I would watch them pulling foul stunts on each other, play fighting and scoring goals.

They had begun to attract girls and their confidence was palpable. One evening, I recall getting off the bus after work and walking home. As I turned the corner I saw Big Tony squaring up to Jai in the middle of the road. He had a firewood hatchet raised and he was clearly going to use it. I ran as fast as high heels would allow and got between them, facing Tony. I grabbed onto the hatchet handle and stared hard into his raging blue eyes. He froze and muttered something about Jai having his watch. Jai, shaking and stuttering, tore the watch off his wrist saying “I just wanted to borrow it to impress Brenda!” Tony let his hatchet arm fall to his side and took back his watch, glittering at me with a strange resigned shake of his head. “I cuda kilt ya, ya stupit air-heed!” he said and I laughed. “Nah, Tony! You love me!” and the pair of them cracked up laughing. I cooked dinner for them that night and Jai went off on his date with Brenda….. and yeah, he was wearing Tony’s watch.

Jai really fell hard for Brenda and everyone could see why. She was very pretty and seemed to be one of the teenage in-crowd in our small seaside town. My brother, Roy, tried to introduce me to that little crowd of girls but they were not receptive. “Don’t care who she is….” one of them said as they all stared at my hippy clothes and bare feet.

Roy said it was because I was friendly with the Jocks and the girls were jealous. I just remember being hurt by the rejection. Big Chas laughed at their sneering faces and, cradling my shoulders, led me away slinging the word “Slappers!” at them over his shoulder.

This was typical of my effect on young females in that seaside town. I came from London and preferred to dress in flowery, flowing long dresses with lots of delicate jewellery and I had wild long hair. They wore jeans, anoraks and sneakers. They all had boyish bob or chiselled hair cuts. They were mods. I was a hippy and the only one in Clacton on Sea at the time.

Sid and his Filthy Few took me out once or twice and I started dating a local boy called Phil. He was preparing to go to University to study geology. Phil was a study-aholic like me. When he went away I was sad but, hey…. life moves on.

Roy and I continued to go to the local discotheque on Saturday nights to show off our dance routines. Roy was as good a dancer as our Dad, he had natural rhythm. One Saturday he did not come with me, I don’t remember why…. I went alone and was asked to dance by a guy who proceeded to behave like an octopus, with his hands wandering wherever he shouldn’t have put them. I made an excuse to go to the ladies room. I did not want to go back to my handbag because Octopus Guy was hovering over it, waiting for me.

I spotted Big Tony leaning against the dance floor wall with a pint of beer in his hand and a couple of local guys at his side. I quickly wiggled through the crowd and, speaking over the booming music, I said “Do me a favour, Tony! Dance with me!” He pulled a face and said “I dinnae dance!” I persuaded by telling him about Octopus Guy. He put his beer on a table and growled “I’ll smash his face in!” “Oh ffs!” I said. “Just dance with me, that’ll be enough to give him the hint to go away from my handbag!” “OK” he relented “But you gotta buy me a beer!” I agreed the deal and we hit the dance floor. Well, Octopus Guy scarpered PDQ when he saw Tony glaring at him and manoeuvring menacingly closer and closer!

The final track of the night was always a slow dance and I fully expected Tony to return to his beer and wall-leaning pose. But he didn’t. Instead, he grabbed me very tight, bent me over backwards, planted one mighty kiss on my lips and then stood me back up on my jellied legs. I know this sounds weird but, years later we agreed that we both had thought in that moment “Oh shit, this is who I will marry!”

Tony walked me home to Jaywick Sands and practised his devastating kissing technique under every lamp-post. I looked like the wreck of the Hesperus by the time I saw myself in the bathroom mirror!

Sid was worried when he found out that Tony and I were “an item”. Of all the Jocks, he trusted Tony the least. He knew how violent and dangerous Tony was capable of being but it was far too late, I was totally smitten, beyond return! Sid shook his head in dismay but accepted my decision.

My Dad did not approve either. His reaction was extreme. He whisked me up (almost under guard) to live in London with him and his new wife and their two children. I played it very cool and, after about a month, I feigned a weekend visit to my old school friend who lived in Romford on the Essex border of London. Except I did not go to Romford. I stayed on the train all the way to Clacton on Sea, booked into a bed & breakfast, dropped off my bags and headed into town to find Tony. It was not hard to locate him. He was still working at the Amusement Arcade, calling bingo numbers.

I slid into one of the player’s seats and waited for him to notice me. When he did, he totally lost his concentration and flushed slightly. I did not play, I just watched and he grew more fidgety by the minute. His work day came to an end at 6pm and he invited me to accompany him home. He and his brother had moved into a poky bedsit at the back of the local hospital. It was awful. It smelled bad, it looked worse and there was a huge pile of dirty dishes in the sink. I did not want to sit down, the place was very dirty! He laughed at me, saying I was “prissy”, to which I retorted “No, YOU are scuzzy, Tony!” and we adjourned to the pub where we met up with his friends.

Everyone was really pleased to see me again and I was so happy to be there. However, I had to be back at my desk in central London, by 9am on Monday morning, so the only way to have my cake and eat it was to work all week and secretly spend weekends in Clacton on Sea. This deception continued for several months until Tony phoned my Dad’s business line and, in true bold traditional style, asked for my hand in marriage.

It would have been nice to have been asked first. 🙄

My Dad was apoplectic when I got home late from work that evening. His wife, Mary, was doing her very best to keep him calm, but he lifted their baby’s pushchair that was in the hallway and launched it at my head as soon as I got through the door.

Thankfully, I dodged the pushchair and Mary took charge. She got between him and I. She demanded to speak to my Dad and was very firm about it. While I ate my dinner they were in their bedroom ‘discussing’ the matter. When he came into the dining room he looked marginally less agitated. He said that Mary had suggested that he permit me live with Tony for 6 months and, if I was still happy and alive, I could marry Tony with his blessing. It was obvious that he believed I would be beaten to a pulp and come racing home with my tail between my legs within weeks.

I agreed and, when I got to Clacton that weekend, I arrived with all I could carry.

Tony surprised me with an actual engagement ring, in a box. I really wasn’t expecting that. He had some good news too. He had a new job, working as a roofer’s labourer and had found us a tiny pretty cottage to live in. I could hardly believe it.

There was one thing missing and I hardly knew how to mention it. So I didn’t.

—0—

It was December 1970. We had a huge crazy party with all the Jocks, their various girlfriends and the Filthy Few to celebrate Tony’s 21st birthday and our engagement. It was absolute mayhem and Tony had to carry me home. I never have been able to drink alcohol.

For Christmas and New Year we went to Glasgow to introduce me to my future parents-in-law and I loved them immediately. In the spring Tony brought me a wriggling black and white border collie puppy tucked under his jumper; followed, a few weeks later, by a sweet tabby kitten to keep the dog company while we worked.

Still the ‘one thing’ was missing.

I finally got the courage to mention it.

“Erm, Tony!” I said one evening after dinner. “Do you love me?”

He looked a bit shocked. Then he said, and I will never forget it until the day I die:

“Of course, I do! Sleeps wid ya, don’t I?”

*\(“_“)/*