Happy, Happy Talk!

Saturday. 6.20 a.m. If you read my blog posts regularly, then you would know that I have been attempting to find someone to look after Alfie when I visit my daughter and grandchildren in Worcester, because Alfie doesn't get on well and makes a lot of noise. There has been a bit of a cul de sac as regards one attempt, but now it seems I have found someone who can look after him, who has dogs. I suddenly had a brainwave. I had the idea that someone at Dexter House might be able to help if I were to go to Worcester and leave Alfie in the flat, but to have someone go in and feed him and take him out several times a day. I thought of Dave, who is a neighbour. I met him when I was about to go somewhere in my car, as he parks his car next to mine. He told me it might be difficult for him to look after Alfie, but his sister might. She loves dogs and has a small one herself, so Alfie would possibly fit in and settle if I left him for a long weekend.

Sunday. 5.50 a.m. It took quite a while to wake up properly this morning, which meant it was somewhat difficult to focus so that I could take Alfie out. He was wide awake and barking loudly, which is why I had the lounge door firmly closed whilst I got myself organized, dressed and ready to go out. It is a mild but somewhat overcast morning. We are being told that for the next couple of weeks we can expect another heatwave. I just hope it's not going to be as hot as it was a few weeks ago. My digital thermometer currently reads 71ºF.

12.50 p.m. There was no church this morning, but there was a picnic at Furzton Lake, but I decided not to go. I had intended to watch the M.K.C.C. service via YouTube, but, having got it all set up through my Fire Stick, it just buffered, so unfortunately I gave up. It just froze, which made it impossible to watch. I've been reading, more of 'Modernity Britain', David Kynaston's book on the later '50s and early 1960s. Very informative, particularly as I can remember vaguely some of the details, as I would have been around 10-11 during that period. He mentions the opening of the Lionel Bart musical, 'Oliver!' which opened at the then, New, Theatre, (Now, I believe, called the Gielgud Theatre. I was at Rushmoor School in Bedford, and we were taken up to London by the English Teacher to see the show. I was very much inspired by it, and it would have been my first experience of a West End musical.  It must have been quite radical in some ways, because the book on which it's based is quite dark in places, think the murder of Nancy by Bill Sykes. The set, designed by Shaun Kenny was very distinctive, imaginative and probably unlike anything a West End audience would have seen up until that point in time. I think it must have coincided with the marriage of Princess Margaret to Lord Snowdon. If I remember correctly, we saw decorations in the street which must have been for this momentous occasion, but, at such a young age, it might not have meant much to me. I do recall going to a Lyon's corner house, of which there were many, not just in London, but in all the major towns and cities throughout Britain at the time, but, now, long since closed. I think this branch was somewhere in the vicinity of the Houses of Parliament. We were all allowed to order whatever we wanted, and one boy being very bold and having a Knickerbocker glory, one of those sweet concoctions, created in a long, stemmed glass, and consisting of brightly coloured jelly, in layers, with fruit cocktail and topped with whipped cream and that completed by a glacé cherry. Very pretentious. Which is probably why I remember it, some 60-plus years later. It must have been that school trip to London, where we were waiting on an Underground station platform, and a train came in, and everyone got on it but it turned out to be the wrong train, so we all had to get on, otherwise some of the group would have gone without us. I don't know how it turned out, but no doubt we had to go back to the same station and start again, getting on the correct train.  The following year we were taken to see 'Pickwick', another musical based on a Charles Dickens novel. It starred Harry Secombe, but it didn't have the same impact or long West End run as 'Oliver!' had. That show was staged at the Scala Theatre in Shaftsbury Avenue, but now converted into a cinema.

I am gradually returning the stuff which was removed from the kitchen units before the refurbishment was started. I just want things back as more or less what they were before the work began. I have lugged two large plastic boxes which have been parked in the bedroom. More or less all the stuff under the sink is back, and I find quite a lot of stuff is duplicated, such as furniture polish. A lot needs throwing away. I have found a really great-looking unit on Amazon which would be ideal to take my HP printer. If I get it, the printer can be moved from the IKEA unit where it lives at present. It comes with wheels and can be pushed around and has space underneath to store printer-related stuff like paper and ink cartridges and even has a handy drawer.

Living At Home- Part 3

My elder brothers were into music. James was (and still is, as far as I know) a very good trumpeter. He liked people such as Herb Alpert and had quite a few of his LPs. Robert, on the other hand, was (still probably is) a very proficient pianist. There was a good piano, an upright Steinway, in the house at Malting Farm. My grandmother Ferriman, who lived at Mill Farm, Cardington, was also a good pianist. She used to play at the annual children's Christmas party which was held each year at the Reading Room in the village. She had the scores of several musicals in the piano stool, including My Fair Lady and Salad Days. When I was a Student A.S.M. at the Everyman Theatre, Cheltenham in 1969 I was involved in a production of Salad Days. It may have been my grandmother's love of musicals which rubbed off on me and got me interested in not only musicals but theatre in general. Granny Ferriman as she was called was something to do with the W.I. I'm not sure in what capacity, but each year they had a drama competition, held in the Civic Theatre, Bedford. Over several years I was taken along to watch the one-act plays performed. I do remember going to London with her to see a play called "Mr Brown Comes Down The Hill", written by Peter Howard, which was put on at the Westminster Theatre. I'm not sure what reason we went to see this play, but it had a sort of Christian theme to it. I had the script of the play, which I had in my book collection for years, but, unfortunately, it got lost basically because I've moved house so many times over the years. After the show we went to a house in, I think, somewhere in Cavendish Square, for a rather elaborate meal. The house was once where Robert Clive, of India lived or someone like that. I remember it was quite a lavish meal. To this day I'm not sure what it was all about. I suppose I would have been about 15-16 at the time.

Every Christmas we always went to see a show of some sort in London. I remember going to see either Chipperfield's or Smart's circus which was put on at somewhere such as Olympia or Earl's Court. A circus came regularly to Bedford, usually in one of the fields along the road leading into Bedford. I remember going to see 'Peter Pan' which ran every year at the Scala Theatre and being taken by Sister Watson, who was a nurse at Bedford Hospital when my mother was a nurse before she married. It was a big, elaborate production which included flying, most likely done by Kirby's Flying Ballet. There was a spectacular scene on board Captain Hook's ship, I expect the sequence where Hook attempts to kill Peter Pan, and there were lots of cannons being fired, which, apparently, scared me. I don't expect I can have been much more than 8-9 at the time.

The Scala Theatre was one of those theatres which allowed you to have tea in the auditorium. You ordered before the show began and it was bought to you on a tray. I can't remember if you got sandwiches and cakes. You probably did. You just sat and drank your tea in the auditorium during the interval. I can't believe they did this, and it's not likely to be revived for a 21st-century play-goer as it would be against our old friends, health and safety.

Early Childhood Memories

What are my earliest memories? That's a difficult one. I remember once going to stay at Mill Farm, where my maternal grandparents lived. It's unfortunately no longer there, having been demolished and replaced by a business park. I was staying there with Jonathan Kendall, one of my cousins. We can't have been very old. There was a channel that ran along the concrete path outside the back door of the house which caught the water when it rained. This particular morning my grandfather and uncle Michael who still lived there had gone out to work on the farm and were about to come in for their lunch at midday. It had been raining heavily and Jonathan and I had nothing better to do. When grandad and uncle had gone into the house to have their lunch they had to take their Wellington boots off before going inside and put them in the glassed lobby. Little me and Jonathan saw the Wellingtons sitting there and decided it would be really amusing to take each one and scoop the water up in the boots from the channel where it was running fast. We then put the water-filled boots back in the lobby, so when uncle and grand-parent came back out to return to work they put there feet into their Wellingtons. As a result they were not pleased at getting very wet feet! Amusing for a very short time as both grandmother and father gave us a good hiding which we never forgot! I can't think this incident was repeated but it sticks in my memory!

My mother had been a nurse before she married my father in the late '40's. She had worked at Bedford Hospital. She had kept in contact with the hospital  after she got married.  I was taken to quite  few events at the hospital, usually held in Rye Close, which I believe is, or was, the private ward. Thinking back I don't remember any of my other brothers going with us.  Generally they had an annual Christmas party for the children of staff, past and present. My mother kept in contact with one lady, Sister Watson. I have no recollection of her Christian name, as she was always referred to as either Sister Watson or 'Watty.' All this would explain why I know South Wing Hospital so intimately as an adult. I have done several shifts as a carer and support worker in that hospital usually on Weller Wing and elsewhere, working with both mental patients and those with varying degrees of learning disability. I imagine I get my abilities for this work from my mother. 

One particular Christmas we went to the Christmas party in Rye Close and in the front entrance there was a quite amazing decoration which included a model of the Moot Hall which is in Elstow, the village just outside Bedford which is associated with John Bunyan (author to, amongst other books, "The Pilgrim's Progress.") This model, about the size I suppose of a doll's house, had windows in it which had been cut out and then the inside had lights which shone through the windows. Well little John saw this model and immediately decided that he wanted it! I presume I kept on and on about this model Moot Hall, to such an extent that I was given it! I imagine it would have been given it because I kept going on about it and it was far easier to give in than refuse!

Watty quite often came to tea at the farm. As far as I can remember she lived in a flat in Kempston, which is a town bordering on Bedford. I think the flat over-looked Kempston Park and you went up some steps to the front door. Anyway, on one occasion when she came to tea we must have gone into the garden at Malting Farm (which was quite large and had a magnificent double-trunked sycamore tree in the centre of the lawn which has since been cut down due to the fact that it became unsafe, sadly. Due no doubt to decay or something.) In the garden, somewhere near the lawn, were a couple of plinths for urns. The urns presumably had been broken or something or moved elsewhere. I think one had survived and had plants in. Anyway, one of these plinthss was reasonably low and on this particular afternoon Watty decided she needed to have a rest and sat on one of the plinths. Young John,  had quite a way with words and descriptions had to point out that this elderly lady looked as if she was sitting on the toilet, much to the amusement (or not, I should think!) of all and sundry!  Children, as I know with having my own, have a way of coming out with things which their parents wished that they didn't. No doubt this was one such time. Another was when my mother went to a shop along the main road going into the centre of Bedford. This was to a  shop which sold all manner of sewing and knitting items called I seem to remember Elsa Currah. My mother did a lot of knitting and sewing so perhaps she had gone in the shop to buy knitting wool or a dress-pattern.  I doubt very much if it's still there. Anyway, the lady who either ran it or was an assistant in there had a rather unfortunate facial feature, quite a heavy moustache. Some older ladies do unfortunately have facial hair and do nothing to either hide it with make-up or even attempt to remove it. This young boy saw this and had to come out and say, in quite a loud voice which I'm sure she must have heard, something  like ' Look! That lady's got a moustache!'  as well as any other customers, who would have been in the shop at the time and my mother took me by the arm quite firmly and dragged me out of the shop, no doubt in a lot of embarrassment.

I've never been able to point to one particular event which got me interested in theatre. Being a farming family we didn't have any connection with theatre in any way. I remember being taken to pantomimes at various stages of my childhood. We went to pantomimes in the West End and if my memory serves to one at the County Theatre in Bedford, in Midland Road, which had been the venue of Bedford repertory theatre company up until it's demise in the late 1950's or early '60's. It later became a Mecca bingo hall and is now run by an evangelical church called the Mount Zion Church.  I think this was a pantomime of  'Alice In Wonderland' and was amazingly on ice. I think I saw another pantomime based on the 'Alice' books somewhere in London which had Frankie Howard in and he seemed to play more than one character, including the Mad Hatter. Don't ask me where the theatre was. We also went to a circus, probably Bertrum Mills or Chipperfield's which was put on somewhere like Olympia. Where the Horse of the Year show would have been staged. I remember we must have gone with my grandmother Ferriman. She had a love of hats, and made of raffia, with wide brims and quite striking. These were worn on all outings including church on Sunday. On this occasion when we'd gone to London we had to use the Underground and we were standing waiting for a train to come into the station. Whenever this happens, there is nearly always quite  draught as the train comes out of the tunnel and draws up to the platform. The wind caused my grandmother's hat to be blown off and it landed on the train tracks and was run over and completely destroyed by the wheels of the train! No doubt my grandmother was upset by the incident but I have no further recollection of the incident.

Watty took me to London one Christmas. I don't think my brothers came with us. We went to see 'Peter Pan' which was staged every year for decades at the Scala Theatre. I think this was in Covent Garden somewhere but is sadly no more. I was frightened apparently by the scene with the pirates and Captain Hook in and where some very loud cannons were fired and there was supposed to be lots of smoke and as I say loud explosions. I loved the fact that Peter Pan actually flew across the stage but had no idea at the time how this was achieved. I also remember that in the interval we had tea brought to us and served in the auditorium on a tray which was quite a  treat. I doubt that you'd be allowed to do this today, considering all the 'Health and Safety' regulations we have to contend with now.