http://presentandsometimesfunctional.blogspot.com

I seem to have lost my early years at school and only retain the bad memories – much what I have done with my grandmother The Dragon. I remember being excited at the thought of going to school and my brother being so impatient that he often disappeared from the house only to be found sitting in the janitor’s room drinking a little bottle of milk. I imagine the first time it happened the neighbourhood would have been out looking for him but after that the dragon just popped up to the school to drag him back home, or the janitor brought him.

My first teacher was Miss McIver, The Witch; she had a thin, nervous and seriously waspish manner that didn’t include smiling or any kind of kindness – I think she put a spell on me so that I can’t remember most of what she did. I was four and a half when I joined her class; she had thirty children around her, some of whom were still on the breast, according to a tale told by the dragon – she was standing at the railings to pass me some toast at play-time break when another woman popped her breast through the railing and suckled her five-year old (I was always the youngest in my class).

The only real memory I have of her is when I swapped pencils with the boy behind me; he had been given a red one and I a blue – I desperately wanted the red pencil and he wouldn’t swap me so I took it and he told the witch. She sent me to stand in the corner of a cold cloakroom all by myself, for what seemed like a very long time. I was distraught and frightened. I have no memory of the outcome of all this; whether the dragon came up to breathe fire on her or not, or if my mother berated her into sullen silence…but that takes up a year of my life, or more, and that’s all there is – The Witch.

Though, there is a vague memory that I came first in her class at the end of the year, second in the next and third in the third – after that it was downhill all the way!

‘Help, help! Teddy, I’ve won the bingo!’ My mother would wake up the whole street two or three times a year. We’d get a quick glance at all the prizes and the handful of paper money waving through her laughter before we were pushed back into our little cupboard bed; it was folded away during the day so my brother and I had space to play.

There would be lamps, cutlery, tea-sets, clocks, ornaments, toys, chocolates and games for us to admire and squabble over in the morning. The cash was always £25, well it is in my memory – that was about a month’s wages for some people then. My mother was such an excitable woman; a bit like me now whenever/if-ever I win anything…you should see me at a roulette table!

When I compare my parents to anyone else’s, from that time, mine won on all counts, all sides – my friends always loved them. There were only two of us so money probably wasn’t as tight as it might’ve been, and the dragon looked after us while both parents worked. My friend Anne, who lived in the next close, had seven brothers and sisters so she’d never been to the seaside until we took her with us. I have an image of her mother’s washing line; it was full every single day. My mother used to accuse her of washing clean clothes. Anne was very clean: I sat in dirt every chance I got – I seemed to love it and was always covered in it. When we played at marbles I sat and she hunkered.

Only my mother was mad enough to feed all the children in the street; she made us chips for supper sometimes and served them up in a paper bag – so we asked her to make some more for all our friends. When we brought back blackberries and raspberries and demanded she make a pie, she did. Thinking back on all this now – she was pretty fabulous.

It smelled of old grass

and Magnolia paint.

My brother and I would ease

our bodies in backwards

pulling the door shut

through coats hanging

on the inside, jangling

half-crowns and florins –

Fanny Hill lay on the top shelf.

Sometimes, there would be

pickles and cheese in Dad’s pocket

with crackers and wooden spatula.

We talked quietly on Mars

it was very dark

my brother was small and hushed.

I’d scoop out a fistful

of coins, squeazing tight

for silence, and spend them

into my dress

counting the clicks.

He would snake his fist in

for his share – I’d feel his eyes shine

and whisper a coin on to his palm.

Published in Verse    Spring 1992

Sundays were a trial, whit wi straw hats

an elastic under yir chin, an orders

Don’t sit doon ootside; nae paddlin

in the burn; an straight hame; an make sure

the minister disney find oot

yir cousins ur cathlicks; don’t let them

cross thersells – tell them there’s nae

holy watter left. My God!

If yir Anty Mary wiz alive, she’d turn

in er grave – takin’ cathlicks

intae Sunday school.

Me an ma bruther an ma muther an the dug

crossin Victoria Bridge, an three lanes

a big rid buses comin o’er the rise

an ma muther dancing a panic in the middle

i the road, an me an ma bruther calmin er doon

leadin er tae safety afore the buses swept roon

ontae Clyde Street terminus.

Aye, the bus runs wur the best. Sometimes

we’d catch the shows up oan a field

oot by Bishopbriggs; we wur well-travelled weans

coz thur wuz oany two i us, when some people

wur still hivin loads a weans, but oor muther

didnay dae ‘IT’…well, she must’ve dun it twice!

She’d run us oan thae buses fur oors -

ah really liked er then.

Ah saw er tits wance; wan Christmas

when ah wiz peekin tae see whit we’d goat.

Big white baws. Ah niver said anything tae ma bruther

tae anybuddy. It wiz like a stranger wiz sittin

oan the side i the bed wi er hons in nylon stokins  

some big wuman who hid nuthin tae dae wi me.   

My mother was a Mantle-machinist; that means she made the whole coat – she didn’t do piece-work…in fact she sneered at piece-work. Her skills gave her power; she worked to her own timetable and her boss let her away with murder, apparently. I vaguely remember the mention of a company called Silvers. (for security purposes I will give my parents new names). Mum can be Queenie and Dad shall be Father Ted – but he wasn’t Irish or priestly.

She made most of our clothes. One of my jobs was to rock the treadle for her sewing machine, though I don’t suppose I did it for more than a few minutes. I couldn’t wait to try on her creations, especially when the dresses had a beautifully long and wide sash that tied in a great bow in my back; there’s a red one in my memory that I never tired of twisting at the mirror to see. The first thing I did with a new dress was twirl to see how high the skirt went – I think I wanted to flash my knickers like Ellenor Powell in the tap-dancing video below; I adored skirts that fanned out around their waists but mine never quite did that. My mother kept my legs well-covered; when other kids were wearing clothes up their legs mine reached mid-calf! I knew I was different even then.

Queenie doesn’t appear much in my early childhood, probably because she was always in the background – she couldn’t have done anything too startling to get my attention or really star in my memoirs: my father was the star for opposite reasons; if I got to see him before bedtime that was a real treat – he worked long hours but I don’t know what he did then, after he left the Merchant Navy. When I was very young he worked on the Renfrew ferry. I was told a story about him taking me to work with him and telling me to sit quietly and don’t move – which I did, so I got to go several times. My brother only got to go once and he was barred because he wouldn’t stay still. That must be where I get my sea-legs from.

My brother was a holy terror and drove Queenie up the wall. We had a huge back garden with four poles to string washing across the green; after getting up and running after my brother a dozen times my mother tied him to one of the poles with a length of rope so he couldn’t escape out into the street; all she ever wanted was to rest in the sun with happy children around her, not bothering her or anyone else. I know that we were difficult.

she was probably in her early twenties hereyoung enough to have fun