Larry has left the building

Maude and I went on a date last night – to a 'gig' in Newcastle.

We hadn’t seen Larry since Maude’s birthday back in December and just presumed that he had hibernated for the winter.

‘Perhaps he’s having an extra long sleep this year. Perhaps he’ll burst out into the world with more energy than ever and, well, a direction.’

Maude is always admirable in her optimistic take on her friends’ capabilities and motivations.

There was the usual long gap between the moment when the support act finally succumbed to boos and groans and left the stage and the moment when the main act deigned to appear. It was during this window that the familiar figure of Larry came into view through the chattering crowds around the entrance to the hall. Maude had inadvertently spilled her drink on a huddle of sixth formers to create some space for us at a rail on the mezzanine. We could see the stage and the door from one vantage point.

Larry has a distinctive gait – part shuffle, part swagger. He rarely looks where he is going – preferring instead to scan the room for familiar faces and pretty girls. On this occasion, though, he seemed fixed on a point in the distance and his movement was more shuffle than swagger.

Maude waved. Larry, however, didn’t respond or deviate – instead he maintained a steady pace in his shuffle into the room.

‘The idle swine is ignoring me.’

I tried to reassure Maude that Larry didn’t seem to be himself. Maude rapidly called Miles, a mutual friend.

‘I just saw Larry in a public place and he ignored me! Have you spoken to him lately?’

I detected something slightly odd about Larry. As he drew closer I could see profound irregularity in his outfit. Larry habitually wears black – he expends less energy on choosing outfits that way. Tonight, he was a riot of stripes.

Maude nudged me. ‘Miles wants to know what he’s wearing…’

Larry emerged through a wave of dry ice and came into clearer focus.

Maude passed the phone to me:

’The last time I was fixing Larry’s Teasmaid', Miles said, ‘he told me about the ‘pyjama caper’. Whenever he needs to get into a club, a gig - or anywhere really - without paying and he can’t get Dink or Helmut to pay, he puts on pyjamas and ‘sleepwalks’ in. Glazed eyes, pyjamas. While the bouncers are laughing and pointing he's in past them and runs into the crowd.’

‘Yoo-hoo!’ Maude was unfazed by the cool attitudes of those around her and thought it best to adopt her grandmother’s way of attracting the attention of a passer-by.

Maude’s cry roused Larry from his ‘sleepwalk’ and queered the timing of his routine. The house lights dimmed. As the crowd began to show its appreciation for the imminent arrival of the main act, Larry’s muffled whimpers could just be heard under the weight of a heavy man who had proved himself to be deceptively light on his feet. The conqueror rose to his feet and a broad back showed the legend ‘STEWARD’. Larry was leaving the building - with his head held high, and his feet held higher.

A bit of a cheek...

I have a mystery ailment. Every once in a while I will get up, look in the bathroom mirror, and see that my right cheek has swollen to make me look battered – or slightly more battered than usual.

‘Perhaps it’s stress related.’ Maude does her best to be sympathetic. I pointed out that if stress were at the root of it, then it would be a permanent fixture.

‘Oh, is it not?’ Maude doesn’t actually look at me much these days.

The doctor was sympathetic, typed a great deal and looked perplexed, but didn’t actually have an inkling as to what the problem was.

‘Perhaps you should try the dentist – it is near your teeth.’

Heartened by such thorough attention to my ballooning face, I made my exit through the guard of honour of coughing pensioners in the surgery waiting room. The dentist referred me on to the Dental Hospital in the centre of town. in the waiting room some had similar swellings to my own and some had teeth so protrusive it was hard not to look at them. It was also hard to imagine what on earth an x-ray could reveal that wasn’t on show to the world.

My turn came and I realised that I was being shown into a room full of students, who were about to observe my x-ray experience. Apparently I had signed a form which included my consent to this. They all looked very young and slightly bogus in their white coat & trainer ensembles.

The qualified radiologist smiled at me and nodded towards her acolytes.

‘We’ve got company this morning.’

The radiologist trainer was one of the smallest women I have ever met. The x-ray machine was vertical and designed to work as the patient stood.

The tiny woman turned to her students:

‘Hey, we’ve got a big one here! How’s little me going to manage?’

The radiology expert then rummaged in a low level cupboard and produced a footstool.

‘Be ready for every eventually when x-raying.’

It struck me that a resourceful boy scout could perform x-rays if this is the level of expertise required.

I tried to smile as the little woman teetered on her footstool and raised the height of the machine to its limit. I stepped forward and the top of my head still hit the frame, just.

‘I could stoop ever so slightly’, I offered.

‘No, I’m sorry sir. Stooping would affect your posture and impair the x-ray.' She then turned to the students to reiterate this last point: 'Stooping, not good'.

The room fell quiet for a moment as the students made zero useful suggestions and the little woman’s brain whirred as her resourcefulness was tested once more. I then saw her expression brighten as an idea struck her. She lowered the apparatus to the level of my groin. I was perplexed by this and thought I caught a titter from one of the male students.

‘One sec!’ The radiologist darted from the room with some purpose.

I stepped away from the x-ray machine and briefly put my hands in my pockets to try and look relaxed and unembarrassed. I thought better of this and took my hands out – only to send a pound coin skidding across the buffed floor. One of the students trapped it under his trainer and offered it back to me in silence. I thanked him and he nodded slightly. I guessed that the ‘communication with patients’ module was later in their course.

It was then that the silence was challenged by a regular squeak in the corridor. The squeak drew closer. The double doors then flew open and the tiny radiologist entered the room with an expression of triumph and a battered wheelchair.

Send Only

If I go straight from work to the house I find that I have been handed the baby before I have even had the chance to remove my coat. I took my seat for dinner on Wednesday after the baby was asleep, for instance, without realising I was still wearing my coat and hat. Maude giggled until pudding.

‘Me time’ then is very hard to come by and, when it occurs, I savour it. I sat in a layby yesterday doing a crossword. Passers-by must have wondered why I smiled so broadly from such a simple pastime – not knowing that it was the joy of being off- radar that gave me such a rush. I then set to work on a task I had been meaning to get around to for some time – my text message templates. I tire of texting the same things over and over again – so templates seem the way to go.

I began with a few templates for Original Susan:

‘Probably working from home today, trouble with the old boiler – plumber called.’

‘Running late – childcare issues. Hope you don’t mind holding the fort.’

I then began work on the template messages for Maude.

The practical:

‘Traffic v.heavy. Feel free to hand over baby in hall on my arrival.’

The contrite:

‘I’m sorry.’

‘I’m so very sorry – forgive me.’

‘I am more sorry than I have ever been – please let me back into the house before the frost sets in.’

A Woman's Touch

Maude and I called to see Benny this afternoon. Benny was keen to show Maude the progress he has made in his DIY efforts. His living room has improved tenfold – with shelving, a rug – even a new pouffe with internal storage.

Maude flattered Benny on his achievements, but I could tell that she was unsure about some of Benny’s general approach to décor.

‘You’ve done remarkably well Benny….in the circumstances. I do think the place could do with a few small touches though. For instance, what about the fire?’

Benny has a new fireplace. A local carpenter made the surround and a new hearth was fitted at great expense. Benny, however, has shied away from setting a fire since his elderly neighbour, Florence, expressed her fears for the safety of his property and of hers. In fact, when she spied Benny with a box of matches at hand she called the Fire Service.

Maude suggested that Benny made a pot of tea. As he left the room Maude caught his heel as she closed the door behind him and held it shut with the pouffe.

I could hear Benny’s voice in the hall – it had the quality of a cry from someone trapped down a well.

‘What are you doing Maude? It is my house you know.’

‘Don’t worry Benny – you’ll thank me.’

Maude likes to hang pictures and keeps a small stock of tacks in her purse. Benny had received a couple of small landscape prints from a well-meaning sister at Christmas. He had been using them as tea trays, so Maude took the opportunity to make them focal points on either side of the dormant fireplace. Using a heel as an improvised hammer, she made light work of the job.

I then helped Maude as she repositioned most of the furniture. Benny could hear the movement from the hall.

‘Tea’s ready. Can I come back in now?’

‘Not just yet dear.’ Maude pressed on and found a new spot for more or less everything in the room. The movement of the furniture revealed lost socks and mislaid Y-fronts. Maude looked away. I felt obliged to protect Benny’s dignity and swiftly found a temporary home for the smalls in the new pouffe.

I was then sent out into the hall to prepare Benny for the ‘reveal’. My friend was sat on the bottom step of his own staircase like a banished naughty child. I reassured him that there was nothing to worry about and he agreed to wear my cravat as a blindfold as I led him back into his living room.

‘Ta-da!’ cried Maude as I uncovered Benny’s eyes.

Benny was a little disoriented and remained silent for a minute as he surveyed the changed environment. His expression was inscrutable, until his face gradually warmed into a smile.

‘It’s wonderful Maude. I needed a woman’s touch.’

‘Quite,’ said Maude.’I also thought that it was time for you to ‘put away childish things’ – so I got your fire going with that balsa wood Messerschmitt from the shelf. It really didn’t go with those books anyway.’

Benny looked a little stunned. We heard the model crackle in the grate and I could see the flames reflected in Benny’s glasses.

‘You just need to keep it tidy dear – we found lots of newspapers and ‘bits and bobs’. If the place gets untidy, you don’t necessarily need a woman’s touch, you could just dump your mess in the pouffe.’

'That was a man thing!'

My best man, Miles, called unexpectedly last night.

‘Could you email a few of your wedding pictures to me?’ he asked. ‘Only I was telling Delilah [his new girlfriend] about your wedding and how Maude gave me a really hard time about my haircut. I just wanted to prove that it wasn’t that bad.’

I said I’d be happy to scan a few images as soon as I got the time.

‘She did give me a hard time you know.’

I was surprised that a grown man was still smarting from a throwaway reprimand of years ago from Maude – the kind of remark I weather on a daily basis, strapped to the mast of matrimony.

‘I think that she was actually more critical of the fact that you hadn’t shaved. Oh, and of the option that you presented to me as we entered the church.’

‘But I offer that to all the grooms I serve and, anyway, you shouldn’t have told her – that was a man thing.’

Miles has been a Best Man on several occasions and stood out as the most capable candidate when Maude and I were planning our wedding. He has a certain charisma and the ability to work a room without showing signs of his massive recreational drug consumption. I did consider Archie, but suspected that the little chap would be mistaken for a pageboy. Larry too was ruled out – his narcolepsy is quite unpredictable.

Miles has a checklist of what he believes to be his duties as a Best Man. He composed the list on a beer mat some years ago and carries it in his wallet. I recall our approach to the church gates on that fateful day. Miles turned to me and raised his hand in a ‘STOP’ signal.

‘Woooah, bonny lad!’

I stopped and said nothing. I thought perhaps he was about to issue some last minute words of advice, or to wish me many years of happily married life. Instead, he reached into his back pocket and produced his wallet. As he opened it I shielded my eyes from a possible outpouring of trapped moths. When I looked again Miles was really concentrating (I could see his nostrils flaring). He was consulting his checklist. He took a small pencil from behind his ear and carefully ticked off the items he had achieved. Miles’ handwriting has always reminded me of ransom notes – I couldn’t read any of the bullet points apart from the very last one on the list. His pencil hovered, as he opened his mouth to speak – it read:

‘GIVE GROOM LAST CHANCE TO RUN AWAY’

'Good carrots ruined!'

Maude’s father, Crawford, has a very fixed idea of Christmas. The details of his Christmas should not be tampered with – as any deviation from his template has the potential to spoil his entire experience.

It was Christmas a decade ago when Maude’s sister, Lucia, last ‘tampered’ with Christmas. Lucia is a gifted chef and took responsibility for the Christmas lunch dessert – deciding that a departure from the traditional steamed pudding was long overdue. It was to be a surprise for Crawford and a surprise it certainly was. The lights were dimmed and Lucia brought the chestnut mousse into the dining room with some ceremony and not a little pride in her efforts. The rest of the company smiled its approval and a gentle ripple of applause greeted Lucia as she processed to the centre of the table. Crawford was conspicuously quiet until he was served. His assessment of Lucia’s efforts was a little harsh and was issued at the top of his voice:

‘That’s a piss poor excuse for a pudding if ever I saw one!’

Lucia burst into tears, Augusta cast a withering look at her husband and left the room. I turned to gauge the reaction of Maude’s twin brother, Roddy, only to hear the sound of his ignition in the yard. Maude put an arm around Lucia’s shoulder and led her, sobbing, from the room. Maude paused briefly at the door until she was sure that the scene was imprinted on her father’s memory and then comforted her sister back to the quiet sanctuary of the music room.

That memory had seemingly receded this year. Augusta had allotted Christmas Day tasks by handwritten memo. I was asked to look after the baby and make sure that the log fire didn’t fade, while Maude took responsibility for the preparation of the vegetables. As I was carrying Aurora from the kitchen, I noticed Maude ransacking her mother’s larder after some culinary inspiration.

‘Brilliant! Fresh ginger for the carrots.’

I had a sudden flashback to the mousse incident and tried to attract Maude’s attention while she was ushering me out the kitchen.

‘But darling, don’t’ forget about (at this point Maude closed the door soundly behind me) ….the mousse.’

Christmas lunch was not very old when Crawford and I found ourselves alone at the table – as we had ten years earlier.

‘What did I say?’ Crawford straightened his paper party hat and pushed his carrots to the edge of his plate. As he tucked into the remainder of his turkey he looked across at my turkey leg.

‘Do you not want that? There’s a wild load of meat left on it.’

Esme, where's your troosers?

We celebrated Maude’s birthday last night. Most of the usual crowd was there. Esme was the first to arrive.

‘You’ve forgotten your trousers’ Maude observed. I looked down and realised that Esme was bravely wearing a ‘shirt-dress’. Maude was easily distracted as Esme proffered a beautifully wrapped birthday gift. The women communicated for a few minutes in a language made up entirely of giggles and high pitched squeals as they admired elements of each other’s outfit and agonised over which cocktail to begin the evening with.

Pierre and Heidi turned up next. Pierre slid into our booth with his usual ease, kissed Maude and straightened his new glasses. I don’t think that he was trying to draw attention to them, but he did anyway.

‘I love your new specs, Pierre.’

Pierre beamed, removed the eyewear and began to explain how he acquired them.

‘Well I was in this thrift shop back in Montreal. I actually went in for some toothpicks, but my Dad was challenged by security for making an inappropriate comment to one of the cashiers. So, anyway, I had some time to kill and started trying on these old glasses and, would you believe I found my exact prescription in these and they were only….99 cents!’

Pierre replaced the glasses and looked at everyone around the table – to illustrate that they did indeed hold lenses with his exact prescription.

‘That’s amazing!’ exclaimed Maude. ‘They do make you look like a lesbian though.’

After several hours of chat and of cocktails taken, Larry appeared.

‘Don’t I know you from somewhere?’ joked Maude. ’You look really familiar.’

Larry hadn’t visited to see the baby.

‘Helmut cycled over,' noted the new mother.

‘Well, he was in the area anyway,’ retorted Larry. ’You’ve seen one baby, you’ve seen them all.’

‘Well you haven’t seen ours – so how would you know?’

Larry then spent the usual hour or so defending his neglectful ways and louche lifestyle with remarks along the lines of:

‘Well it’s just the way I am’
‘I’m still your friend.’
‘I’ve been really busy out partying and meeting new people.’
‘The ukulele tuition is really taking off and I’m teaching Alan Shearer some tunes to liven up his after-dinner speaking.’

Maude suggested that Larry performed some minor 'tweaks' on his life:

‘Get a proper job’
‘Learn to drive’
‘Marry Dink and have children.’
‘Buy a house’

Larry was touched by Maude’s concern and the amount of thought she had put into her advice. He then muttered something and left the table. I realised a few minutes later – when he retook his place with glass in hand - that the mutter was an offer to buy a round of drinks.

Esme then squeezed into a space between Larry and I which was far too small for her.

‘Room for a small one?’ she asked. She turned to speak to me with a buttock firmly on Larry’s knee. She smiled at me and then opened her mouth to speak.

‘Oh, I’ve completely forgotten what I was going to say to you.’ It was then Esme ‘realised’ that she was sat on Larry.

‘Oh. look who I’m sat on! What a coincidence.’

Wait a minute Mr Postman!

So, rogue postmen do exist. We received an abused item of post in a polythene evidence bag from the Royal Mail – complete with a letter of profound corporate apology. The letter had been filleted by our postman (we think it had contained a voucher) and was the first item to be returned as part of ‘an ongoing investigation’. The case is in court, so we will have to wait for more information on what else the thieving swine took. He had been our postman for several years. Maude thought him very agreeable – as he remembered us from our last address a few miles away and would ask how she was. He would thoughtfully come into the porch (we rarely lock our doors in The Villas) if a parcel was too large for the postbox. Not for him, the leaving of a card causing the inconvenience of a trip to the sorting office. He was more interested in the massive inconvenience resulting from the theft of valuable post.

Since Aurora's birth we have excised several friends who failed to acknowledge the event with an appropriate gift. Now it seems we might have been hasty. Postie has probably had a bumper couple of weeks at the car boot sale – or on Ebay – with much profit made from cuddly toys and baby blankets.

I have begun to wonder what else he might have purloined in his 5 years as our postman. Maybe there was a letter (and cheque) from Archie & Leap – acknowledging their deficiencies and their indebtedness. Perhaps that literary agent did write back on receipt of my novel – with a record advance and an apology for not recognising my greatness earlier.

Des, Burt and me.

The registration of a birth is an old-fashioned process. An appointment is required and a lengthy series of questions are posed by a person who takes the role of registrar very seriously. A sign on the wall warns that the giving of any false information in the circumstances is PERJURY. I was quite reassured by this formality and looked forward to getting a piece of parchment confirming Aurora’s place in the world.

I was a few minutes early for the appointment and the reception office had not actually opened for business. I could see figures moving around behind the frosted window. Women were wishing each other 'good morning' and already discussing what they had brought in for lunch. I could hear a fridge door being opened and closed as the exciting lunch items were stowed away for the morning.

The office opened at 9.30am. I took a seat and waited for the wall clock to tick loudly around to opening time. When it did, I excitedly got up. I was to meet the registrar and our daughter was about to become a citizen of the borough. I approached the counter as a middle-aged woman slid back the window. The hatch looked like one of those serving windows from the 1970’s and the woman who revealed herself had heyday makeup that complemented the look. Sky-blue eyeshadow beamed out from behind large bi-focals. She adjusted her glasses slightly and focussed on me.

‘I have an appointment with the registrar.’ I was formal, but enthusiastic.

I expected her response to be something like: ‘What’s the name please?’, or ‘Oh, yes, please take a seat sir’. When her glasses were at the right angle to survey me through her bi-focals, she said:

‘Is it to register a death?’

I was disappointed by this.

‘No,’ I said weakly, ‘a birth’.

‘Oh’ she said barely containing her surprise. She turned to her colleague and raised her eyebrows before turning an insincere smile on me.

‘You’d better take a seat then.‘

She slid the window back into place and I watched her retreat to her desk through the frosted pane.

The waiting room was empty save for me, but I still waited a full 20 minutes. I presumed that the registrar was refilling her fountain pens, or just making me wait to emphasise her importance and the gravity of the registration process. While I waited I felt increasingly insecure as an older father - I obviously looked more like a morose widower than a new dad. This gloom wasn’t lifted by the conversation I could overhear from behind the frosted glass.

‘Des O’Connor - well into his seventies. He’ll probably be dead by the time that kid goes to big school.'

There was a long pause here - during which a ringing phone was steadfastly ignored.

‘Aye. Burt Bacharach, he’s another one. I saw him in the paper. He’s ancient – he’ll be lucky if he sees that kid get to nursery'.

All Donations Gratefully Accepted

Our neighbourhood has many elderly residents. The area even has one of those ‘Elderly People Crossing’ road signs. I was unnerved by this at first – thinking that I had ended up in a dormitory suburb ‘as it were, for life.’

With old people though, come old customs and manners. This is no bad thing - especially when one of the customs involves the giving of money.

The other day Maude and I took our first promenade with the new baby – Aurora. It was a sunny day so we did a circuit around the leafy, blooming lanes of ‘The Villas’. Maude’s mother, Augusta, walked 30 yards ahead and used her natural authority to divert any traffic or dog walkers from our path.

An elderly lady was busy dead-heading roses in her garden as we passed.

‘Oh, a new baby!’ She exclaimed and leaned precariously over her garden gate to catch a glimpse of the infant.

Maude proudly pushed back the awning on the pram to reveal Aurora’s sleepy face.

‘Oh, she’s absolutely gorgeous,’ continued the old lady. ’So good to see some new blood in The Villas – the next generation, as it were. Wait there.’ She then disappeared into her kitchen. Maude was slightly perturbed. Reappearing moments later, the lady rummaged in her purse.

I realised what was happening and whispered some reassurance.

‘It’s an old custom darling – some older people will give the baby a small amount of money for good luck.’

The old lady reached across under Maude’s watchful eye and pressed a shiny pound coin into Aurora’s tiny hand.

‘Good luck!’ She smiled and returned to her gardening chores. Maude thanked her and we moved on.

I had not seen the giving of money to strangers’ children for many years, but I was heartened to see the warm glow in the old lady’s cheeks as she made the gesture.

I have since resolved to brighten the days of as many of our senior neighbours as possible: early morning walks around the full extent of The Villas (including culs-de-sac) have been highly profitable. Hovering around the trolley return station at Tesco has also paid dividends – the elderly shopper is very likely to be easily distracted after retrieving their pound coin and before you know it another coin has dropped into Aurora’s university fund and the cockles of another old heart have been warmed.

A well-timed saunter past the post office as it opened brought in a remarkable pram haul of £7.59, some Werther's Originals and an Out-Patient appointment card.

The wind that shakes the barley water

Someone told me that our local supermarket had a goodwill policy of offering new mothers a free shop if their waters happened to break on the premises. Maude is 3 days away from what has been described as her ‘outside due date’ – whatever that means. She is profoundly bored at home, so yesterday she took me up on the offer of a trip to the supermarket. I used the subterfuge of stocking up on a few of those last minute essentials for the hospital trip – snack bars and magazines, for me.

I thought it best to hover in aisles with supermarket staff in them. That way, the breaking waters would be witnessed and there could be no question of our qualification for the complimentary trolley dash.

‘Why have you taken over 10 minutes to choose flapjacks? You always eat those weird seeded ones there. You are a creature of habit. Just get them and we’ll go.’ Maude didn't seem to be enjoying the expedition.

I suggested that we move on to the alcohol aisles (remembering that those areas are always patrolled by vigilant staff).

‘This could be our last chance to get something to wet the baby’s head darling.’

Maude viewed me with mild suspicion – nothing new – and began to move, slowly. I helped her along from behind – massaging her back in line with the pregnancy help-books I had been reading. Maude had marked the most germane sections for me and left the books piled on my desk – together with a multiple choice test paper for me to fill in at my leisure (it’s so stimulating being married to a teacher).

‘If you don’t stop that I’ll use the last bit of strength in my body to send you flying into those shelves. Those shelves, there, with all the tins.’

I gathered that this wasn’t quite the right time to employ my new massage expertise. Maude joined me in the wine aisle a few minutes later. I’d taken the brief opportunity to gather a bewildering array of champagne, in the hope that we could linger over the choice and improve our chances.

‘That one will do.’ Maude grabbed the bottle with the prettiest label and began to shuffle towards the checkouts. As we were passing the soft drinks and cordials I was beginning to believe that the mission was doomed. Maude reached for her favourite flavour of barley water, but she suddenly stopped short and held the shelf for support. I was heartened and felt sure that we had a result. I raised my voice:

‘Darling, are you ok? Is it…..is it time? Oh god, imagine going into labour at the supermarket of all places, who’d believe it?’

A security guard looked slightly intrigued and approached from the end of the aisle. Maude remained silent until he was within five feet of her.

‘I wouldn’t come any closer,’ she suggested and I now felt pretty confident that we would soon be filling a family trolley with every product I could find from the ‘Finest’ range.

‘Just checking that everything is ok, madam. Would you like me to find a seat for you?’

A long, pregnant, silence ensued and time seemed to stand still as we waited for a response.

As the Tannoy system announced ‘a large range of bakery products at very reduced prices in aisle 7’, Maude broke wind with a volume I have never before witnessed and wouldn't care to experience again.

‘Oh,' she sighed, 'that’s much better.’ She then placed the champagne in my basket and made her way briskly to the car park.

Look out kid.....

Every time I leave the house at the moment, Maude reminds me to drive carefully. Whenever I leave the house for work, she states ‘I hope you’re still driving carefully.’ I tell her that, of course I am driving with absolute care.

‘I rarely get to ton-up any more dear’, I said yesterday morning when this ritual took place. ‘I have stopped overtaking on bends while sending text messages – all in the past, that kind of thing. I have even started wearing my seatbelt.’

Maude usually adopts her stern 'teacher face' at this point – the one she uses when trying to outstare a spirited teenager at school.

‘You know what I mean. You wouldn’t want to leave me a widow and this poor child (points at bump) an orphan.’

I usually do my mock-chided face at this point and she lightens up, safe in the knowledge that she has put the notion of safe driving at the top of my limited mental agenda. She does, however, have detailed knowledge of my driving habits.

‘What about the flash cards?’

Last year I watched a Bob Dylan documentary and was quite inspired by the film clip for ‘Subterrannean Homesick Blues’. Like most Dylan songs, it is a bit top-heavy with lyrics, but he whips through them briskly and helps his audience with an armful of placards. He drops or flings aside each card when the line is complete. I spent several hours in the garage composing a similar set of message boards – all with a motoring application. Maude flouts the highway code by frequently using her horn 'as a rebuke' (accompanied by some regrettable gestures). My card system is designed, instead, to encourage fellow drivers to reconsider their driving style.

I travel along the A1 a great deal (apart from the occasions on which I am forced to go cross-country. The A1 often grinds to a standstill at peak times and I am forced to pull myself off to avoid an unhealthy build up of frustration). I find that I often end up sat parallel to a motorist who has recently cut me up, changed lane without indication, or has a mobile phone clamped to his or her ear. At such times I have my handy stock of clearly stencilled flash cards. The most useful cards read as follows:

(for handheld mobile phone users) : QUIT YOUR JIBBER JABBER!
(for non-indicators) : GIVE US A CLUE!
(for boy racers) : GROW UP!
(for emergencies) : YOU'LL NEVER TAKE ME ALIVE COPPER!

‘Very rarely used, dear', I reassured Maude, 'and never in anything above second gear.’

Maude put on her coat and kissed me on the cheek, seemingly happy with this renewed attention to safety. She stalled halfway through the front door.

‘I haven’t forgotten about your replica gun.’

Last Night I Dreamt....

Maude and I share everything – hopes, fears, dreams. She asked me why I hadn’t slept very well on Sunday night and was even more tired than usual for the start of the working week. I explained that I had been distressed by a bad dream. ‘What?’ she asked 'a proper nightmare?’.

‘Worse than that,’ I answered.

I explained that my dream had featured my finally striking up a friendship with Morrissey. (I once declined an invitation to a party in Manchester – unaware that The Smiths were there. This has obviously stayed with me). I went on to describe how Morrissey had brewed his best tea for me. He had poured it from a teapot swaddled in a tea cosy bearing the combative image of Pat Phoenix and then served it in China cups. The cups chimed beautifully when replaced in their saucers. We had lovely muffins, freshly toasted on Morrissey's open fire – all the while talking about our favourite books, the highlights of ‘kitchen sink’ cinema and trying to quantify just how much Manchester had to answer for. The phone kept ringing and he fielded calls from Nancy Sinatra and Alan Bennett – explaining that he had a far more important new friend and it was highly unlikely that he would need their company any more. It was then that the dream took a dark turn. Morrissey had just asked for my help.

‘Please please PLEASE! have a look at the songs for my new album – I’m really not too sure about them.’

Morrissey then crossed the room and rifled through a leather satchel. He produced a large scrapbook with the legend ‘My New Songs’ stencilled on the cover. He fumbled a little, put on his reading glasses and made to return to me at the hearth. My second muffin was very nearly done to perfection. Morrissey’s face now wore an expression of profound relief. He had obviously been carrying a great deal of worry about the quality of the new songs and saw in me a kindred spirit - someone who would add the necessary polish to get the songs to recordable quality.

Morrissey’s body was then struck by a terrible spasm. His hands dishevelled his cardigan and clutched at his chest. He then fell, dead, on the deep-pile carpet.

Of course I awoke at this point.

Maude looked unmoved by the events of my dream.

‘I tend to dream about family and friends,’ observed Maude. ‘You know, the people who matter to me…..you.’

‘I dream about you as well, dear.’

Maude looked unconvinced and continued.

‘I dream about the person I’m going to spend the rest of my life with.’

I pointed out that I was still upset and she really should keep her threats to herself.

Mother Knows Best

Maude and I attended our first ‘Parentcraft’ class last night. Maude was quite looking forward to it – she had done a great deal of research and wanted to participate fully.

The midwife introduced herself and was impressively warm and welcoming.

‘That’s Carol,’ whispered Maude. ’She’s our midwife.’

I smiled and Carol suggested that all the couples introduced themselves to the group – since we would be sharing the sessions for several weeks.

The introductions began. Couples squeezed each other’s hands, exchanged smiles, gave their names, detailed how pregnant they were and where they lived. Carol thanked each couple in turn and made everyone feel at their ease – especially the men who shuffled in their seats and fidgeted with the change in their pockets. Our turn arrived and Carol glanced over. I drew breath and shifted slightly in my seat. Before I could say anything Maude took over:

‘Hello Everyone! I’m Maude! I am 36 weeks pregnant and I will be having my baby at the Queen Elizabeth.’

There was a finality at the end of this statement, so Carol smiled again and moved to the next couple. I tapped Maude’s arm gently.

‘Well, they don’t really need to know who you are, do they?’

Maude ‘whispered’ this, so it was audible to the entire room. A diminutive father beside me sniggered. I looked closely at him. He was wearing a waistcoat which made him look like a snooker player and his sideburns were shaped to emphasise his individuality. I began to think that I didn’t really want to surrender my anonymity to this group anyway.

Carol took the group through the 3 stages of pregnancy. Maude answered when Carol asked if anyone knew the names of those stages. Maude also chipped in with various technical terms and suggested at one point that one of Carol’s diagrams was, in fact, the wrong way up.

Carol persevered, but began to offer her questions exclusively to the other side of the room. Maude was undaunted and fired her answers at the back of Carol’s head – repeating them until she turned around and was forced to acknowledge that Maude was right.

‘Maude's being doing her research, hasn't she?’ Carol forced a smile.’If I’m feeling under the weather next week, I'm sure she can take yous all through the rest of the course.’

I swiftly fell off my chair to distract Maude, before she worsened the situation by correcting Carol’s grammar.

In case of picnics

I was in the bank the other day in Seaburn. An elderly man was at the counter in front of me. He was busy rifling through the pockets of his raincoat. I gathered that he was looking for the origin of his errand: a chequebook perhaps, or some cash bound in an elastic band. He then began to produce all manner of items unrelated in any way to banking. It felt as though I was witnessing a performance by the oldest and worst magician in the world.

Firstly, there came a long piece of string. It struck me that old men do indeed revert to being little boys. What possible use could there be for a piece of string in an old man’s coat pocket on a trip to the shops? Unless he was working as the best disguised assassin since The Jackal and the string was actually a garrotte. A running commentary was inevitable.

‘Oh, sorry Pet. It’s in here somewhere….the doings.’

The next item to appear in the slow motion sleight of hand was a handful of paper. I could see crumpled shopping lists, written in an elderly hand. They were in exasperated capitals and I guessed that this man wasn’t the most efficient messenger in the neighbourhood. He turned and was slightly startled by the steadily growing queue behind him.

‘ Oh, I do apologise. Must find this thing to pay in. I know you’re all busy people...... I do beg your pardon.’

I felt uncharacteristically charitable from this point on. The lone counter person smiled an unconcerned smile. She looked well used to working to the clock of the elderly in the area – all of whom seemed to have retired from everything, including Greenwich Mean Time. I was in no hurry to get back to the office – I never am. The ‘show and tell’ continued and the old man began investigating the deep raincoat pocket on his left side. I heard the rustle of cellophane and then, ‘before my very eyes’, the man was showing the room a small, wrapped set of plastic cutlery.

‘They are a good idea, you know. I carry them in case of picnics.’

You can't hide your famine eyes

Maude is now in the habit of mentioning my physical attributes in the context of our forthcoming child.

‘I hope the baby doesn’t get your big nose,’ for instance.

I know that this is well-meant and I try to not let it trouble me.

‘Yes dear, I hope not too.’

Lately though I do tend to leave the living room and busy myself in the kitchen during the TV commercial breaks. If I forget myself and linger, Maude’s gaze wanders and I can feel her looking me up and down. It makes me feel like an old nag at a horse fair, at the very end of the day’s business.

‘I do hope that the baby isn’t preternaturally tall either….like you. Somewhere in between my normal height and your excessive height would be ideal. I do hope that my genes win out.’

Another trait of my family which has often fascinated Maude is our weary-looking eyes. She dropped many hints when we first dated that perhaps I needed to have my eyes tested - that perhaps I ought to wear glasses. She then met the family, realised we all had ‘Deputy Dog’ eyes and quizzed me about this particularly unfortunate part of my genetic heritage. I suggested that this was just a throwback to The Famine. I also joked that - however indirectly – it was attributable to her community ('your lot', I think was the term I used).

‘Oh yes, we took all your potatoes didn’t we. Don’t remember all the details – I was very young.’

Lately, the ‘Famine Eyes’ have become less an object of banter and more a focus of genuine concern.

‘Seriously though. Freakishly tall, with a big nose and famine eyes. You can explain all that to the child when it is ostracised to its own corner of the playground and pelted with bits of packed lunch. ‘

I suggested that our genetic makeup could well fuse perfectly. We could create an ‘individual’. This individual could indeed inherit some of my burdens, this is true. They could also be blessed, nonetheless, with Maude’s forthright approach. This individual would deal frankly with all challenges in its way – even ‘famine eyes.’ Maude extracted the flattery from this theory and began to smile proudly. I was in my pyjamas and barefoot at the time. Her smiled faded as she looked down and began to scrutinise the imperfections of my feet....

Osama bin Ginger

A friend of mine has developed a habit of travelling to dangerous places around the world for ‘holidays’. Over the last five years his passport has been stamped in Pakistan, Iran, Afghanistan and the Lebanon.

Born and raised in Newcastle, Tig never felt part of the local clique of ordinary boys. He cultivated more refined tastes in dress and culture after watching ‘Brideshead Revisited’ as a boy. He took things a little too far when he wandered to the cornershop in a smoking jacket, while trailing a teddy bear. It was during the subsequent month in traction at Newcastle General Hospital that he was first exposed to David Lean’s ‘Lawrence of Arabia’. He then formulated less conspicuous strategy for the acquisition of refinement (I have often thought that only the bedbound would be likely to hang around long enough for Omar Sharif to come into view across the desert).

Foreign travel became Tig's new obsession and not for him the clichéd stopovers of the Grand Tour – T E Lawrence would have balked at such comfort and indulgence. Insurgency, the threat of kidnapping and civil unrest became the big selling points in Tig’s imaginary holiday brochure. (Tig has always claimed to ‘blend in’ with the local community when he goes on his travels. I am still unconvinced by this: he is pale, ginger and stands at 6 feet 7 inches.)

I was recently in his company when he was asked about his predilection for staying in unstable countries.

‘Well it’s a bit like when one was a child and mater would tell one not to touch something because it was hot. One just had to touch it..... didn’t one?’

The fazed enquirer paused for a moment and then simply said: ‘No’.

Tig is also in the habit of returning to Tyneside bearing some suggestion of his latest odyssey. I waited for him recently at the bar of our local, just after his return from Pakistan. The pub has a large glass facade looking out onto the Tyne. It was a summer evening and I had an uninterrupted view through the hazy evening sunshine all the way up the hill to Byker. I could see a speck moving on the brow of the hill and watched it intently as it grew and moved closer. A shimmering figure became discernible and strode closer with some purpose. I recognised the gait – it was Tig.

Another 30 seconds of watching and I could make out that he was wearing some kind of pale cloak. The cloak wafted in the wind as he pushed the button at a pedestrian crossing on a main road. He crossed the road and endured some barracking from a passing car, casting his cloak over his shoulder in a gesture of disdain for the barbarians within. He was now in the home strait for the pub and I was nearing the head of the queue to be served. The pub gives a panoramic view of the river and approaching friends, but is more or less opaque to those looking in.

Tig’s full ensemble was now visible: sandals, a goat-herder’s shawl, a crook and a Pashtun hat. He looked like he was on the catwalk for the Taliban’s spring collection. I edged towards the open fire escape. As I stepped out into the glare of daylight, I heard the pub’s warm Tyneside reception for the returning traveller.

‘What’ll it be Osama?’

What's the frequency Desmond?

Maude has insisted that the house be reordered, in readiness for the imminent arrival of our first child. Gone is the office – it is now the nursery. Gone is my chest of drawers, it is now the baby clothes store. Gone, even, is the piano.

My piano practice now takes place in the garage. This isn’t quite as bleak as it sounds, as I am surrounded by many of my displaced possessions and it feels quite homely in there. As I was playing the blues in there yesterday, I could hear a voice coming from the driveway. I pushed the button on the electronic garage door control fob which hangs from one of my belt loops. I enjoyed the transient sensation of control. As the door began to rise, a pair of dusty knee-pads came into view and I knew that it was Desmond from next door (he’s a carpet-fitter).

‘Been pushed out then I see...’

We chatted about his own gradual removal to the garage, as his family expanded. He made a few suggestions about the modifications I could make to create a ‘home from home’..... in a building four feet from my own home.

‘I’ve got a loo in mine…. and a little wash-basin. Me and Celia have walkie-talkies as well, just in case something crops up.’

I could see the radio antenna sticking out of the pocket on his combat trousers. I wasn’t sure that I really wanted to follow the same path as Desmond.

‘That sounded really good, though.’

I played on and Desmond began to ‘drum’ with his hands on the top of the dog kennel (the dog wasn't in there - she has the run of the house).

‘I used to be in a punk band, you know.’ Desmond had a far away look in his eye, as his mind drifted on a wave of nostalgia. ’We were rubbish.’

Desmond laughed and carried on drumming. He kept solid time and the dog kennel produced quite a good sound. I played on and turned the blues into something with a bit more boogie-woogie. Desmond noticed that my toolbox was within reach – its stock of screws and nails visible under the clear perspex cover. He alternated between it and the kennel – the jangling screws creating a passable approximation to the sound of a high-hat.

‘We sometimes get together in Big Alan’s shed down on the allotments, you know. You should come down. He’s got everything in there – amps, drum kit, guitars. He’s talking about rigging up a four-track with solar power.’

I must admit I was enjoying this jamming session with Desmond and felt quite attracted to the idea of a haven in the allotments with a group of kindred spirits. Who would know? We could even record something and send it.........to someone.

As the crescendo of my boogie-woogie rose, a shrill disembodied voice entered the garage and a red flashing light was visible in Desmond’s trousers.

‘Desmond! Do you copy? I can’t reach the All-Bran!’

Golden Slumbers

It was Larry’s birthday on Saturday and some of his friends decided to come together for an appropriate celebration.

The slumber party began at teatime. Maude and I arrived at Larry’s lodgings with a tasteful something as a gift. A queue had already gathered on the staircase. Guests had thrown themselves into the ‘theme’ and were all in their sleepwear – lots of funny fluffy slippers, Disney T-shirts and pyjamas.We’d thought it wiser to opt out – I wore my navy Paul Smith 2-piece and Maude turned heads in a simple black dress she’d picked up in New York.

It took half an hour or so to get close to Larry’s bedside to wish him many happy returns. He was propped up on a large bolster, like a Gateshead Proust, so that he could play the guitar to his assembled friends. Dink was circulating with nibbles. Just ahead of us in the queue was one of Larry’s German friends – Helmut. Helmut is an academic and has just finished 5 years of very hard work researching the decline in the British work ethic. Larry’s existence had formed the basis of Helmut’s PhD thesis. On the German’s many ‘field trips’ to Gateshead, the two men had become firm (if unlikely) friends.

Helmut has always been too busy to master a musical instrument. Larry, in contrast, had become a virtuoso guitarist in the comfort of his own bed and Helmut is inclined to make musical requests in circumstances such as these. I was, as ever, impressed with Helmut’s sartorial effort – his silk Paisley pyjamas were topped off with his usual Fedora (at its usual cheeky angle). However, my heart sank as I heard his clipped German tones:

‘Happy Birthday Larry and I have a special request – I want you to do ‘Abbey Road’ Please!!!’

Larry falters in all physical endeavour and prefers to stay in bed, but in music he has remarkable recall and stamina. I knew that at this point Larry would perform his party piece: a complete rendition of the ‘Abbey Road’ album by The Beatles (which has no gaps between tracks). Larry smiled and protested briefly.

‘I’m sure that no-one else really wants to hear that Helmut man!’

Dink was just leaving the room to replenish her tray of lightly buttered Ryvita and seconded Helmut’s request.

‘Oh Darling, go on – you know you want to.’

As the performance wore on, I could sense that Maude was losing the will to live. Helmut had begun to dance. Larry’s landlord was heard ransacking an upstairs cupboard during ‘Here comes the sun’. Larry’s landlord is also called Larry - usually known as ‘Lively Larry’. As Helmut harmonised with more enthusiasm than tunefulness on ‘Sun King’, Lively Larry reappeared with a pair of bongos.

When the epic medley reached 'Golden Slumbers' many of the employed people in the room seemed to be singing with some gusto. Maude tugged at the back of my jacket and we were soon on the landing. It was then that I heard a racket in the hall below. I peeped over to see Archie bounding up the stairs with his miniature snare drum strapped to his front. Leap giggled in his wake. Arch bounded into Larry's room and beamed at his bedbound host. As we passed the doorway to descend the stairs, a jiggling Archie had his sticks poised to join in. Larry struck the dramatic closing chord of 'Her Majesty', the final track of the album. As we trod softly down the stairs, the room above fell quiet, but for some whispering and a stifled giggle from one of the guests. I paused and saw Archie's diddy figure framed by the spindles of the stair rail. Dink gave him a consolatory hug. Archie was jiggling again, but I suspect that this time he was tearful.

The Look of Love

Sandy, Maude and me were all at college together and share many fond memories of academic life. Arch was something of an arriviste in the circle. Sandy and I shared rooms while we studied. Arch had misrepresented his qualifications in gnome-painting as ‘fine art’ to gain entrance to the lodgings and to become our neighbour. Our rooms were south-facing and benefited from a lovely set of French windows - in front of which we placed the desk. Sandy would arrange his books at one end of the desk and I would set mine at the other. We clubbed together for a typewriter and it sat in the centre. The arrangement worked well – as Sandy was nocturnal and would write his essays through a haze of cigarette smoke in the small hours. I would air the room in the morning and then use the desk myself. In moments of quiet study I would notice movement in the shrubs at the far end of the shared garden. At the time I took this to be a small animal.

Meanwhile, unbeknown to us, Archie was moving his way though the house. He had begun in a garret space (formerly a very cramped nursery). The landlord had been surprised at Archie’s willingness to live in such confinement - he usually showed the room as a small joke to amuse prospective tenants. He used it as a broom cupboard and would open the door on the ‘penthouse suite’ as more of an icebreaker than a genuine option.

‘I’ll take it! I’ll take it! It’s perfect!’

Archie had seen this as his chance to get into the house and break into what he took to be an intellectual atmosphere. He then strategically changed rooms as they became available, to achieve proximity to us.

Sandy and I had always been cordial to Arch, before we got to know him properly. The house had an old church pew in its entrance hall. The pew was very useful - it had a hinged lid under which was storage designed for prayer books. We used it for the post. Each morning the postman would cast the post into the pew and each scholar would appear, lift the lid and rifle through the envelopes in the hope of a cheque from home.

Some mornings Arch would be asleep in the pew.

After an evening out, Arch was often overwhelmed by the prospect of climbing the stairs back to his room – especially during the time when he lived in the ‘penthouse.’ He would choose, instead, to climb into the relative spaciousness of the pew and wait for the shower of post to rouse him in the morning. The postman and residents were all a little startled at first, but it was a liberal environment and allowances were made for the little chap. Some occupants took to throwing some loose change in at Archie’s feet after retrieving their letters.

If not asleep in the pew, Arch could often be found perched on it, swinging his legs and reading ‘difficult’ books. Sandy and I were leaving the house in a hurry one morning to catch a lecture and I saw that Archie was sat in his difficult book reading attitude. He was also wearing spectacles. I noticed that he rubbed one of his eyes by poking a finger through the frame – there were no lenses.

Sandy was oblivious to Archie’s presence and busied himself lighting his second cigarette of the day from the rapidly diminishing stub of his first cigarette of the day. As he did so, a shaft of winter sunlight poured in through the stained glass of the front door. The light penetrated the cloud of smoke and cast a halo around Sandy’s dishevelled, cherubic curls. Looking back, I suspect that this was the coup de foudre moment for Archie. The small one straightened his ‘glasses’ as though to get a better view and peered over the top of his book. He seemed to be drinking in every atom of this glowing vision of his idol – in its beatific morning glow. As Sandy grabbed his satchel of books and made for the door, Archie’s eyes followed his movement with a trancelike stare. Before I followed and closed the door behind me, I took the opportunity to pick the Samuel Becket novel from Archie’s grip and turn it the right way up.

¡Adiós!, ¡Hola!

For a full 2 years Archie and Leap had been talking about going to visit Sandy and Lola. Sandy went out to Barcelona to join his Catalan amour a couple of Easters ago.

Sandy began his Spanish career collecting the money after Lola’s troupe of street artists performed on the Ramblas. He then went through an assortment of casual jobs. For a while he was the oldest ball-boy at the Nou Camp, but Barcelona FC let him go when he was beaten to a ball by a disabled fan in a wheelchair (the years of Gauloise smoking had taken their toll on Sandy’s fitness).

Sandy’s relationship with Lola fused her Catalan feistiness and his dry Northern English wit. She enjoyed teaching him all the Spanish and Catalan he needed and they became regulars at many of the town’s livelier bars – Sandy reciprocated by educating her in the detail of British guitar bands from the last 25 years.

Sandy then saw a niche in the market for bookselling and began to hawk dog-eared English paperbacks from a handcart – targeting the university in the winter and the beach in summer. His doting mother, Doris, scoured the charity shops of northern England and sent the books in regular batches. On occasion the poor woman would be unable to source enough secondhand books and would buy new instead. She would then enlist her husband, Arnie, to read them – or at least handle them enough to make them look used.

For her part, Lola was not content to be a street performer for all her life and knew that she needed to move on. Stilt-walking had lost its appeal and instead she took an interview with a global communications company in her stride. Lola also began to realise that her education in the development of British pop music was probably complete.

So it was that Lola decided to spend a large chunk of her savings in a single morning at El Corte Ingles department store. Her hair extensions were removed and a business-like bob was introduced. A pinstripe suit replaced combats and t-shirts. The shoe department indulged her for 30 minutes as she trained herself to finish off the new look and walk smoothly, at ground level, on heels.

Sandy had endured a fruitless morning on the beach approaching baking tourists who he hoped might need a paperback. Responses ranged from ‘No, thank you’ to ‘Raus!’ and he was rapidly losing heart. Sandy had never really adapted his wardrobe to the Mediterranean heat. Lola had applied her talents as a seamstress to one of Arnie’s old suits on a visit to England. Sandy wore the outfit all the time – as a symbol of his love for both Lola and his father. On a warm summer’s day in Barcelona, a polyester suit did not create a feeling of wellbeing in a hungry immigrant trying to run what he described as his own ‘small business’.

Lola had a taxi waiting on the seafront. Her final purchases had been from the bookshop at El Corte Ingles: a title they both knew well and a pen for the inscription.

Sandy’s tarpaulin had been stolen a week earlier. He had used it protect his stock from sun damage and rain, but a homeless drinker had used it to create some shelter in a nearby park and Sandy did not have the heart to reclaim it. He removed his jacket and placed it as a makeshift cover on a collection of spines boasting many holiday reading favourites: The Naked Lunch, On The Road, Hangover Square and American Psycho. Sandy found a lamppost against which to lean in a Belmondo attitude. He tapped a cigarette out of his pack, lifted it to his lips and lit it in his timeworn fashion. As he exhaled the first acrid cloud of his smoking session, a businesswoman dashed from a waiting taxi and pushed a book-shaped package into his hand. As the smoke cleared he watched the taxi disappear into the chaos of the midday traffic. He opened the El Corte Ingles bag to expose the first new book he had seen in some time - a crisp new English edition of Kerouac’s On the Road. The inscription was pithy:

‘Adios, Lola. x’

Sandy realised that while he had been preoccupied in assuming his favourite film pose he had let real life jump in a taxi and leave him. He took a long, consolatory drag on his Gauloise. His smoke seemed to be merging into the smoke of others nearby. A sea breeze arrived to clear the conglomeration of fumes and stood before him were the small, smiling, haversacked figures of Archie and Leap.

Sandy was still in state of devastation and found it hard to feign enthusiasm for the sudden arrival of his old friends.

‘It’s me, Sand!’ Archie jumped a little to emphasise his presence.

‘I think he’s a little upset’, whispered Leap.

As Archie began to quietly sob, Sandy was roused from his miserable reverie. New fumes were reaching him and he realised that his jacket had spontaneously combusted in the sun. The entire stock of his ‘small business’ was now aflame – the handcart a funeral pyre for the books he loved and for his Barcelona affair.

Dinky Dinner

Larry came to dinner last night, with his girlfriend Dink. Maude had invited Larry a couple of days earlier and he had made no mention of the probability that Dink would be around. I called to collect him from his lodgings just as he and Dink were returning from a game of tennis in the local park (the courts are free). I discreetly phoned Maude to check that it was ok to bring Dink along. Larry has a strange habit of forgetting that he is in a relationship and literally forgetting Dink. For many years he was inclined to absentmindedly leave Dink in cafes and on trains. I was often asked to collect Dink on Larry's behalf (a full afternoon of giving ukelele lessons often left him badly fatigued).

‘I’m sure there’ll be enough food to feed little Dink as well,' Maude reassured.

Unlike Larry, Dink now drives. This means that, these days, being forgotten is less of a practical problem - she remembers herself and takes herself home. She followed me back to The Villas in her reconditioned ambulance. Larry shows no desire to learn how to drive.

‘But Dink can drive, I don’t need to. We would only argue if I was able to drive and sat up front commenting on her driving. I’ve seen so many couples do that. It makes more sense for me to lie in the back.’

Dink must have taken a wrong turn at some point as she followed me and it took her and Larry an extra half an hour to reach the house.

‘So nice of you to join us.’ Maude kissed Dink and pushed Larry towards the dining table.

It emerged that Dink had taken a detour to buy a delicious chocolate cake for all of us and Larry had taken advantage of a 'two for one' deal on pale ale to buy two bottles for himself.

As Maude brought the dinnerware in, Larry blurted ‘No potatoes!’

Maude had made some of her excellent potato dauphinoise.

‘I think that you meant to say ‘No potatoes for me, thank you’. Why ever not?’

‘It came up at the top of the list when the food man tested me. I get so much mucous that I can hardly breathe, I nearly choke.’

‘Only nearly? Probably far too much energy in them for you.’ Maude smiled and created appetising piles of potatoes on all of our plates.

Larry was slightly piqued and consoled himself with the lion’s share of the boeuf bourguignon. He smiled sweetly at Dink as he scooped a mouthful of the casserole onto her plate, before scraping the remainder of the dish onto his own.

‘Better leave some room for that cake eh Dinky?’

Smoking Car

Our business centre has a rich variety of people. People of all shapes and sizes mill around and go about their ‘business’. They carry items of post and piles of photocopying. It’s a hive of north eastern industry. Even members of my team join in from time to time – one of us will usually pop down for the morning post at about 2 in the afternoon. Lionel, the building manager, raises his eyebrows when he notices this – he doesn’t understand ‘the arts’. There is one member of the business centre staff, though, who trumps our lack of effort and seems to have opted out entirely from any exertion whatsoever. She is a large woman who works on the other side of the building. I’m guessing that she has a sedentary job. The building has 2 storeys and she takes the lift. It’s a very slow lift and by the time you have waited for it, you could easily be up the stairs and sat at your desk.

The building managers recently made provision for the smokers on the premises – a small space has been cleared beside the wheelie bins and a corrugated canopy stops the rain from extinguishing fags. The large lady smokes, but chooses not to join her fellow-smokers. Instead she always claims the parking space beside the smokers’ pen (she must get in early just to achieve this) and sits in her car to smoke. She reads her ‘Chat’ magazine as she does this. In my (limited) experience of ‘Chat’ magazine I have noticed a regularity of stories on obesity: 'Doctors gave me 2 days to live if I didn’t shed 5 stone’, ‘The Pain of Britain’s Fattest Toddler’ – that kind of thing. Such scaremongering is lost on the smoking lady and she carries on puffing away in there. She winds the window down a little and the smoke pours out. Passers-by, unfamiliar with her habits, often do a double-take to check that the car isn’t on fire. The car is a Ford Fiesta – a small, light vehicle. When the smoking lady is in place, the car groans and lists badly to one side. The smoking lady has the look of a large child abandoned on a see-saw.

I passed this morning as she was finishing her cigarette and placing a bookmark in this week’s ‘Chat’. I noticed that she cast her cigarette end onto a pile in the adjacent flowerbed. The pile was clearly all her own work – she can’t even make it into the smokers’ pen to dispose of her fag butts in the receptacle provided.

I imagine that, at some point in the future, enthusiastic archaeologists in shorts and armed with trowels will establish the boundaries of this small building created for the ancient habit/ritual of tobacco smoking. This will obviously be televised. They will produce a captivating CAD visualisation of the smokers’ pen as it would have looked some time in the early twenty first century. Delighted with their discovery and their contribution to the body of archaeological knowledge and social history they will return to the site to help to convert it into an interactive experience for visitors – so that future generations might stand and smoke (de-nicotined) cigarettes in an authentic recreation of 21st century office life. This would extend the experience of wandering the corridors of the restored ‘business centre’ in period business costume: using the restored office equipment and listening to authentic recordings of 21st century business voices. The archaeologists would then be truly thrown as one of their trowels unearths an inexplicable pile of well-preserved cigarette ends just beyond the boundary of the ancient communal smoking area…….

I am Billy Casper

I have reached the age at which any outfit I put together for the gym makes me look like Billy Casper from ‘Kes’. I usually try and sneak out of the house, but Maude always appears before I manage to and remarks that I need a new top, or a new pair of shorts or a new pair of trainers. A complete new outfit for the gym, basically.

‘Why don’t you ask Byron where he gets his stuff?’

Byron is the man who runs the gym. Byron is superfit. He has a gruelling schedule of leading spinning classes and boxerfit sessions, alongside pacesetting for the gym’s running club. In between these commitments he wanders around the gym and lifts weights. He seems always to arrive at a weight machine straight after me and ostentatiously takes the weight peg out to lower it to somewhere around double the burden I was straining to lift. His routine would reduce the average marine to tears and he doesn’t ever appear to break a sweat.

Byron also looks ‘gym smart’. He wears vivid gym colours and his trainers are always freshly whitened. I pointed out to Maude that it was his business to look smart – as he owns the gym. His fancy gym wear is the equivalent of a businessman’s three-piece suit and facilitates his blokey welcomes to the male members and his outrageously flirtatious manner with the female gym-goers (making the point here that his flirting was indiscriminate and should not be mistaken for any form of genuine partiality).

Maude went quiet for a few minutes when I made this point. I had, however, made the mistake of following this line of argument while still in my own 'workwear’. As I bent to put a fresh cup of tea on Maude’s remote control table, I noticed that her eyes were scanning my outfit.

‘So, scuffed shoes, jeans and an open-necked shirt are de rigeuer in your office are they? Must make all those penniless artists feel a lot better about their lives. Why don’t I track down some fingerless gloves for you – to complete the look.’

The height of rudeness

I work in Sunderland (I think I have mentioned this). More precisely, I work near the football stadium. The most convenient supermarket is on the coast – in Seaburn. Seaburn appears to be almost exclusively populated by old people. I suppose that older people like to retire by the sea. This gives the aisles of the supermarket the air of a hospital main corridor. Most of the trolleys are of the wheelchair-friendly kind and a busy spell causes bottlenecks of the bewildered at certain points around the shop. I try and speed through. I know what I want and I haven’t – unlike most of the other customers – got all day. I tend to zig-zag my way through the shop, avoiding the hotspots for elderly congregation: the bread products, the reduced-to clear section and the high-fibre cereals. The narrow central aisle is also out of bounds – as it serves as a cruel funnel which brings the old people to a virtual standstill and then delivers them into the confusing maze of the greeting card aisles.

I respect the elderly, most of the time. On every other visit I make to this to this store, however, I am accosted by one of them. I am tall. I know that I am tall. I have been tall for a long time. Old people seem to feel an irresistible urge to bring my own height to my attention. I’m up here, I know about it. It’s usually men who make a sporting gambit along the lines of: ‘You must play basketball, do you son?’ or ‘You should be in a line out son, do you play rugby?’ Occasionally women will say something. Two tiny old ladies stood beside me at the checkout last week and one said to the other ‘Eee, I fee proper titchy beside him’ and giggled.

All innocent enough I suppose – a transparent attempt to connect with a stranger. The problem is I’d much rather remain a stranger. The last old timer who felt the need to inform me that I was a tall person was well-intentioned, but he made a simply ridiculous remark. ‘My, you must be 8 feet tall are you son?’

‘That’s right,’ I said,’well done you.’ He flashed his ill-fitting dentures in delight. I hadn’t quite finished.

‘And you, sir, must be…what.. a hundred and ten years old?’

Barcelona Calling

Arch & Leap have a strange routine. They drink and listen to music when they get home from work after a long commute and consequently tend to eat late, very late. Leap controls the menu – she is a vegan, or as Maude’s father once introduced her, ‘a very severe vegetarian’. Archie relishes Leap’s cuisine at home, but lapses occasionally when out and about. Maude witnessed him eating a pork pie on a passing bus last week. The large pie obscured his face momentarily, but as he lowered the meat feast to draw breath, his cover was blown.

‘I love what Leap cooks,’ insists Arch – ‘it’s really healthy’.

We visited Arch & Leap’s cottage last night. Maude has tired of being offered nothing more in the way of hospitality than some Bombay mix, so she called in advance and told them that she would bring some food. When we arrived she handed a large pan of curry to an unusually excited Archie. His knees almost buckled under the weight, but he giggled and managed to rush through to the kitchen without spilling it. His progress wasn’t helped by various obstacles. Arch & Leap have an unorthodox approach to storage. They ‘organise’ their possessions by creating a miniature Manhattan skyline of piles of books and compact disks on the floor of their lounge, so that they are constantly reminded of what they own. One wrong move and a pile is demolished – sometimes creating a domino effect which knocks down neighbouring piles of stuff. When this occurs Arch shows remarkable agility for man of his girth and rushes to minimise the damage.

‘They’re all in order, you know!’ He exclaims. ‘That took me ages to alphabeticalise.’

In a clearing in the forest of piles there is enough space for the sofa, and the hearth. Archie lies on one side of the hearth and Leap assumes a lotus position on the other. For the festive season Leap creates a nut-cracking workshop space on her side – consisting of a tree stump and a toffee hammer.

‘Have you thought any more about shelving?’ Maude asked after we had finished our curry.

‘We’re fine,’ insisted Leap, as she smiled and whacked a walnut.

‘This way we know where everything is when we need it,' added Arch, as he glanced at his watch.

I could see that Maude was eager to point out that they were unlikely to need most of the things littering the floor in the very near future, but she resisted the urge.

‘Anyway,’ continued Leap, ’it provides a smashing little playground….’ Leap smiled in Archie’s direction at this point.

‘Isn’t Archie a little long in the tooth for a ‘playground’?’

Leap shook with laughter. She mis-hit a walnut which flew across the room and bounced off Archie’s forehead.

‘Not for Arch, Silly! For Fingerbob.’

‘Fingerbob?’

‘Yes, I keep catching Fingerbob in my mouse-catcher and releasing him out in the fields, but he keeps finding his way back to us!’

Maude looked unimpressed. ‘You have a mouse?’

‘Yes, but he is no trouble really. He is really quite entertaining. Last week he took some cinnamon sticks all the way from the kitchen cupboard to the corner of the living room.’

Maude’s eye followed Leap’s finger as it indicated a corner of the room completely obscured by the piles.

‘Quite the little adventurer.’

This created a natural pause in the conversation and Arch took the opportunity to wind his way through the area of the room devoted to his ‘alphabeticalised’ cd collection to reach the bathroom. The phone rang. Maude was comfortable on the sofa. Leap was stoking the fire and gestured to me to answer the call. I eventually traced the phone behind a teetering pile of fading Sunday supplements. As I was about to lift the receiver, Archie came back into the room at speed. He had left the bathroom early after hearing the phone. His excited manner and his watch-checking all made sense now – he had been expecting a call. Archie was wearing a cardigan which was far too long for him and had the look of a frock-coat. As he bounded across the room his woollen train caught the top of one of his piles of party compilation cassettes.

As he excitedly shouted ‘That’ll be Sandy!’ and kept motoring towards to me, I watched the edifice of cassettes collapse and destabilise a neighbouring pile of Betamax videos, which in turn unsettled an orangebox of Leap’s recipe scrapbooks. Archie was undeterred by the chaos developing around him and continued on his expedition to reach the phone. His face was remarkably gleeful. He looked lustful and carefree – like a man half his age and twice his height running along a beach towards the outstretched arms of the love of his life.

(Sandy has been in Barcelona for over a year and Archie sorely misses playing a bit part in the imaginary film that Sandy casts around him.)

I could see Archie’s small hand forming to grasp the handset as his arm began to outstretch, but this movement took his attention away from holding up his trousers (as I mentioned, he left the bathroom early). Small change and a heavy tobacco tin soon had Archie’s trousers plummeting to knee level. The poor man then lost his footing and became a human torpedo – crashing through the carefully arranged music section of the pilescape and causing severe ‘de-alphabeticalisation’.

As I lifted the phone to suggest that Sandy called later, Leap unfolded her legs and went to Archie’s aid. As she abandoned her post, Fingerbob saw his chance to make off with the last walnut of the evening. Maude was already buttoning her coat.

Piano Time

As part of my quest for self-improvement I am learning to play the piano. I am having lessons with Simon - a well-mannered gent who lives just off the village main street. He is a very proper individual – always wearing a suit and tie, even though he conducts the lessons in his own home. Simon tuts gently at my inability to complete my homework and is very patient with my ham-fisted attempts to master 'Jingle Bells' as a Christmas surprise for Maude.

My lesson is in the same slot each week and I follow a young boy called Jack. Jack is about 9 years old and is quite the little prodigy. He has very shiny hair in an old-fashioned bowl cut and eyes as big as saucers. Jack's little fingers glide over the keys, to the delight of his attendant mother. There is always a slight overlap between our lessons - as Simon is far too polite to rush his students. I hover while Jack is congratulated on his progress by Simon, who then reminds the boy of what he needs to practise for his homework. Jack’s mother carefully packs Jack’s sheet music in his special music satchel (decorated with the word ‘Jack’ spelled out in crotchets) – all the while beaming with pride.

Simon and Jack’s mother exchange pleasantries at this point and laud the boy’s natural affinity with all things piano. It is at this point every week that Jack turns and casts a sinister look in my direction – while I stand awkwardly clutching my adult piano learner book in my arthritic old hands. When Jack is sure that his big saucer eyes have caught my attention, he plays one last dazzling encore on the keys – usually some particularly dramatic Gershwin or ‘The Entertainer’ – taking in several octaves and ending with a flourish and a toss of his shiny mane.

‘Oh Jack!’ exclaims his mother every time this happens – looking at me (in vain) for some kind of corroboration of her son’s precocious genius. I usually smile politely and glance at my watch – as though to say ‘I think you’ll find that Jack the genius is eating into my piano time now.’

All I want for Christmas is a refugee

I recently went through training to become a mentor for refugees. Maude checked my outfit as I left the house and agreed that I was wearing enough corduroy to pass for a caring liberal.

The training was comprised of intensive sessions with other Guardian readers in an inclusive, ‘safe’ workshop environment. I had never seen so many Fairtrade garments in one room. The sessions were led by a startlingly ginger young woman from somewhere near Liverpool. This meant that the way in which Janet spoke was, for the most part, Standard English. Every now and again, however, her face would contort into a Liverpudlian mien and a perfectly formed bit of scouse pronunciation would slip out – like an unfortunate tic.

We were led through a variety of possible scenarios which might come into the lives of refugees trying to integrate in the community here in the North East: how to join the library, how to understand the quaint local dialect, how to hold your own in a taxi rank at 2am after a 10 hour drinking binge.

I came away from the training feeling as though I was about to contribute something worthwhile to society – to ‘give something back’. Janet assured us all on our departure that we had all handled the training very well and that she would get to work on matching us up with appropriate refugees.

Last week I was invited to a social session for the members of my mentor group. Janet had insisted that we could all skip tea and join her in her office at 6.30pm where a festive buffet would await. This was the first disappointment of the evening. I arrived to see a ‘buffet’ of a dozen shop-bought mince pies, a tub of humous and some breadsticks.

I was one of the first arrivals and chatted with Penny from Yorkshire – or rather I chatted and she shouted. I gathered from her blaring that she had been matched with a refugee (possibly hearing impaired – or soon to be). She went into great detail about the many coffees she had already enjoyed with Hassan and how much she had learnt about his culture and he about hers. She had in front of her a sheaf of expenses to claim back from Janet’s petty cash. I was surprised that someone so abrasive had been so easily matched up with a vulnerable refugee adrift in the cold North East, but feasted on another breadstick and awaited the arrival of the rest of the group. As the liberals trickled in and cast weak smiles around the room, the conversation flowed and it became clear that everyone else in the room had been matched up with a refugee. Janet avoided my gaze and relayed information about various refugee-friendly local events and cultural venues. She then encouraged a general chat on the experiences of members of the group in their early dealings with the their mentees. Anecdote followed anecdote and it became clear that many of the members of my group had become so familiar with their charges that they knew, for instance, the basic rules of Iraqi cooking or the rudiments of Persian folk-dancing.

‘So everyone is having a really productive relationship with their mentee, by the sounds of it. I lurv it when that happens!’

I coughed gently at this point.

‘Oh, I know that not everyone has been matched up… just yet.’ Janet looked at me fleetingly and reddened.

As the get-together came to a close, I hovered. Janet was collecting her papers and urging everyone to ‘take care’.

As the room emptied she realised that I had no intention of shuffling away quietly without something approaching an explanation of why I was the only fugee-less member of the group.

‘Oh, you’re still here.’

‘Yes’, I smiled. ‘Just wondering if there is some kind of problem with matching me up…..’

‘No, not at all. Just having a little trouble finding a match for your particular range of talents.’

I resisted the temptation to ask her what those ‘talents’ actually were – up to now she had only witnessed my ‘talent’ for wearing the requisite amount of corduroy and my ‘talent’ for tolerating the volume of brash Yorkshire people and simperingly smug mentors who would soon claim to be dreaming in the obscure dialects of their mentees.

I buttoned my coat and gathered up my things. As I cast a last disappointed glance at the ‘buffet’, I made my position to clear to Janet.

‘If I haven’t got a refugee in time for the Christmas party, I’m not coming.’

Ending Up

Original Susan is already worrying about her thirtieth birthday – she turns 30 in March. I like to think of myself as a decent and humane colleague, so I made some efforts yesterday to counsel her and to bring to light the positives that such maturity brings.

I began by describing my own 30th. As I fell further into this story I realised that it wasn’t really the best example to use. I spent the evening of my 30th in a darkened room with a take-away curry and a half-written, overdue, Masters Degree essay. It wasn’t even my house. I was house-sitting at the time for some friends. The house was Georgian and was blessed with shutters which definitively blocked out the outside world. Maude was merely my girlfriend then and she called round to try and cheer me through my crisis. After the food she was soon distracted - happy to occupy herself in rifling through our friends’ possessions. I applied my aging, shrinking brain to an essay on ‘myths of masculinity in contemporary culture’.

I awoke in my thirties the following morning to the familiar sound of Maude screaming. She had set a bath running and promptly fallen asleep in front of morning television. The sound of fusing electricity had roused her – as water seeped through the light fitting above her head. I spent the rest of the day drying out the house and trying to find the fusebox. Maude thought it would be a shame for us both to be confined to the house – as it was so close to the shops of the city centre. I found the fusebox at teatime – after an exhaustive torch-lit search of the dank cellar.

Susan was heartened by this story. She did, however, go on to note that it was a shame I didn’t seem able to mend my career with 'a bit of fusewire’. She didn’t really, she smiled, want to ‘end up’ like me. I thanked her for her well-intentioned observations and reminded her that I had not yet ‘ended up’ anywhere. I was just ‘passing through’ – using the Arts Council for my own ends: funds, company…. biscuits.