Once Upon A Time in the West . . . Country (12 page)

At the end of that track, I rushed quickly over to my base camp and put my tracksuit bottoms back on. Sandra glanced in my direction, perhaps thinking that I was leaving.

‘You all right, Tony?’

‘Yes. Yes, thanks. Just putting my tracksuit bottoms back on.’

The same ones that she, and everyone else, had observed me removing three minutes earlier.

‘You’re doing well,’ she said.

Sandra was a fine dancer, a good teacher, but an absolutely fabulous bullshitter. If I was
doing well
, then just how low could her expectations of me have been at the start? I was only
doing well
because I hadn’t killed anyone or napalmed the building.

The same pattern continued throughout the next forty minutes – that of learning a move, only to have it immediately switched to another. I watched the clock with the same foolish devotion of the bored factory worker. Time, of course, passes more slowly when monitored. The agony is prolonged.

What was most upsetting was that Sandra seemed to be utilising every dance movement known to man
except
the grapevine. My chance to shine was being denied. It wasn’t until the very last song, when the clock was reading 8.26, that Sandra suddenly called ‘Grapevine!’

Brilliant! At last! I thought, and I leapt into that move like a shot – with all the gusto and all the enthusiasm I could muster. I knew what I was doing at last.

There was a problem though.

I went left and the rest of the class went right.

‘Sorry!’ I blurted out, as I kicked the lady next to me quite hard on the shin.

She looked away, either lost in her dancing, or in her fury. I had dealt her quite a blow, but she did not even break stride. Adrenalin was carrying her through.

‘Well done, ladies! A great class!’ announced Sandra at 8.30 on the dot.

The gaggle of ladies applauded. The solitary man hung his head. He tried to seek out the lady he had kicked to make another attempt at an apology, but she was in a huddle with another group, no doubt bad-mouthing him.

The man went home alone, rubbing an elbow that was now hurting, following an earlier collision with a solid wall. He had a bath. He went to bed.

He wouldn’t be doing Zumba again in a hurry.

***

He was back at the village hall again all too soon, though, twenty-four hours not being enough time for the scars to have healed. The Zumba elbow was still sore too.

I had never been to an AGM before. I’d happily, and somewhat irresponsibly, lived in a world where the running of things was done by others. My life had been one in which I’d been happy to complain and criticise where necessary, whilst ensuring that I never became involved in any of the processes that had led to the decisions or policies that I disliked. That was about to change.

Fran and I got to the hall at 7.02 p.m. About twenty-five people were already seated in a semicircle in front of the table that presumably contained the vestiges of the outgoing committee. Village life seemed to be well-represented, from the grubby to the well-turned-out, but there were no children. Or young people. Surprisingly, they had chosen other activities ahead of sitting in a hall on a summer’s evening, listening to their elders discussing how it might best be managed. Even the youngsters who might have been interested could have a more stimulating experience playing the computer game ‘AGM’, in which the chairman can be zapped if he gets someone’s name wrong, or fails to point out the fire exits.

Heads turned to see who it was that had turned up two minutes late. We lived less than five minutes’ walk away, so not being on time wasn’t impressive, but both Fran and I are good at faffing.
1

The meeting kicked off the moment our arses touched the hard chairs, almost as if this was the cue for the grey-haired outgoing chairman to begin. What followed was not top-quality entertainment. He was only a few minutes into his speech, outlining the improvements that the previous committee had made to the hall, when my mind started to wander. His voice became a monotone backdrop to myriad thoughts about sea walks, jobs that needed doing around the house and whether the oil needed changing on the car.

I tuned in occasionally, just for long enough to learn that a three-phase electrical renovation was recommended, but most of the time I surrendered to my mind’s indiscriminate meanderings. It was like being back at school. No engagement. Oh, how I remembered that feeling that one should sit down, shut up, and listen. There was nothing to draw you in, or prick your interest, and so the creative mind used to rebel and play truant.

Are you listening, boy?

The honest answer was no.

No, I’m not listening, because nobody asked me if I wanted to do this, and actually I don’t – because I find it dull
.

But that was an invitation to punishment. So we lied.

Yes, sir.

And upon this system we build the fabric of our society.

Half an hour into the meeting, there was a rare moment of audience participation. Those present were asked to vote on whether the village hall should adopt the new constitution that had apparently just been explained to us. (I was on horseback in the Andes at the time.) It must have made good sense since everyone in the room, including Fran, raised their hands. I raised mine too, simultaneously exercising and, given my ignorance of what I was now approving, abusing my democratic rights.

With the new constitution in place, two of the three men behind the table then announced that they were resigning and that a new committee was needed. The other man, the treasurer, said that he was prepared to stay on for one year. No real explanation was offered as to how and why this situation existed, but all we’d been told was that there had been a clash of personalities and that this was why fresh faces were needed for the committee. Untainted by the past. The moment that Fran and I had come to seize had arrived. The now ex-chairman asked if there were any people present who were prepared to form the new committee. I raised my hand.

For a moment, Fran seemed to hesitate. Was she going to betray me? To my relief, I saw her slowly put her hand up too. Those present turned and looked. A buzz of conversation echoed around the hall. I looked around to see that there were three other volunteers, two grey-haired ladies in their sixties and Brenda – the former owner of our house. The ex-chairman counted the hands and asked for each of the volunteers to be seconded. Seconders were not hard to find, and I got the feeling that there was immense relief that anyone was prepared to take on this task. It was announced that this was enough for a new committee to be formed and the AGM, wonderful spectacle that it had been, came to a close.

History had been made.

There was a part of me that kept thinking – could it really be done like this? You could simply put up your hand and that was enough to get you on a committee? Were there no votes? No declarations of policy? Was this how rural Britain operated?

The new committee were ushered to the front table, whilst everyone else slowly dispersed from the hall, chattering excitedly. Perhaps it wasn’t quite our village’s equivalent of a new pope being elected, but it was still reason for a good old gossip. To the relative noisy soundtrack of an emptying hall, the new committee (all of retirement age but for me and Fran) were introduced to each other and then asked to sign a document that was witnessed by the outgoing chairman. We were then instructed to have our first meeting, and we were invited to sit down around a table.

I felt rather unnerved at this point. The way sportsmen feel when they’ve won a big trophy, but without the elation. I was experiencing the ‘Ah, this has actually happened’ moment. As we gathered around the table, the new committee eyed each other in turn. The looks weren’t suspicious, but they could have been interpreted so by any onlooker who didn’t know what was going on. Introductions were made, followed by hasty judgements. There was Rose, apparently strong and confident. Ann, sweet-looking and timelessly dressed. Brenda, whom I already knew, well-dressed and genial as ever; and Mary and David, a smiling and assured couple. Then there was Fran. I knew her. I’d slept with her. Good. Always good to have slept with at least one person on any committee on which one sits. It’s the British way.

We all sat down and David, the incumbent treasurer from the previous committee, showed himself to be the only one who had the vaguest idea of the protocol.

‘I suppose the first thing we’ll need to do is elect a chairman,’ he said.

‘And how do we do that?’ I asked.

‘Well, we’ll need to see if anyone will volunteer for the position and if so, if anyone will second them. I don’t want to do it, but is anyone happy to be chairman?’

Chairman? Who would make a good chairman, I thought? I was pondering this baffling point in my head, when I received a dig in the ribs.

‘Put your hand up!’ muttered Brenda between her teeth, presumably having made a judgement that I was good chairman material, based on the authoritative way in which I had viewed her house.

The jab was sharp and sudden enough to cause me to obey without thinking. Only when my arm was aloft did I realise that I was now volunteering for the position of chairman of the village hall. Before I had a chance to drop my hand, Rose chimed in.

‘Great. I’ll second Tony,’ she said, her hand aloft now alongside mine.

‘Excellent, that’s it. That’s decided then,’ said David, who proceeded to jot something down on a piece of official-looking paper.

Was that it? Was that all it took? A jab in the ribs, an arm aloft and everything was done and dusted? Seemingly so.

I flushed. Strangely, I was experiencing a sudden and entirely unexpected rush of adrenalin, as it dawned on me that for the first time in my life I found myself in a position of authority. Albeit only seconds into the job though I was, it felt strangely invigorating. I found myself thinking about power. I was the Chairman. OK, I wasn’t Chairman Mao – presumably I had an altogether different remit – but I had power.

My creative mind ran amok, allowing me to indulge in absurd fantasy. It told me to stop and think of all that authority! Boy, the changes I could wreak upon these people. For a moment I was Napoleon, Gaddafi and Hussein, Assad, Stalin, Hitler, Pol Pot – the only difference being that, rather than torturing, maiming and slaughtering, I would be deciding whether we undertook a three-phase electrical renovation.

In that moment, I understood what drives men to seek power. It was intoxicating. It was all-consuming. It was seductive. And, in my case, unfeasibly stupid.

‘L . . . l . . . let’s get the me . . . m . . . m . . . mee . . . meeting underway,’ said David, falteringly.

It now became apparent that David had a slight stutter. He’d spoken smoothly before, but perhaps now the realisation of who was holding the position of chairman was making him nervous. A horrible thought occurred to me. What if he
knew
?

What if he knew that in 1988 I had written and performed (as one third of the trio that were Morris Minor and the Majors) the Number 4 hit ‘Stutter Rap’.
2
Rather insensitively, and with a brash disrespect for political correctness, the lyric had outlined the difficulty of the stutterer when faced with the task of rapping.

My life was so well-planned

Survivin’ and a-jivin’ in a funk band

’Cos rapping it’s my bread and butter

But it’s hard to rap when you’re born with a stutter

What if David
knew
? What if he’d harboured a 25-year grudge against me and that this entire ‘village hall crisis’ was a sham, fabricated so that I could be inveigled into becoming chairman and then slowly be driven to suicide by the weight of petty and yet overwhelming bureaucratic tasks?

Time would tell.

‘W . . . w . . . what should we call you?’ asked David.

‘What do you mean?’ I replied.

‘Well, should we refer to you as Mister Chairman?’

Oh yes, it was coming back to me now. This was the protocol for committees, wasn’t it? The chairman suddenly loses his or her first name and becomes mister or madam, gaining the new surname ‘Chairman’.

‘Mister Chairman?’ I said. ‘That sounds a bit weird.’

‘It’s normal.’

‘Does anyone mind if we go with
Tony
?’

The first radical seed had been planted. Outrageous. Suggesting that we call someone by their own name, rather than a silly made-up one.

‘I think that’s a good idea,’ said Brenda.

The others looked on nervously but then, as if struck by a thunderbolt of good sense, they all began nodding. Before we knew it, we had unanimous approval. This seemed to be rather a nice committee.

Of course, Napoleon, Gaddafi and Hussein, Assad, Stalin, Hitler and Pol Pot would never have done such a thing and allowed their apparatchiks to be on first-name terms – to become friends, instead of subordinates – but mine was going to be a benign rule. I had never sought out this office, but now that it was mine, I was going to use it to make the world a better place.

‘OK, so what happens now?’ I said, demonstrating enormous authority.