Dispatches From a Dilettante (25 page)

There was a huge area to be filled with concrete which, inexplicably, could not be reached by the chutes that normally disgorge vast amounts of concrete into big holes on building sites. Thus a crude, uneven and unstable concrete ‘run’ had been constructed from planks on bricks. We wheeled our barrows up to the mixer had them filled and then did the run of about thirty metres to the tipping point – for hour after relentless hour. It was all I could do at first to lift the wheel barrow and turn it round and on the first run I failed to get up the slight incline to the tipping point and had to be helped. I expected derision from the mostly Irish labourers but they either felt my evident inadequacy wasn’t worth their scorn or they were a bunch of really good guys. Thankfully they were the latter and gave me smaller loads for the first couple of days.

Thirteen hours is a long time and I had never known fatigue like the utter exhaustion that I felt after day one. My mother was so alarmed at my inability to grip my knife and fork to eat the meal she had warmed up for me on my late return, that she rushed and got a ‘Double Diamond’ to ‘relax’ me. For younger readers this was an alcoholic beverage sold in the late sixties and advertised with the tag line ‘A Double Diamond Works Wonders!” She virtually had to pour it down my throat as my grip reflex had ceased to operate at all. It failed demonstrably to effect any ‘Wonders’ but sleep is of course the great restorer and although bleary eyed and stiff I made it in for day two.

After a couple of hours there was a break from concreting and we were sent upstairs to rip apart two of the old dressing rooms which were merely to be refurbished rather than demolished and rebuilt. We hacked listlessly at an old cupboard which came apart easily but contained half a dusty cardboard flier. ‘3rdNovember 1963….in place of the usual film programme…one night only…. Exciting, Dynamic, Fabulous THE BEATLES’. Then underneath and clearly second on the bill ‘Britain’s top disc double – The Brook Brothers’. On what remained of the poster you could just make out Peter J…and the rest was lost when someone had ripped it in half. T’internet tells me it was Peter Jay and the Jaywalkers and even at the time I knew the Brook Brothers had been billed as ‘Britain’s answer to the Everly Brothers’.

Enthused by this ‘find’, which sadly neither of us had the foresight to keep, we hacked away further but nothing else was revealed from what was a rare music show at the cinema. What this little interlude had provided though was a blessed respite from the concreting to which we were soon recalled.

Nine days doesn’t seem a long time but I nearly packed it in at least twice every day. We made it to the end and on the last night had a glorious drinking session with some of the regular labourers in pub by the market. Delirious with fatigue and alcohol I got off the bus home early to pick up some fish and chips. Thrilled with the focus I had applied to make it as far as our front door, but unable summons the hand eye co-ordination required to get my key out, I knocked loudly. I was in mid vomit when my mother opened the door and then kindly, instead of remonstrating with me, cleared the mess up, while I crashed around before collapsing onto the bed still fully clothed. At some level I think she thought this might be a sign that I could stick at something and on another she knew that her generous loan to fund the flight costs would be repaid which I ‘m sure she had not counted on. My unorthodox homecoming was never mentioned again.

In the interest of accuracy I should mention that this was, strictly speaking, not the first attempt at manual labour. However as the first lasted two days before dramatic interruption, I think I can be excused. At the tender age of seventeen a friendly neighbour who was a builder hired me in the summer to ‘do odd jobs’. Driving to the site where he was starting to build a house the odd jobs he talked about were to commence with the digging of a foundation trench. Heavy rain prevented much action on day one and on the second day he nearly killed me.

Diving rather too quickly in a van without seat belts he was forced to brake suddenly and skidded into the car in front. My head hit the windscreen so hard that it actually came free of its’ attachment to the frame of the car. Mercifully it did not shatter but I instantly had a huge swelling on the left side of my forehead, and felt dizzy. I had never heard of the word ‘litigation’ or ‘culpability’ but the builder had understood instantly the implication of my injury, which is why he was incredibly solicitous as to my wellbeing. I spent the rest of the day in the hut on site brewing tea and he paid me for the week and ‘let me go’ after the second day.

Manual Labour – Thirteen Days 1973

Life could not be described as glamorous when I lived briefly above a sewing shop in Leigh. It had formerly been the living quarters of my then girlfriend’s parents who had moved out into a new house. Quite understandably they wanted to keep me as far away from their daughter as possible, hence the solo accommodation. One of her college lecturers’ was married to a big property developer in Wigan and I was unemployed. After a campaign by my girlfriend, who was kind intelligent and mature and therefore obviously got rid of me soon after, I was taken on by him for unspecified duties.

The first of these was to catch the boat to the Isle of Man with three other employees to renovate a house that my new boss had recently bought. Our trip coincided with the TT event and so we had to be at our place of work very early and stay there until late, as the roads were closed for the races most of the day. On first meeting my new workmates I instantly disliked them and the feeling was reciprocated. It is amazing how quickly you can go off people and the feeling of mutual loathing had already been engendered by a conversation on the ferry going over.

One of the guys, proving that pomposity is not the sole preserve of the middle or upper classes, informed me that he played in a band and had it on good authority that the Beatles had never touched their instruments during the making of The White Album. He knew this for a ‘fact’ because one of his mates had played on the sessions. Instead of ignoring him I poured scorn on his ridiculous assertions and so daggers were drawn, metaphorically speaking, before we had disembarked.

On arrival each day at the site we were locked on our own little island as bikes roared past which at least made it impossible to hear the never ending drivel emanating from my co worker’s mouth. The days passed slowly and the loathing had almost become hatred. Work progressed even more slowly, mainly due to the fact that we were barely speaking. The ramifications of our fall out included cement being mixed when not required, walls being knocked down which should have stayed up, strengthening joists being incorrectly placed, and as a result, someone today is living in a house at Ballacraine that could fall down at any moment. We sulked and bickered through the evenings and sailed back to Liverpool in silence.

During my last week which was also my second week of employment in ‘England’s Northwest’ as we are now obliged to call it, I had the career enhancing opportunity to see my first dead body. Having had the word on our Isle of Man debacle, the firm’s owner had put me with a benevolent older and long serving employee and we were digging in the garden of a terrace house as preparatory work for the erection of an extension.

Confirming every stereotype of northern friendliness, as our ‘hosts’ were not around, the elderly woman next door leant over the fence and asked us if we’d like a ‘cuppa’. A minute later she popped out again and asked us if we would like some toast with it. This generosity was all the confirmation we needed that a break was due, so we downed tools and lit up. I was going through my cigarette phase which lasted about three days and was killed off by my having to bum full strength filter free fags from the man I was now chatting to.

No toast or tea was forthcoming and after ten minutes we tentatively peeked over the fence but could not see into the house. A gentle call received no response and so we considered the options. She could have been called away which was unlikely. She could, being quite old, have simply forgotten about the offer she had committed to and was probably watching telly unaware that major construction had been halted. She was in fact dead.

When we eventually plucked up courage to climb over the fence and investigate we eased into the lounge via a patio door to see her sitting up peacefully in a high backed lounge chair. She was partly facing away from the door and we could not, at first, see her face and so called out nervously. Upon getting no response we went further into the room where it became instantly apparent that she was dead, although sitting as though alive and upright in the chair. My fellow labourer then demonstrated the power of television by remarking that he had just seen a film the night before where death was confirmed by holding a mirror under the nose of the person thought to be deceased. There was one on the mantelpiece so that’s what we did. When no breath clouded the mirror we were certain that we were looking at a dead body.

Flippancy is the default mode for many when faced with difficult situations and it’s the default position for me in almost any situation. “Let’s see if she’s done the toast before we do anything….I’m bloody starving”. She had so we brewed up, had two slices of toast each and then, suitably refreshed, phoned for an ambulance while the kettle boiled. There was the added bonus of not being able to do any work for the rest of the day as the ambulance came, relatives arrived and then the police showed up requiring statements. It was CSI Wigan all over.

Only when I was home and on my own did I think seriously about the day and realise what a brilliant death it had been. To reach old age unscathed, to die in a chair in your own home with your last living act being an offer of generosity and kindness to strangers was a dignified and graceful way to shuffle off this mortal coil. Without really being aware of it, I realise now that it affected me profoundly for years to come as I witnessed more brutal exits.

Manual Labour – One Day 1965

Cycling out to the farm on a warm summer’s day I was quite looking forward to my first ever job and was equally enthusiastic when It ended six hours later. I had cycled there the day before, knocked on the farmhouse door, and been told I could do some painting of barns. Now I was being given a large brush and a huge can of green paint. The farmer pointed at the nearest barn, brusquely told me to start painting it and with that disappeared into the fields on his tractor. No one else seemed to be around.

The lower part of the wooden barn that I was supposed to be painting was caked solid with hardened cow dung. As I had been given no instructions or other implements to work with, I took my first professional executive strategic decision and painted over the cow dung. Never having painted anything before, the green paint was soon all over me, all over the ground and certainly all over the cow dung. When I got any paint as far as the bare wood it was so dry that the paint had almost no effect.

After about an hour when the lumpy green cow dung on the lower reaches of the barn gave it, in my view a distinctive look, the farmer returned. He got of the tractor in silence. He viewed my work in silence. He viewed the green paint on the floor in silence. He walked over to my bike, which was leaning against an adjacent building, still without a word. He wheeled it back to where I was standing in silence and motioned me to get on it. He dismissed me with a wave of the hand at the same time recovering his powers of speech saying simply but witheringly “I don’t think so”.

Barman– Twelve Days 1967

The King Charles pub in the centre of Leeds does not exist anymore. Nowadays at exactly the place where the entrance used to be a man sells paintings of Bob Marley, beanie hats in Rasta colours and old style reggae CDs. In truth it barely existed when I worked there during the Christmas break of 1967. It was a throwback to another era even then as I, with my natty little maroon acrylic barman’s jacket, worked from the customers’ side of the bar. They ordered from their seats and I then went up to the counter, got their drinks, put them on my tray, then returned and served them. This was, after all, the lounge as opposed to the public bar.

The landlord, and indeed all the staff were friendly and even when he sounded a minor note of caution, it was delivered in such a mellow tone implying it was the sort of warning that he had to give, that I though no more of it. His words were along the lines of “In the unlikely event of a fight make sure you get behind the bar before I pull the counter shutters down”. I looked up and observed that there were indeed shutters running the length of the counter and then instantly forgot about his words of advice.

Even though it was approaching Christmas there were times at lunchtime when it was quiet and I got to know some of the customers. An ex marine used to stand at the bar every lunchtime and slowly drink three pints. The first one was usually supped in a moribund silence but he became garrulous after the second. “In the marines we had to change our underwear twice a day” he would remark on a daily basis to no one in particular. If that failed to elicit a response he brought out a battered old colour photograph of him in some swamp in Costa Rica. He would then buttonhole the nearest customer or me and demand “How many people can you see in that photograph?” The obvious answer that I fell for the first time was ‘one’, whereupon he would triumphantly extol the camouflage skills of the marines by pointing out six other well disguised bodies blending in with the foliage.

Unfortunately after three pints he could never remember who he had impressed with this photograph and was distraught when he produced it to someone who casually, after a brief glance en route to the bar, replied ‘seven’ without breaking stride. He would then drink up and leave in high dudgeon but always returned next day for a repeat performance. I was comforted by the fact that he was almost certainly wearing clean underwear for my entire stint at the King Charles - old habits die hard.

Unimaginable though it may seem today when they live in gated compounds, but on my third day a well known professional footballer walked in to get as he freely offered ‘a break from the wife who’s bleedin’ spending my money on presents faster that I can earn it’. He was a striker for Sheffield Wednesday and quite happy to converse with the several people who recognised and approached him. It’s always interesting to get an insider’s view on sport when it is delivered away from the media glare and his anecdotes were funny and self deprecating. One though amusing, destroyed a little bit of my innocence. He described an end of season home game at a previous club, which had no consequence for them but could mean if they won, that the club they were playing were relegated. The managers were long time friends and a draw was agreed before kick-off.