A Memorable Day.

Herewith, the latest subject in the Loose Bloggers Consortium list. Chosen for us by Ramana.

 

Do not forget to visit the other Bloggers in  the group for their writings on this topic. Ashok , Conrad, Gaelikaa, Maria, Marianna, Ramana, Grannymar , Judy & Helen

Well, what is it that makes a day memorable? A special occasion? A special person or people?  The weather?  An event? A place? Something unexpected or unusual? A combination of all of these?

I could write about many days, our wedding which was the start of a long story  and when I first met my father’s full brother,  whom I had not known existed before. I could write about the birth of either son or the marriage of the elder of the two. There are Memorable Days about which I should not write and some about which I cannot write.

January 1958, a Wednesday I’m sure. The raw chill of winter seeps into  the bedroom and my breathe makes clouds in the air. A quick wash and then get dressed. It’s not fair my sister, and nearly everyone else in school has a day off. Not me. I have to walk the two miles to school to sit my 11plus exam, along with a few others deemed intelligent enough to have a chance of “passing”. Everyone else in the school had a day off from five year olds to fifteen year olds. Yes, Fifteen year olds, for this  was a village school which was attended by everyone of school age who did not “pass” the 11 plus as there was no Secondary Modern in the area, yet.

Breakfast, porridge with Golden syrup followed by fried bacon and fried bread and a cup of tea. When finished then the washing up had to be done, teeth cleaned and the morning visit to the toilet made.

Wrap up warm, short flannel trousers with long socks and strong shoes. A grey shirt  and a pullover and on top a mackintosh and a scarf at the neck. Woollen gloves, hand knitted and attached to a string that passed up the sleeves and across the shoulders. A school cap or maybe it was a sou’wester.

Ready to set off and then the first memorable thing of the day. Memorable because it has never happened before. A twelve sided brass thrupenny piece is thrust into my hand. To buy some sweets. I look at it in disbelief .

Off I set into the raw, rimey fog of that winter morning. My breath adds to the fog. Down the drive past the young trees to the gate onto the road. Turn right and walk down Crowgate Street. Not really a street but just a country road in Norfolk. Funny name Crowgate Street. “Gate” is an old word which means street..Crow Street Street…funny name that. Oh yes,even at that age I know things that no-one else at school does. Past the council houses where several of my fellow pupils live, the Finches and Margaret Gawlina. Children with whom I am not allowed to play, ever. Before the Council Houses  a turning that leads to Effie Bell’s shop (that shall have to wait for another time).

On I trudge, passing hedges and trees with twigs and branches covered with white rime in a tracery of nature’s lace, to the Coltishall cross roads and turn right again along Market Street towards the level crossing. I remember passing a sugar beet field where a man, a sack across his shoulders, over an old army great coat I shouldn’t wonder, tops beet with a bill hook,  throwing them into a cart between the shafts of which there stands a horse. A horse of seemingly infinite patience.  There theyare, silhouetted in the fog, like grey ghosts.

Beyond the level crossing, after pausing to listen for trains although the crossing keeper would have closed the gates in good time, I pass the junction of Watering Pit Lane, from the banks of which I will soon be able to pick wild primroses and violets and then the Horse and Groom public house, Landlord and Landlady, Malcolm and Renee Bradbury, where I stop to spend my thrupenny piece. What did I buy? I remember a conical bag of multicoloured sugared, puffed rice.

Beyond the pub the school. Red brick with large windows. Warmth at last.

For once Charlie  Hewitt, head master who the previous October had said of Sputnik 1 that, “Nowt will come of it” and who later would tell me that my father was an ignoramus because he did not know how to play chess, is quite amenable. He  fusses over the girls, his favourites, and tells us two boys to get warm.

I don’t remember the tests themselves but I remember the damp cold walk home afterwards and thinking that it was not as beautiful as it had been earlier in the day, with the rime frosting the trees.

The results?  Edwin Bullimore and I “passed” and the girls didn’t. As far as I recall, Edwin went to Paston Grammar School in North Walsham whilst I went to Wymondham College with its Nissen huts and Ghosts of American Airmen from WWII.

Memorable? Yes. It changed my life.