Why - part 2; Moi.

 

There I am – up there at the top; a little boy then, I was, probably totally confused with a Dublin accent and living in Birmingham. 

I can't remember where the actual hard copy is now, but I think it said on the back that I was a little more than three years old – but it looks like a school photo so why would I be wearing a tie?

I hadn't learned to read, I don't think, and I couldn't see the notice on the corner of Vincent Street and Moseley Road; a post card in a window which was offering rooms to rent: no blacks, no dogs and no Irish. Very famous now, I know. I certainly saw it when I learned to read and at the time of the photo I probably thought we were in Ireland. 

We lived in Birmingham and sometimes we would go to Sussex on our holidays, to my dad's brother Danny and his family, and the kids there would say 'where do you live' and I would say 'England' – always used to say that when we were in Ireland – but in Sussex they said 'this is England' which totally confused me.

I was only a little fella there, and maybe I was getting used to the fact that the little fella gets all the fuss, the extra piece of cake, first in the queue behind the bar, although I didn't go into many bars in those days; but who knows. 

I was always a bit on the small side but I grew to the height of my heroes, Paul Newman, so I was, and always, have been, more than satisfied with how close I was to the sky. 

I remember distinctly my first day at school because I didn't want to go and never liked it – I've said this before. Miss Jones, my poor teacher, carried me in and I was kicking and screaming – this lasted right up till the age of 16 when Miss Jones had enough – my little joke, sorry. She became Mrs Wailing and, I have only just noticed, that the name described me at the time.

My mother was a seamstress in Dublin – in Ringsend – and she made some clothes for me – probably the braces above – and I remember showing one of the teachers my new jerkin she had made for me, and the strange look on the teacher's face as she looked at me as if I was showing her a piece of wet fish I had found in the playground. The hard tarmac playground.

We did a play, 'The Golden Goose,' and most days there was a rehearsal. I say 'we did the play' but I wasn't in it.

But I loved it.

I would sit in my seat every day to watch the rehearsal and knew every word of every character. The three girls I liked would enter and the first one would say 'Oh! A golden goose, please let me have a feather.' And she would rush forward and grab a feather getting stuck to it; as it said in the script. In a flash the other two girls came in: number two 'me too, me too' and the third 'and me.'

And they were all stuck.

Every day I watched. And every day I loved it from my seat.

On the night of the play, someone dropped out. I didn't give it a thought – but I do now.

One of the boys – Robert Mapp – was asked to play the vacant role, and he said 'but I have this costume on' – I can't remember the top but he was wearing yellow trousers.

'You can do a quick change' said the teacher – and he had plenty of time.

Sitting in the audience I watched with them; I knew all the lines still, I knew what was going to happen next – 'please let me have one, me too me too, and me.'

Robert Mapp took his exit and I waited for him to come on with his quick change and on he came – still in the same yellow trousers from his previous character.

I will never forget it and if any of his relations are reading this – no offence.

I only thought of the teacher, recently – she saw me, every day, sitting in my seat, lapping up the play, knowing every role and movement and I now wonder why she didn't send me on. Maybe because I probably didn't speak right, maybe I was too small.

I did find a photo of some other play we did where I was a ruffian and I was standing with two big boys, threatening the guy behind the stall. On the photo I could see my little fist up, threateningly, behind them.

Size not being everything I remember when I went to the secondary school at the age of eleven.

That was a boys' school and I went for a trial for the football team. They asked me what position I wanted and I said centre forward. 

Someone said 'No. Roger Munday will get that' but I went for it in any case.

I touched the ball once; it came to me when I was around the half way line. I stopped it and was about to kick it over my head and it hit me in the chin.

When I came off the same guy who told me about Roger Mundy said 'you only touched the ball once and it hit you in the chin.'

It must have been funny to see me when a corner was being taken. Standing in the penalty area with all the big kids as the ball came over, half the size of the others, trying to figure where the ball was going to land so I could head it into the goal, not realising that if the ball came and hit me on the head, the greasy leather case ball would probably knock me out.