Guilty Conscience

I don't know how it is in your country; he says, in a blatant attempt to have an excuse to mention his mahoosive* audience in the US, Germany, and the Ukraine; but in the UK, when you near the end of Primary School (age 11), you are taken on what is called an induction visit to the school you will be attending for next, and final, five years of compulsory education.

Or at least, that's what happened when I was a lad. It's probably all changed now, most things have. Anyway, this is the tale of what happened when I went on my induction trip. Enjoy. Or at least do your best to fake a fair approximation of enjoyment. For me, yeah?

It had been decided, via whatever arcane sorcery is used to decide these things, that the school I would attend would be a little place called Parkside Comprehensive School. Now Parkside was a little bit unique (I KNOW THAT DOESN'T MAKE SENSE DON'T SHOUT AT ME) as Comprehensive schools go, in that it was split over two separate locations; not a few streets away or even on opposite sides of town, but in two separate towns.

The first two years would attend classes in one town and then years 3-5, or 9-11 as we were constantly told we must refer to them; this being just about the time that that whole new numbering system was being implemented; would attend classes in the larger complex in the other town.

Now you would think that since the point of an induction visit is to get you acquainted with the world you're about to enter, we would visit the complex that took first years. However, the teachers were boxing a bit clever, and in what I'm sure was just an attempt to save on bus fuel it was decided that all of the local Primary schools would take their pupils to whichever complex was nearest. Which meant my class would go to the larger complex. Which meant I shat my pants.

Now, the idea of going somewhere I'd never been, to meet people I'd never met, who would essentially be controlling my life for the next 5 years, would have been anxiety inducing enough to have me waking up in the night in a cold sweat for weeks in advance; which meant I really didn't need anything else to worry about on top. I had it though, in the shape of a little thing called 'oh shit, what if I give the game away paranoia.

You see, the school we were about to visit was this school, and the events in question were still very much fresh in my mind. The whole thing was doing my anxiety no good at all.

The big day arrived and we all trooped from one school to the other; single file, teacher at either end of the train, hold hands to cross the road, stop sniggering back there boy; and when we arrived we were met by one of the most intimidating figures I've ever known. He was the Head, whom I shall call Mr J, and I can't tell you why we all felt such instant fear when we met him. He was tall, dressed really smartly, had a head of silver hair, and was incredibly well spoken, so perhaps we thought he was a Bond villain, but I don't recall him doing anything particularly nasty or strict. In fact, I don't recall much of anything about him, because he was always a big fan of delegation, leaving his Department heads and heads of year to do all that awful 'dealing with kids' malarkey.

We were split up into groups and told that each group would only be touring a fraction of the school. This boosted my spirits somewhat; what were the chances that I would be in the group that...oh, home economics you say? And that's...cooking, right. So the kitchens then? Brilliant.

They've knocked down and rebuilt huge swathes! Didn't recognise the place. That's the spot though.

My arse has never been clenched so tight in all my days. We went through the doors and my eyes went straight to the spot where we'd taken the microwave (it had been replaced) before swiveling to the window we'd come in through (it had been repaired) and then, in a fit of panic, to the teacher doing the tour to make sure he wasn't looking at me (he wasn't).

You see, in my head, this was all too much of a coincidence. The fact that we had come to this school rather than the one we'd actually be attending, the fact that I just happened to be on the group that came to this particular section of the school; I was convinced it was some weird, elaborate sting operation to out me as the great microwave thief of Olde Willington Towne. Nonsense, obviously, but the mind will play tricks.

We spent half a day in those bloody kitchens, baking cupcakes. Now I liked cupcakes as much as the next pre-pubescent boy but I couldn't quite get into the spirit of the exercise. Can't think why.

And that's the tale of what happened to me when I went on an induction visit to a school I wasn't even due to start at for another two years. I hope it wasn't too boring. And if it was, keep it to yourself, yeah? There's no need to hurt anyone's feelings. Tata for now.

*Given that non-English speaking readers are probably relying on google translate or similar, I should probably tone down the made up words, eh? Although when you think about it, aren't all words 'made up'? If they weren't, we'd all be pointing at trees and saying Ug, am I right?

Blaming the black kid.

Last week I introduced my 'Paki' friends, and talked about how I was raised in an environment where such words were... not condoned, so much as not questioned at all. I had my reasons for bringing up the McA's that went beyond a surface glance at the issue of racism in '80so Britain, or rather, my reason; the eldest of them was to be my patsy in a very near miss with the law.

This is that story. (I tried to pull some stills of the area from google street view to illustrate this post, but the surrounding area has been flattened and re-built and the Speccie itself extensively remodelled and it made me cry because my childhood is gone so you'll have to do without)

I can't remember whether I've talked on here before about the level of 'mischief' we used to get up to at The Spectrum Leisure Complex (or Speccie). I know I've alluded to it, but genuinely can't recall whether I've done a post that delves into the specifics. What's more, I can't be bothered to check, either.

Suffice it to say, our activities; knocking on office windows, running through the ski lodge screaming at the top of our lungs, changing the scores on those little flipboard things during vital bowls games, and pressing the emergency stop button on the rope that pulled ski-ers back up to the top of the slope; did little to endear us to the staff there. We thought we'd keep getting away with it forever. We were wrong.

Twas a day like an other, that it all kicked off. And by a day like any other I mean we were torturing the poor bastards. It was fairly obvious, in hindsight, that we were pushing our luck; they were watching us much more closely than normal, and had chased us more than once; but rather than take that as a sign that we should cool it for the day, we were energised by it. The bigger a reaction you give misbehaving kids, the more they like it and play up to it; that's just science.

But then they got clever.

You see, whenever they chased us, we'd scatter and bolt for home. Then we'd wait five minutes and head back. So, we're strutting through the gates for the tenth time that day, all laughing and full of our own daring, when suddenly, we're surrounded! They're coming out of the buildings, from behind trees, from the side of the gates behind us to block exit... we were fucked. So the panicky, but still fun, scattering began. Twas pandemonium. Glorious pandemonium.

Of course they were never going to catch us all, even as mob handed as they were. The area was too large, the kids too nimble and the exits too numerous. They were pissing in the wind.  Except... well, except for the fact that I was finding the sight of all these slightly out of shape (ironic, given what they did for a living) adults having rings run round them so much that I wasn't actually running myself. I was just standing and laughing. At first it didn't matter, because no-one tried to grab me; the instinct being to go after the ones who were running; but eventually a couple of them did come for me and, although I did make a last minute bolt for it I'd left it too late and got nabbed. Silly me!

Of course these days it would have never happened. In today's age of kid gloves and fear of recriminations the idea of grabbing and detaining a bunch of kids would never be countenanced but we were living in different times (The 1980's! I'm well ancient!) and I'm surprised they stopped short of cuffing me around the head. That was understood though; you misbehaved, sure, but you knew you'd be for it if you were caught; it was all part of the game. In this case though, once my collar was well and truly felt, I was just marched to the office of the manager; a fairly gruff fellow with whom I had so far managed to avoid any dealings with. Gruff as he was though, I wasn't intimidated; I was 10, I had no fear.

He told me that my parents would be informed and that I would 'get a hiding' from them, which if nothing else marked him out as a good judge of character; he told me my school would be informed and I would be ridiculed in assembly, as if being told off in assembly would do anything other than boost my reputation; and he told me that he was going to call the police.

That one gave me pause. You see, we weren't all that far removed from this incident, and I was still very much entrenched in my 'all cops are dickheads' phase. I was also, don't laugh, convinced that they would be out to get me after the way I had humiliated them in our previous encounter. Fucking Al Capone over here. If Al Capone was 10, and innocent. Sort of.

Talk of police involvement prompted my next brilliant move. Yes, I lied about my identity. Foolproof! Of course, I hadn't seen The Usual Suspects at this point, so i didn't claim to be called Slazenger Reebok, but I came up with something almost as good; I gave the name of the eldest lad in our old friends, the 'Paki' family. Well, obviously.

Why did I choose him? I could have chosen Ian, my cousin; I could have chosen Wayne, my best friend. Both of them had actually been among the gang of us causing mischief. Or I could have chosen any one of the 20 lads in my class at school. I could even, were I feeling particularly not stupid, invented a name. Instead, I chose him. I'm not saying I did it because I knew my Mother wouldn't mind me getting him into trouble, or because I thought that him doing something wrong would be more believable, given his background; I'm not saying those things, because I genuinely don't think that was my reasoning, at the time. I'm willing to bet it was a factor, sub-consciously, though. I had been, at least partially, indoctrinated into the racist ways of my community.

"Right, stay here and don't move. I'll be back in a minute" he tells me, and wanders off, locking the door behind him. Locking the door behind him! He kidnapped me! What a prick, eh? Anyway, once he was gone there was no way I was sticking around; I filled my pockets with pens, a ruler, and several million paperclips, and was away out the window. Oh yes, you aint holding me for long!

I have no idea whether he ever phoned the police, or indeed whether he ever had any intentions of doing so, but to the best of my knowledge the McA's never received a visit from the boys in blue since the lad in question knew what I'd done, because I told him, and he found the whole thing hilarious; I'm sure he'd have thought differently if he'd had to deal with his parents after a visit from the police.

My whole 'daring escape' thing, thankfully, was considered 'cool' enough by my friends to negate any lingering naffness caused by being the only one daft enough to get caught in the first place, which was nice.

And that's my trip down memory lane for this week. Not one of my finer moments, but not my worst either. There would be another case of me trying to talk my way out of trouble; also including stolen pens, as it goes; about a year later, and in that case I would do something that would have lasting repercussions for my whole family; not to mention it makes me sound like a callous dick.

So look forward to that one.

Hardened Criminal Part 2

I'm writing this blog post on a Sunday. It's for posting on a Monday but it's being written on a Sunday. I just thought I'd let you know that, so you can attempt to figure out, while you read it, why I felt the need to point it out. It must be relevant to the post in some way right? Ooh, mysterious...

I'm a little lost off with where I am in my life story at the minute, what with diversions to talk about all the women I perv o... I mean talk to, on twitter and to have a bit of a dig at my libelous brother and of course jumping ahead to the days of bicycle beatings, but I'm gonna try to get things back on track this week. Maybe.

Lots of members of my family are criminals. Reformed criminals, to be fair, but at the time that I'm writing about now, that part hadn't happened yet. As a result, it was something of a foregone conclusion that I too would enter the family business of taking what belonged to other people and making it mine, whether they liked it or not. I think there's a name for that, but I can't quite think of it.

Now, I'd like to tell you that the thought made me distraught, and that I tried everything in my power to avoid the icy grip of a life of crime, but that my familial connections made it impossible and I was dragged back every time I tried to crawl away. I'd like to tell you that, but I can't. I didn't resist. It didn't even occur to me to resist. This is just what people in my family did.

A couple of minor shoplifting occurrences and the taking of a bottle of tippex from the receptionists desk at the opticians; I was quite proud of getting away with that one; were my only offences until the day one of my Uncles, who shall remain nameless so as not to incriminate the, er, guilty, decided that the time was ripe for me to go on my first burglary. Exciting stuff!

The allotted night didst swift arrive, and we set off, clad all in black, to the local comprehensive school. I'd been there often, because we would sometimes kick a ball around on their fields at the weekends, and cutting through their grounds was a good shortcut to the river on a hot day. I had never actually been inside though. Until now. My little heart was all aflutter on the way there; even the torrential rain couldn't dampen my spirits. 

Unc insisted on going the long way around and approaching from the woods, which I felt was a bit of a waste of time but what did I know, I was 10. Still though, it was a bloody long walk.  Anyway, we came up on the school, he did something very clever to a window and hey presto, we were in. At which point he lay on his belly on the floor and slithered away like a snake. Which made me laugh.

See, I'm not an expert on these things but I'm pretty certain he may have been watching a few too many movies. It was a school for crying out loud. What kind of security system did he think we were dealing with here?

But anyway... We were in a large kitchen with loads of desks in the middle. I assumed it was for cookery classes but I learned later that that was a gross inaccuracy; it was a Home Economics/Food Technologies lab. Shows what I know.

The whole thing was destined to go tits up, of course, because I was involved so how could it not? Alarms went off and we were out of there, except he was damned if he was going empty handed so he waited until I was out then threw a microwave out to me. Which I dropped.

Then he was out and we were running; with him carrying the microwave because he didn't trust me; and we get... to the corner of the fence, whereupon I slip on my arse in the mud and can't get up. (See, cos I said earlier there was rain? That's foreshadowing and shit, that is.)

I manage to pick myself up eventually and we head into the woods. We hide the microwave for retrieval the next day, because he doesn't want to be seen on the streets with it, and then we head home. The long way around, of course.

The odd thing about the whole incident is that on the night in question my Unc was stressed, angry, blaming me for screwing up and panicking like a motherfunter. Yet, within days, the story was that he had deliberately set the alarms off and made a hash of things, in order to 'scare me straight'. Ha, nice cover job son, but I know the truth!

We went back and got the microwave the next day. It didn't work. A damning indictment of our schools funding? Or because I dropped it in a puddle? YOU decide!

So there you go, the night that my criminal career escalated, and pretty much peaked. I'm not saying that was the last time I ever nicked anything, but it was all petty rubbish and it didn't last long.

Oh, and if you're wondering, the reason I mentioned writing this on Sunday to post on Monday and asked you to figure out why it was relevant was... to see if you would try to work out why it was relevant as you read the post. Did you? Go on, tell me you did.
                                           

Hardened Criminal

So I've put it off long enough. The time has come for me to tell the tale of my first ever run-in with the local constabulary. Truth be told, it's the only run-in I've ever had with them that involved me on the side of the accused and I was actually innocent of any (well, almost any, and certainly innocent of what the police accused me of) wrongdoing. Which is not to say that there weren't other occasions when I was not quite so innocent that they just never cottoned on to; but what are you going to do when you come from a family of rogues? Anyway, it started with a visit to the home of Philip...

It's a peculiarity of the psychology of children I think, that no matter what the evidence presented to them in their own homes and families they always assume that other adults are all somehow intelligent, respectable, trust-worthy and above all honest.; be they teachers, shop keepers, random neighbours, or our friends parents. Those last perhaps most of all; you just never think that they could ever be like your own parents, or even worse...

I knew Philip primarily as one of the Brancepeth Boysbut he was also an occasional member of our merry little troupe at weekends. On this particular day he invited me and my brother back to his house to play on his computer. We had, in our house, a Commodore 64 and as with everything in life the grass always seemed greener on the other side so his ZX Spectrum was the highest of novelties to us* and off we trot. It was to prove a mistake.

Long story short, because I never do that on here and I fancy a change, is that while we were there Philip asked if he could keep hold of something of mine and I agreed. Then I saw something of his that I thought I'd quite like to borrow in exchange but after a long drawn out conversation with the paranoid voices in my head, wherein they convinced me that he didn't like me enough to lend me anything, I decided just to pocket it. As you do.

The next day, I showed what I had taken to Wayne, (I wasn't yet the fully fledged evil genius/criminal mastermind that I would become) and he, having promptly recognised it from his visit to Philips house and being far more honest than I, told Philip when next he saw him. Deep shit, was I in.The police were called in by Philips parents. Little bit of overkill, possibly, given that what I had taken was worth about 50p but fair play to them, they were playing the long game.

The police took me to the police station, did the whole 'scare the little bleeder' thing with the cells and stuff and then took me into an interview room with the whole tape recorder thing going on. Intimidation, thy name is local bobby. Now, I'd seen The Bill, I knew the score, and I felt confident that I could bluff my way through this. You see, I'd formulated a plan that would 'get me off' (and yes, I was thinking in those terms; to me this was Great Train Robber stuff) and what's more, would make me seem like somewhat of a victim in the whole affair. I was going to blame Philip. Genius.

The idea was that I would tell a sob story about how Philip had invited us up to his room and then once we were there he had demanded that I hand over my stuff (the stuff he had politely asked to borrow) and had threatened to hit me if I hadn't. I figured if they checked up, they'd find my stuff in his room and hey presto, they'd believe me. (See, I was at least on my way to criminal genius.) Then, I'd say, I decided to take the stuff of his to get back at him. I'd say sorry, that I knew it was wrong, and maybe throw in a few tears. No way could I be in trouble after that.

Wrong!

The police didn't care about the toy. That's not what they were interested in at all. They were interested in the money that had gone missing from the living room of Philips house. Say Whaaat? Oh yes, it seems that while I was there stealing toys from Philips bedroom a bunch of notes had disappeared from the jar in their living room. It couldn't be a coincidence could it? It had to have been me. Well, it wasn't me, and I'd be damned if I was going to sit there and let them say it was.

My indignation kicked in. The same hatred of undeserved authority being bandied about that had seen me locking my Dad in an outside toilet for several hours and would later see me get on the wrong side of many a teacher, and then bosses, led me to get very serious and determined in the face of this false accusation; I was having none of it.

The guy doing the questioning obviously figured he had me bang to rights. I'd admitted stealing one thing, so I must have stolen the other. Sherlock Holmes he wasn't. I explained to him that I had never actually been in the living room while I was at the house; that in fact I had never gotten farther than the kitchen on the ground floor. (The back door opened onto the stairs and you turned right into the kitchen. You had to pass through the kitchen to get into the living room if you entered through the rear) I said that I had gone straight upstairs upon arrival and that when we were leaving Philip had gone into the living room for something but the rest of us hadn't.

At this point he tried to trip me up. "Did Philip take any money while he was in the living room?" says the copper. "Not that I saw, no." replies myself. "Aha!", cries the copper, "I have cunningly led you into my trap. How could you know what he did if you weren't in the living room?"

Whoops, had I slipped up? Had I revealed a flaw in my intricate web of lies? Was I dealing with a Sherlockian mastermind? No. "I know because I was watching him from the doorway" I answered. This threw him for a moment but he soon rallied.
"Which doorway?"
"The doorway to the living room"
"But you said you didn't get further than the kitchen"
"I didn't"
"So how could you be in the doorway to the living room if you didn't get further than the kitchen?"
"Have you been in their house?"

The doorway to the living room was in the kitchen. The rooms were directly linked. Had he been in the house he'd have known that. So either he did know and had just assumed he could make me flustered (because I was just a daft kid after all) or he didn't, in which case why was he the one doing the interview? Anyway, I refused to back down and at one point told him that he should go and look at the house before he called me a liar, which made my mother shout at me for being cheeky, which made the copper tell her off for shouting at me. It was all very tense.In the end the police took my fingerprints and sent me on my way. Nothing ever came of it after that, presumably because they didn't find my fingerprints anywhere in their living room and so knew I was telling the truth.

I've often wondered who did take the money, or even whether any money was ever really taken at all. I thought at the time that it must have been Philip, using my real actions as a cover but I reckon now that that was just my blindness to the faults of adults coming in to play. I'll be honest, I don't think Philip was bright enough to think of something like that, but maybe his parents were; maybe one or the other of them took the money and blamed me to the other one, or maybe there never was any money and they were just trying to get my mother to cough something up to keep me out of trouble. Who knows, really, and at the end of the day it doesn't really matter; all was well that ended well, as they say.

The one lasting impact that incident had on me; the one way in which it changed the direction of my life completely, was that it badly eroded my respect for the police. In their dealings with me they were one of two things; either they were incompetent, or they were bullies and neither one of those things inspired me with confidence. It would be a long time before my disdain for them subsided.

*Younger readers may be confused by the terms Commodore 64 and ZX Spectrum. This is because you are all spoiled rotten by the wondrous technology of today. They were the absolute cream of the crop of home computers back in my day and would take anywhere up to half an hour to load a game. Good times.