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CHAPTER 3 My Earliest Memory People have told me that they can remember when they were as young as two years old. As far as I?m concerned, the years prior to four have little place in my memory. I say four, but I was a little older when remembering my first Christmas. It was Christmas 1954. I had woken up to a pillow case containing an apple, an orange, some nuts and a bright coloured package - ?Is this what I think it is?? I hurriedly ripped the paper apart. ?Yes!? It was a cowboy suit, all I had ever dreamed of for months. But wait, there was something more, a small package at the bottom of the pillow case - ?What could this be?? I eagerly opened the package. I couldn?t believe my eyes; it was a Roy Rogers penknife, now I was a real cowboy. I was now fully equipped to face anything. Having eaten my fruit and cracked my nuts, mainly to find most of them were bad, I made my way to the adventure playground. When I say adventure playground, I don?t mean a park with purpose-made climbing frames and tidy little picnic seats for mums and dads to sit on and supervise. My adventure playground was far more adventurous, far more realistic; my adventure playground was the street. Here anything could happen. In just one day, playing in the street, you could find yourself in charge of a battalion fighting the Germans in the war; you could be a champion footballer or even a champion racing-car driver. When I was a lad you didn?t need a racing car to be a champion, as long as you could run fast and make a brrrmm noise like a racing car, you could be a world champion. Okay, you were only a champion in your own head but, if you believed it, that?s all that mattered. I walked onto the street dressed as a cowboy and carrying my precious penknife. I looked up and down to see who was about. In my little mind, I had just arrived in town and I was looking for trouble, just like the real cowboys I had seen so many times at the Saturday-morning pictures. At the top of the road I spotted two friends, Johnny Anderson and Barry. Johnny, who lived at number 12 on the street, was dressed as a cowboy, but Barry, who I think lived in Bawdale Road, was not; he was dressed as a Red Indian, I think that term is outlawed today. This could only mean trouble. I walked towards them slowly with my hat pulled forward just above my eyes, my arms slightly away from my hips and my eyes coldly focused on them. Finally we came face-to-face -?What ya get for Christmas then, Wardy??they said. Wardy was my nick name. ?I got this cowboy suite and this penknife, ?We compared presents and began to argue about who got the best and what cost the most, probably like kids do today. We played happily for some time, running and chasing each other, firing our pretend guns and making all sorts of weird noises. However, it wasn?t long before Barry suggested that we have a real fight. Fighting was a big part of my childhood; if you couldn?t fight you were in for a very tough time, growing up would almost certainly be a long and painful process. What happened next stays with me to this day. Barry was a tough kid; his father was serving ten years in prison for armed robbery. Because of this Barry had something to prove. Even at this early age he was showing signs of following in his father?s footsteps. He pulled out his prized Christmas present: a six-inch sheaf knife. I can see it now, bright and shiny, sharp and pointed. He told me to fight him using my penknife. It seems silly now, why didn?t I just say ?No? and walk away? The truth is, it?s hard to do that when you?re a young boy growing up in a tough environment and needing to prove yourself, for whatever reason. Don?t suppose much has changed today. I opened my knife and pointed it at him. He came towards me. I knew he meant business; I could see it in his face. I knew without doubt that he would cut me with that knife. He came closer and closer, too close for comfort. Suddenly his arm went back and he plunged the knife down towards me. His intention, I?m sure, was to push that knife into my chest like he had seen on the cowboy and Indian films. I honestly don?t know what happened next but, somehow, I avoided his blade and managed to slice my blade across his hand. The blood ran quickly down his fingers and dripped on the floor. I know now that it wasn?t that bad, just a small cut but, as a little kid, it was a big cut and I was scared and my heart was pumping so loud. Barry burst into tears, clenching his arm, shouting at me and saying I had stabbed him. As for Johnny, well he ran away. Eventually, Barry went home to his mum, probably to tell her I was the bad guy. After a few minutes of standing alone I looked up and down the street. I can remember it being very quiet. There was no one about; the sun was shining but it was cold. I felt a strange feeling inside me, a feeling I hadn?t experienced before, a feeling of pride and satisfaction. I had done it; I had knocked Barry off of his bully?s pedestal and won my first real fight. However, unbeknown to me at the time, the real fight was just about to begin, a fight I would surely lose when my mum found out what I had done. After that day I don?t really remember seeing Barry very much I guess he decided to play somewhere else with kids who didn?t know about his lost battle I often wonder if he followed in his dad?s footsteps, hopefully not.

Thank you MrsR, I think you will enjoy it. I look forward to you letting me know. Regards Wardy

beejay, it is a book, I published it last year. Just thought I would put the main chapters on here to put a smile on peoples faces during this horrible lockdown. Enjoy

I'm glad people are enjoying my story, we all need some enjoyment in this lockdown. There are several chapters, so should take us through February. These chapters will tell of some of the characters that lived in East Dulwich and the long forgotten shops, plus the ups and downs of my family. If you know of anyone who may find this interesting please let them know. The next chapters will be on Wednesday at 3pm. Thanks again - Wardy

CHAPTER 2 Life at Home Having told you about my mum and dad, it?s time now for you to step into my childhood. This isn?t something I decided to do lightly; my childhood has always been reasonably private. I have occasionally discussed bits and pieces, but I have never attempted to describe the reality. It was a time when I learned a lot about myself and my family, a time that was second to none, but it was also a time that I would never want to return to or wish on anyone. From the age of about five through to my teens I probably spent more time frightened and alone then most people spend in a lifetime. As such, I know before I start that it?s going to be difficult for me to describe my childhood; there are parts that I don?t want to remember or, should I say, that I have put to the back of my mind. I have never had any hang-ups about my childhood and I have never resented not having a more advantageous upbringing; things were what they were and that?s that. Thinking along these lines, I decided not to write about my childhood like a story book, but instead like a memory book, talking about things I remember as I remember them. The dates may not be exact and some of the names have been changed or forgotten. Some memories are pretty sad, others are funny and some are enjoyable; but they are all as it was - no exaggeration, nothing added, just the truth as I remember it growing up in the fifties. I was born on 17 July 1950 in the back room of 25 Rodwell Road ?The rough end of the street? in East Dulwich, London SE 22. In that house lived me, my brother Fred, my sister Margaret, and my mum and dad. I had another sister, June, but she married when I was just nine months old and moved to Peckham, London with her husband John. The house where we lived had no bathroom, an outside toilet, and a very small garden, more like a yard. The house was very poorly decorated, very cold and had lino in most rooms. I say most rooms because the front room, lounge as it would be known today, had a carpet. However, the front room was only used at Christmas or on very special occasions, such as a long-lost relative visiting. At all other times the front room was out of bounds and you would need to be very brave to disobey that rule. The street where I lived was typical of South London streets. The houses were Victorian terraces with bay windows and very small front gardens. These gardens were mainly planted-out with privet hedging along the front boundary. The houses opposite from where I lived had basements; which we called the airy. Why? I don?t know. I shared a bedroom in the house with my brother Fred. Fred was nine years older than me and he was my hero. My brother could fight the biggest bullies, would always protect me and knew more about everything then anybody. Fred would never let me down I was his little brother and we would always be together. I can remember on miserable dark nights when Fred and me would go to bed. Our room was at the back of the house on the first floor; it was cold and always felt damp. There was no central heating in the house, just one coal fire which was downstairs in the kitchen. We would go to bed dressed in jumpers, a pair of old trousers and socks to keep us warm. There were no duvets or crisp cotton sheets in those days, at least not for us. We had a couple of old Second World War army blankets. These blankets were heavy, hard and itchy; it felt like they were made of thousands of small needles. Going to bed was a very horrible experience. At bedtime we knew what was waiting; cold, shivers and complete discomfort but, besides all that bedtime could sometimes be fun. I remember one night Fred pulling my arm around his body and wiggling his bum up against my knee. I thought he was snuggling up to get warm but, no, I was wrong; he was putting himself in position to fart on my leg. Silly, I know, but it was times like this that we would laugh so much that we forgot the cold and the itchy blankets and would fall asleep, cuddled up together as only two young brothers could. One of the great things about sleeping in the back bedroom of the house was the exit door leading from the bedroom to a set of outside wooden steps which led down to the back garden. You may say, ?What?s great about that?? Well let me tell you: we had a neighbour, Jim, he lived in Heber Road and his garden backed onto ours. Jim grew prize winning apple trees. I know I said the gardens were very small and they were, but Jim managed, through pure determination, to grow these apple trees in the smallest of spaces, I think there were about 3 in total. He would spend hours pruning, spraying and generally looking after these trees. With the exception of Christmas, apples and fruit were rare things in my house and fruit at the bottom of the garden was just too tempting to resist. You?ve probably guessed by now why those steps leading to the garden were so important. Every autumn, when the apples were ripe, Fred and me would get up in the middle of the night go down the steps and rob the trees, rob Jim too in a roundabout way, of half of those apples. We would climb the trees and fill our shirts up so much we looked ten months pregnant. It was so exciting being out there in the silence of the night with just the moon and stars for company. When we returned to our bedroom we would eat and eat until we couldn?t eat any more. To make sure our mum didn?t find out we would hide the apple cores behind a great big iron fireplace that was in our bedroom; those cores are probably still there to this day. Every year after pinching the apples the procedure would be the same. The following day Jim would come out into his garden to view his apples only to find many of them gone. He would call out over the fence and ask us if we had taken them. Every year we would say - ?No Jim, we wouldn?t do that Jim.? We would then suggest that it was the girl next door, Linda. Linda lived with her mum, Violet at number 27, and both were never known to work for a living. Jim would always swallow our story and set about having an argument with Linda and her mum. It?s ####ing terrible when you think about it, poor old Linda never tasted one of those apples, but she got the blame for pinching them year after year. Wouldn?t it be a coincidence if she was writing a similar book to this one; she would probably say, when writing about the apple trees - ?Every year that old bastard Jim blamed me for taking his ####ing apples. Why?? Well Linda, wherever you are now, read this book and you will find out why. Not having an inside toilet could sometimes be a big problem. I say no inside toilet, there was one upstairs but unfortunately it never ever worked, dad was a builder but repairing his own house was never a priority. I can remember on many occasions during the night lifting the sash window in the bedroom and pissing down into the garden. How crude you may say but, imagine it?s February, its 1am in the morning, there?s snow on the ground outside and the temperature is way below zero. You?re tucked up in your army blanket and wearing all the clothes possible to keep yourself warm. Suddenly you wake up from a deep sleep, dying for a wee. What do you do? Well I suppose the proper thing to do is to get up, wrap yourself up warm, toddle off down the stairs, go out into the dark, cold and windy night, trample through the thick snow with your feet freezing, find the outside toilet in the pitch dark, drop your bottoms, exposing your bits to the elements and pee. On the other hand, if you were like me and Fred, not too fussy, survivors of life and not particularly wanting to freeze any more th an necessary, you would get up, look out the window, see the snow and say, ?#### that,? open the window and go, quick, simple and a lot more comfortable. Yes, I?m afraid to say that happened on many occasions during the winter months when I was a child. I didn?t start writing this book with any particular type of plan in mind, probably because that?s how my life has always been, no particular plane. However, it appears to me that when remembering my childhood at home I seem to remember different events by the room I was in at the time. So, having reminisced about my first bedroom, I now find myself in the kitchen. This was a place of action where most events happened or were talked about. First let me describe the kitchen; it wasn?t like you know kitchens today with work tops, self-closing cupboard doors and high-level ovens. Our kitchen didn?t have these things or fancy equipment, but it did have a dilapidated pine table, an old black gas cooker that had seen better days, a couple of rickety chairs, a coal fire and a wireless. Yes, you heard me correctly: a wireless. Let me try to explain what I mean by ?wireless?. Wireless in today?s terms means communicating without wires, the creation of words and pictures which can be sent to anyone, anywhere in the world in seconds. The wireless I refer to was a large polished wooden cabinet full of valves and lights, knobs on the front and an electric cable running to a fifteen-amp socket. It was one of the first types of mass-produced radios ordinary people had in their homes. These were installed by a company, I think they were called Radio Rentals, who would come to where you lived, fit the wireless, normally on top of a cupboard, and fit the control box, which was separate to the wireless, to the wall. The control box had three settings. Each setting was a radio station, yes, just three radio stations. Each month a representative from Radio Rentals would call at the house and collect the rental money. If you didn?t have the money the wireless was taken away. In the early fifties we didn?t have a TV. Not many people did, we just had the wireless. To me it was like the internet is to today. I would sit on the cold kitchen floor, there weren?t enough seats for everyone, and listen to the wireless hour after hour: Mrs Dale?s Diary, the Archers and endless songs such as ?There was an old women who swallowed a fly? I can remember the words to this day. But the wireless wasn?t always the best entertainment in the kitchen. The kitchen was the most used and most important room in the house. It was here that we ate, talked, cooked, argued and ironed our clothes, and what a performance ironing was. When I was very young, like many, we weren?t wealthy enough to have an electric iron. Instead, we had an iron that was heated up by placing it on the coal fire, or one of the rings of the gas cooker. The shape and the look of these irons were very much like irons today, except they had no electric cable or plug. When you wanted to iron some clothing, you simply put the iron face-down on the fire or gas ring to heat it up. Whilst waiting for this to happen you laid a towel or blanket on the table, yes, you guessed it; we didn?t have an ironing board. When the iron was hot you picked it up and started to iron in the usual way. However, the big difference was, when the iron got cold, which didn?t take too long, you had to put it back on the fire and wait for it to get hot all over again. This was done time after time until all the ironing was complete. A clear memory involving ironing in the kitchen was one Sunday morning when mum was ironing a shirt for dad to wear to the pub. It was traditional in those days for most working-class men to go for a pint on a Sunday morning, while the ?little woman? I say that with tongue in cheek, cooked the Sunday roast. On this particular day she finished his shirt and placed it on the back of a chair ready for him to put on. Dad came into the kitchen wearing his smart trousers and highly polished shoes, picked up his shirt and noticed a crease in the collar. All hell let loose; dad shouted at mum in a raging temper, and then ripped the shirt to pieces. I remember this so well probably because it was my first experience of violence in the house, but it wasn?t going to be my last. The only heat in the house was a coal fire in the kitchen. It was by the fire that we got warm before going to bed, dried our wet clothes, and warmed our bums when coming in from the cold, but most importantly it was the fire that toasted our bread before dad bought the toaster. My dad wasn?t by any means the perfect father or husband; he went to work, but made sure he had the lion?s share of his wage. Part of his share was spent on going dog racing at Catford Stadium, ?The dogs? as it was known, nearly every Thursday night and the procedure would always be the same. Dad would return home from work on the Thursday evening, send me or Fred up to the shop on the corner of Rodwell and Cyrena Road, it was run by Hilda and Dolly Wheeler; there weren?t any supermarkets, just corner shops in those days. Our task would be to purchase a Seven O?clock razor blade, just one blade, not a packet, you didn?t buy packets of anything in those days, and a single sachet of Vosene shampoo; I don?t suppose you can buy sachets today. The razor blade would last dad all week. The shampoo was used first by dad; he would have about half on the Thursday night before going out, then my mum followed by my sister Margaret, then Fred, and finally me, usually on the Sunday night. I suppose my share of the shampoo was about 1%, which I?d top up with cold tap water. Anyway, the point being, this was dad?s dog night; on this night he shaved, shampooed and put on his best suit, and went to the dogs ready to have that big win. Unfortunately the big win never came about, but there were little wins and sometimes we all shared in those. One Thursday night, probably about 11pm, I was sitting listening to the wireless with my mum, Fred and Margaret. Suddenly the front door opened abruptly with a loud crash. We all looked up knowing it was dad back from the dogs, and drunk. We were right, but on this occasion it was different, dad had had a win and we were about to share in the proceeds of that win. Dad stumbled down the passageway to the kitchen, almost falling through the door. In his hand he was clutching a large box. He put the box on the table, sat on a chair and gave one of his unmistakable smiles while lighting up a Woodbine, that?s a brand of cigarette. Someone said- ?What?s in the box, Dad?? ?It?s a bread toaster.?He replied Well, you had never seen such excited faces. We had never seen a toaster before. We had heard of people who had toasters and we had seen them in posh shops, but to have one in our house in those days was like winning the lottery today, okay, probably not quite like winning the lottery, but close. Dad, who at this moment was our hero, pulled a ten-shilling note from his pocket, that?s about fifty pence and was commonly called ?ten-bob?, and told Fred to run up to the corner shop and get a couple of loaves of bread and some butter. If you think twenty-four-hour shopping at Tesco is a modern phenomenon, think again, we had twenty-four-hour shopping decades ago. When closed we just knocked on the side door of the corner shop at any time of the night seven days a week. Fred ran off and returned with a couple of loaves and a slab of butter. The box was opened and the toaster revealed. I can remember the gasp from everyone as they laid sight on this magnificent piece of machinery for the very first time. A bloody toaster, how pathetic this must sound, but that?s the way it was. Anyway, the instructions were read aloud by mum, the toaster plugged into the only fifteen-amp socket in the house, which meant the wireless was turned off, the bread placed in the toaster, the handle pushed down, and two minutes later, bingo! - Up jumped two slices of toast. What a bloody miracle! I had never heard such a sound of laughter and cheers. It?s probably hard for you to imagine how two pieces of ###### toast could bring such joy and excitement into a family, but it did and no gadgets since has given me such feeling of joy. We sat up until the early hours, toasting bread, laughing and just having fun with that toaster. It was a great night and one I will never ever forget. Not long after the arrival of the toaster we had another exciting event: mum and dad bought a coal-effect three-bar electric fire. I don?t know why they bought it; I would imagine they were probably going through a gadget phase, rather like we do today with mobile phones, iPods and computer games. The only difference being, their gadgets were needs rather than wants and contributed to a better lifestyle for all the family rather than an individual. I was always fascinated by the glow of the electric fire and even more fascinated when dad lit his cigarette by placing it on the glowing electric bar. One day, when no one was in the kitchen, I decided to investigate the electric fire and its mechanics. I obviously didn?t have any knowledge of electricity, but I could understand how it travelled down a cable to a switch and then on to the electric bar. Using this remarkable knowledge, I decided it would be safe to touch the bars when the switch was off. I knelt down beside the fire and squeezed my finger through the safety guard, slowly edging my fingers towards the bars. On touching the bars I immediately discovered that my well-thought-out theory of electricity was completely wrong. I was catapulted across the room by the force of the electric current passing through my body, a bit like a human cannonball. Needless to say, I never told this story to my mum or dad, and you are probably the first to know. Bath time was always on a Sunday evening. We had one bath every week; the rest of the week we washed in the scullery sink, the scullery was next to the kitchen. Our bath, unlike modern baths today, was kept in the garden suspended on a brick wall by a six-inch nail. The bath was made of galvanised tin and was about five feet long. The bath was brought into the kitchen and placed in front of the fire. Following this, numerous pots were filled with water and placed on the gas-cooker rings to boil. The boiling water was then poured into the bath followed by cold water until the temperature and depth were just right. You can probably understand now why people didn?t bath as much then as they do today. The whole performance was exhausting, but things didn?t stop there. Once you had your bath you were then in the situation of having a five-foot bathtub full of water in the middle of your kitchen. Remember, this was a portable bath so there was no waste plug. The only way of emptying the bath was to sweat your balls off pulling this dead weight across the kitchen to the back door. You then had to lift one end and tip the bath up so that the water emptied out of the back door, leaving the back garden flooded with two inches of soapy water. The whole process was a bloody nightmare and completely #### up any enjoyment of having a relaxing bath in front of the fire. Another great entertainment that took place in the kitchen was the game of darts. Like many kitchens in those days there was a built-in cupboard, known as a larder. The larder had a door; it was on the back of this door that we hung our dart board. You don?t have to use your imagination very much at this point to visualise the scene. Here we have a room, probably no more than 16 meters square, being used for cooking, ironing, bathing listening to the wireless, keeping warm and dart matches. Yes, the kitchen, without doubt, was the most interesting, most used and most alive room in the whole house. But like most good things there was also a dark side. Saturday afternoons in the kitchen, for me, were full of fear, tears and sometimes terror. Most Saturdays dad would spend the best part of the afternoon in the pub, arriving there at about 12.30pm after finishing work, and returning home at about 3.30pm, usually pissed and usually skint after having a bet on the horses. For many years mum suffered from a very bad hernia. Now I don?t know if it was coincidence, but this hernia flared up every Saturday afternoon. There I would be at home with mum when she would start to feel unwell, go white in the face and eventually lay on the kitchen floor in extreme pain. She would cry, moan and scream out in pain. I witnessed this from the age of about five until she eventually had an operation some years later. Like any child, my mum was my world. To see her lying in pain while my dad sat in the pub was just too much for me to describe. Yes, my memories of Saturday afternoons were of me lying beside my mum on the floor, stroking her head and asking her to get better, whilst at the same time dreading the return of my dad from the pub. When he did return, there would be little sympathy or compassion for mum. Instead he would fall in the chair and start to argue with her lying there. There were times when I hated my dad; I hated him so much I wanted him to be dead. Why couldn?t he be like other dads, come home, take me out, play in the garden, but most of all look after my mum? After the usual Saturday-afternoon argument, dad would go to bed, mum?s pain would eventually go and I would dry my tears. I prayed so many times for them to make up and never argue again. The make-up would always come true eventually, but the never-do-it- again, well - that never came true. It goes without saying, if it wasn?t Christmas, when we used the front room; almost every happening in the house took place in the kitchen, including police investigations. One Saturday afternoon, two police detectives came to our house making enquiries into some vandalism at the golf club in the posh part of Dulwich Village. Apparently, all the windows in the club house had been smashed by vandals using catapults and my brother Fred was in the frame. The police spoke to my mum; Fred was out at the time. She consistently said that her boy wouldn?t do such a thing, that he wasn?t the kind of boy to have a catapult. I listened with great interest, but every time I wanted to say something mum would give me a nudge and say - ?Be quiet, I?m talking.? Like all kids, when mum said ?be quiet? it made me more determined to have my say. I left the kitchen and went upstairs. Being too young to understand the seriousness of the situation, I didn?t realise that there was no way my mum was going to tell these men that me and my big brother were good catapulters; we had hit every window in that club house, and I was going to prove it. I came back to the kitchen, where mum was still protesting Fred?s innocence. This time I interrupted with vigour and tapped one of the detectives on the arm. Looking up at him I said, ?Mister, I?ve got a catapult and my brother is the best shot in the world.? From my back pocket I produced my pride and joy, a catapult made with my own young hands. I felt so proud that I had proved my mum wrong and proved me and Fred to be the dog?s knackers in catapulting. I don?t remember much after that, I do remember being the biggest shit in the family for a long time. I learnt a lesson from that experience: keep your mouth shut. It?s a lesson I have never forgotten. Before we finally leave the kitchen there is one other thing I can clearly remember. Dad would sit every night in his chair, smoking cigarette after cigarette. An ashtray would be in front of him, which he used for putting out his fag However, he never used the ashtray for ash; this was flicked on the floor. At the end of the evening there would be a pile of ash almost up to his ankles. I remember mum having a go at him, time after time for not using the ashtray. His reply - ?It?s good for the carpet, it helps hold the threads together.? Now that may be true, I don?t know, but the thing was, we didn?t have a ###### carpet in the kitchen, just lino. I once asked him if what he said was true. ?Yes,? he replied, ?my Mum always flicked her ash on the carpet and that?s what she told me, so it must be true.? I do know something of his childhood and I would be surprised if his mum had a carpet; in fact, I know they didn?t. Strange when you think about it, two generations, not having carpets, flicking cigarette ash on the floor to help hold the carpet threads together, incredible. In the 1950s all houses had a lounge, known as the front room, and my house was no exception. The front room was always kept clean, decorated, smelling of polish and full of ornaments and pictures, mostly of relatives long since dead. The front room was used at Christmas, special occasions, such as weddings, and when special relatives paid a visit, which was not very often in our house. Once a visitor entered the front room they were rarely allowed to venture into any other room; the idea being to make them believe that all the other rooms in the house were like the front room, immaculately kept, carpeted and full of precious ornaments. The thing was, everyone lived in similar conditions, we all knew, regardless of whose front room we sat in, that the rest of the house would be a shit hole. If I think about it seriously, the front room brings memories of joy mixed with a little sadness, joy, because it was here that Christmas was celebrated, parties were given and friends would visit and when leaving, usually, reached into their pocket to give mea couple of bob. ?Bob? being the name for a shilling. And sadness, you see, this was also the room we would return to after attending a funeral of a friend or neighbour. There?s not a lot more to say about the front room. After all, I was only allowed in there once or twice a year. Having said that, there is one incident that comes to mind that maybe I should tell you about. I had sneaked into the front room to have a poke around to see what I could find. I remember opening the sideboard draw and discovering a small dark brown bottle. Being curious, I unscrewed the top, lent forward and smelt the contents. I have never had such a nasal shock in all my life. The smell was so strong it made me fall to the floor with a bang. This was heard by my mum who was in the kitchen at the time. She came rushing in to the front room to find me lying on the floor semi-conscious, clutching the brown bottle - What have you done?? she cried ?I only smelt this, Mum,? I mumbled ?Serve you right for coming in this room without asking me first.? ?That?s a bottle is smelling salts, they are meant to give you a shock.? I have never understood why we had smelling salts in a draw in a room that was never used. I think they were probably there in case someone visiting the posh front room managed to find their way into another room, and fainted with shock at seeing the state of the ####ing place. I don?t suppose I will ever know the truth. Like most houses, our house had a hallway or ?passage? as we called it, leading from the front door, with doors going off into the various rooms and a staircase leading to the first floor. It?s strange, but I can remember this passage vividly. It was here that I kept my bike up against the wall. I can still remember all the marks and chips along that wall where bikes had stood for years and years, the old greasy appearance of the wallpaper that looked like it had been on those walls since time began, the fancy decorated coving around the edges of the ceiling and the Victorian plaster cast around the ceiling light. Those casts would cost a fortune today. Probably my best memory of the passage was when my dad decided to have an electric socket put by the front door. I don?t know why he had a socket put there: maybe it was his way of modernising the place. However, the decision was made and he made arrangements for a mate from the pub to come to our house on a Saturday morning to fit the new socket. Now, the electric supply from the fuse box was at the far end of the passage, next to the kitchen, and the point was needed by the front door, which was at the other end. Consequently an electric cable needed to be run under the floor boards for the full length of the passage. Well, I don?t know who had the bright idea on how to do this, but someone suggested that dad took up a single floorboard from either end of the passage, tie one end of the electric cable around Charlie the family cat, place the cat through the opening in the floor at one end of the passage and place a plate of cat meat in the opening of the floor at the other end. The plan was for Charlie to walk the full length of the passage under the floor taking the cable with him as he went towards the plate of meat. Unfortunately, no one told Charlie the plan, which was a big mistake. Instead of going straight, Charlie decided to go right and then left and then right again and carried on like this until, eventually, he, and a fifty yard reel of cable had disappeared completely and Charlie was nowhere to be seen. I still have a vivid picture in my mind to this day. Dad was lying on the floor with his head down the hole crying - ?Here Charlie, Charlie, Charlie.? At the same time, his pub mate was at the other end of the passage; he had his head down the hole, whilst tapping the plate of cat meat with a screwdriver and calling - ?Here puss, puss, puss - Here puss, puss, puss.? It took them hours to get Charlie out from under those floorboards, but thanks to him, it was one of the few Saturdays that dad didn?t get pissed. The room I hated the most was my mum and dad?s bedroom. I can see and smell this room to this very day. It was the downstairs back room, in-between the kitchen and the front room, the room where I was born. It was always semi-dark and had a lingering smell of pee. I mentioned before that the toilet was outside in the yard; there was no way that dad would venture out there when he was in bed. Instead, he had a bucket under the bed, a ?piss pot? as it was known. This bucket would not only contain the contents of his bladder, but also the odd fag end and matchstick from where he smoked in bed. It?s probably easy to think of this kind of behaviour as being disgusting and unacceptable, and this would be the case today. However, you need to remember that my dad was born in 1910 into a large family; he had gone through two world wars, fought in one, been through the great depression and spent most of his life fighting for survival. The rights and wrongs of pissing in a bucket would have never entered his head. While I?m talking about disgusting things, I would like to return to the kitchen for a moment. Somewhere in the mid 1950?s mum and dad rented their first television. It was a huge TV with a miniature screen and, of course, it was a black-and white picture, with just one channel, BBC. We were one of only a few, if not the first, families in our street to have a TV. In those days you always watched the picture with the room lights turned off, mainly because the picture was so bad it was hard to see it with the light on. On many occasions, neighbours would come into our house just to watch TV; some nights there would be standing-room only. Dad would sit in an old worn-out armchair right in front of the TV, mum would be beside him in a similar chair, I would sit on the floor between mum and dad and the neighbours would stand or sit behind us. We watched all manner of crap; endless football results on a Saturday, piano players, boring people talking about things we didn?t understand and live shows where the scenery would be made of cardboard and very often fell over, all in black and white. I?m rambling on now like an old person; I need to get back to my original dialogue about disgusting things. Sometimes on a week night dad would send me to the corner shop to get a bottle of R. Whites lemonade. After giving me a very small glass he would sit in front of the TV, with the lights off and the bottle of lemonade beside him, occasionally reaching down and replenishing his glass. One night I ran to the corner shop to get dad?s lemonade. I was given my usual small glass and then I went to my bedroom to play. I returned an hour later to the kitchen where dad was still sitting in the dark watching TV with mum. I went to the back of dad?s chair and sat on the floor to watch with them. After a while I started to fancy another glass of lemonade but, knew dad would only say no. In the darkened room I could see the reflection of the lemonade bottle beside his chair; the temptation was too great. I slowly edged my way closer to the bottle until I was within reaching distance. Making sure dad was looking at the TV; I cautiously picked up the bottle, unscrewed the top and had a huge swig. It was ####ing horrible; it was bitter and sweet at the same time and left a dry taste in my mouth. I couldn?t understand why it didn?t taste like the first drop I?d had earlier, I felt sick. I screwed the top back on and put the bottle back beside the chair. After a couple of minutes dad called to me - ?Nip up the shop and get me another bottle of lemonade, Son.??You?ve already got some Dad.? ?No, I finished that,? he replied, ?I used the empty bottle to piss in; it?s too cold to go outside.? There?s must be a lesson to be learnt there somewhere. Last but not least I mustn?t forget the back garden or yard. It?s hard to remember just how big the yard was, but it was small, very small, like most city gardens. It was probably about 20 feet long with neighbouring gardens to all three sides. I loved my garden; here I could do anything and be anyone. On one particular occasion I was a pirate; I put a plank of wood on the ground, tied a knife to a broom stick and made out I was sailing across the sea. I was in my dream world, when my brother Fred came out of the kitchen door and started to take the piss. Well, there?s one thing you don?t do to a pirate, take the piss. I drew back my make-believe sword, the knife on a broom sticks, and plunged it forward, like a spear, aiming at Fred. Fortunately for him he managed to get out of the way. Unfortunately for me the spear carried on travelling and went straight through the kitchen window. Mum came running out of the kitchen door into the garden. She was ready to kill me. There was only one thing for me to do in these situations, run. At the back of the house there was a drainpipe which went straight up to the roof. This drainpipe saved my bacon on many occasions and this day was no exception. Seeing mum?s face, I ran towards the drainpipe and clambered to the top. Once there I pulled myself onto the roof and climbed the slates right up to the ridge. I was safe; she couldn?t get me up here. Mum looked up at me sitting on the roof and shouted all the usual obscenities - ?Get down here you little bath-bun,? ?Get down here you little cow-son,? And her favourite ?I?ll put my toe up your arse when I get hold of you.? And so the shouting continued. I never questioned mum?s words, but I did often wonder what they meant. What was a ?bath-bun? or a ?cow-son?? How could you get a toe up someone?s arse? Swearing was common in my house and I wasn?t afraid to shout obscenities back - ?#### off you silly old cow,? and, ?B######s!? In fact, the fouler the language I used the more mum got angry and the more fun I had. I suppose you could say that swearing in this way, mother to child, child to mother, was like an early form of child therapy, minus the psychologists and social workers. These events always ended up with mum saying the same old thing - ?You wait until your father gets home? Dad always got home eventually, but good old mum never told him what I had been up to. I don?t know how she explained the broken window without dropping me in the shit, but she did and that broken window stayed broken for many years. Next chapters Wednesday at 3pm

Sorry about this but its refusing to accept my post, I think because there is some colorful language. I will remove and post the whole chapter, hopefully, at 4pm. Regards Wardy. Up-Date Managed to do it Enjoy

See Below

See Below

Trying to post the next chapter but having problems

Thanks everyone for the lovely comments. Look forward to tomorrow at 3pm

MrsR Thank you for reading it. You will find it gets funny in places and a bit sad but, its all true as far as I can remember. Enjoy - Wardy

Wardy The Kid From The Rough End Of The Street CHAPTER 1 Mum and Dad Before I start to write about my life, I think it?s important to give you some background into my mum and dad?s life. Over the years we will take on some of our parents? values and ways, we may try to discard them, dislike them or even love them, but subconsciously we learn from them. This learning might be for our good or to our detriment; it depends on the characteristics of our parents and the natural characteristics within us. Some of us may grow up admiring our parents, and others hating them, but like it or not they are probably the biggest contributors to what we are and to what we become. Whether they be dead or alive they will always be there; you can?t escape them. Believe me when I tell you that one day, probably when your parents are long gone, you will look into the mirror and see your parents looking back. You will see some part of your features turning into your parents? features. You will sit somewhere and make a remark, probably quite an innocent remark, but you will know it is one of your parents speaking. You will make a move or place you hand in a certain position and you will know that you have momentarily taken on the position or move of one of your parents. I first experienced my parents? momentary possession of my body following a bath. I had my foot placed on a bath stool, drying my feet with a towel. As I dried my feet a sudden shock came over me, I was drying my dad?s feet. Yes, my toes had turned into my dad?s toes. For some unknown reason I could remember what my dad?s toes looked like and those toes where now my toes. Over the years slowly but surely parts of my body, movement, speech and mind have become what were my dad?s. So let?s start with him. My dad was born in London in 1910; he was christened Cecil Fredrick Lees Ward. In his family there were his dad, his mum, three brothers and a sister. Dad was the middle child. Both my dad?s parents were said to be decedents of Irish gypsies, the Wards on his father?s side and the Lees on his mother?s side. Now the story is, these two gypsy families were not good friends and for them to marry into each other?s family was a terrible thing to do. My great grandfather Lees, my grandmother?s father, was a very wealthy man and proud of his background. He owned numerous houses and business premises in Brixton, London; he was the owner of several trotting horses, trustee of the then large company ?Mac Fisheries? and, together with the famous ?Tubby Isaac?, the first man to bring prawns into this country and onto the dinner table. He was also a very influential member of the Masonic Lodge. He married three times. His first two wives committed suicide and the third, very much his junior, outlived him and eventually attended my grandmother?s, her stepdaughter?s, funeral. When he found out that my grandmother was to marry a Ward he disowned her completely. The Wards on the other hand, although not wealthy, were respectable and proud; that?s about all I know of them. The wedding took place and my grandparents settled down to a moderate lifestyle. I say moderate; they didn?t have money, my great grandfather saw to that, but they did have pride and they knew how to act like middle-class people. Life must have been pretty tough for my grandmother. She was the daughter of a wealthy man and prior to her marriage had all that comes with wealth: a big house, nice clothes and money in her pocket. Because of love, she married a poor man and because of her father?s rejection she now had all that came with poverty, a couple of rooms, no money and few clothes. My grandparents brought their children up to have respect and were conscious that education was important if their children were to climb out of the pit of hopelessness and back to the level where, they thought, they rightly belonged. On leaving school the first of the children went to good firms, training in professions. Whilst training the pay was very poor; the benefits hopefully coming in later years. My dad?s eldest brother found a place with a national newspaper and went on to become a very senior person in the printing industry. His eldest sister found a place with a London City firm and finished up as the personal assistant to the chairman of the board; this was in a time when very few women, if any, had senior positions in business. She never married. When it came to dad?s turn to leave school, his parents were in a predicament. They had two children at work, training in their chosen professions, neither bringing home a wage, two more attending school and with dad about to leave school. Being in this somewhat difficult financial dilemma, dad?s parents decided they couldn?t afford for him to go into a profession; instead, he was to find a manual job. He would have been about thirteen years old at the time. By doing this he could earn decent money for the family pot and help support his brothers and sisters. It?s difficult to imagine how dad must have been feeling at this time, I?m sure if it was me I would have been pretty pissed off with the situation. But in those days you didn?t argue with your parents; you just put up with it and knuckled down. I think the decision by his parents to send him out to work probably shaped his life for evermore and in a peculiar way shaped mine to. Dad got a job labouring on a building site and the money came home. The proceeding years saw his brothers and sisters, older and younger; get their education and their first steps onto the professional ladder. During this period dad become a hardened manual worker, labouring for bricklayers, carrying a laden brick hod up and down ladders all day long. If you don?t know, a brick hod is a three-sided box for carrying bricks. It has a long handle and is carried over the shoulder. I was told that one particular year, dad won the South London championship for carrying the heaviest hod up a ladder; you needed to be bloody strong to do that. It wasn?t until my dad was very old that I met one of his brothers, Albert, for the first time. He told me, that when dad was a teenager, and without his parent?s knowledge, dad would enter bare-knuckle fights to earn extra money. Apparently, he would wait outside a factory, any factory, on a pay day; people got paid weekly in cash in those days, and as the workers came out from the factory at finish time, he would challenge any man to a bare knuckle fight. All the workers from the factory would put a penny into a hat and the winner took the proceeds. I can?t imagine what guts it must have taken to stand in the street and challenge anyone to a fight. There must have been times when he was beaten to a pulp, lost the fight and got #### all for his efforts. What a hard way to make extra money. However, it was honest money, he didn?t pick on just anyone; all of his fights were with volunteers and the crowd loved it. Hats off to my old dad! I don?t condone what he did, but he must have had some bollocks to do it. Dad sort of drifted from job to job and spent a lot of his time in the pub and betting on horses and dogs. I don?t know exactly when, but at about the age of twenty he met my mum. They married in about 1931 and lived in Peckham, London. They moved several times over the years but eventually settled down at 25 Rodwell Road East Dulwich, London SE22. I can remember my mum telling me a couple of strange things. Before she married, my grandfather Lees, the man who cut off my grandmother, summoned my mum to his house. Now if that was today and someone summoned me, regardless of their wealth; I would tell them where to go, but not my mum, not in those days. She arrived at my grandfather?s large house, somewhere in the city of London, and knocked on the door. The door was opened by a servant who told her to wait on the doorstep. Shortly after, my great grandfather Lees came to the door. He looked mum up and down and told her he had heard she was going to marry his grandson. Remember this was a grandson he had never seen. He said he wanted to see what she looked like. He wished her well, shut the door and left her standing there. My old mum had got up that morning, washed, put on her best dress and coat, travelled across London on numerous buses, or trams as they probably were in those days, just to have some old fart look her up and down and wish her well. She wasn?t asked into the house or even offered a cup of tea after her long journey. Now I know he disapproved of his daughter?s marriage to a Ward, I know he was a wealthy and an important man, but in my mind he was a complete prick. No money in the world gives someone the right to treat another person like shit, particularly a young girl on the eve of her wedding. The other strange thing my mum told me was that just before she and dad got married my dad?s mum told her to walk away. She said that my dad wouldn?t be good for her and she would never have anything. Now she probably thought that she was doing the right thing, but, if you look at it from my mum?s point of view, she must have been devastated. She travels across London just to be looked up and down by some old bloke with money living in a big house and now her future mother-in-law was basically telling her to ?#### off.? What a wonderful start to a marriage that must have been! After their marriage, dad?s family, his brothers and sisters, bought him a market vegetable stall in Peckham, London. I suppose it was their way of Saying - ?Thank you for leaving school at thirteen years old and helping us to get educated and into well-paid professions.? From my dad?s point of view he may have thought it was their way of saying - ?There you go, there?s a little market stall,now #### off, leave us well alone and let us be successful and make some real money.? I say this because in all my childhood I can?t remember more than two occasions when I saw a member of his family or knew of my dad being in their company. As for my grandmother, I only saw her on one occasion, when she was ill. I was allowed to wave to her through the hospital window a couple of days before she died, in about 1957. Dad didn?t make any effort to make a success of the stall. He employed a young lad to run it for him while he spent most of his time and profits in the pub. Needless to say he went broke and was back to square one, potless. I will say one thing about dad: despite all of his faults, he had charm, charisma, was always smart and tidy, when not at work, and no one could help but like him, particularly if he had a pint in his hand. My mum on the other hand was a completely different kettle of fish. My mum was born Mabel Florence Quaife in Peckham, London in 1911. She was born into a very poor family all living in a single room. My mum?s mum, my grandmother, had been married before and had two children by this marriage, both boys. Her married name then was Conlon, her maiden name was Benstead. Her first husband was killed in a mining accident, I believe somewhere in Kent. Apparently, the lift shaft, bringing him up from a mine, broke and he fell to his death. She married my grandfather some time afterwards, taking on the name of Quaife. She had two further children in this second marriage, my mum and mums younger sister Nell. Compared to today?s world, life as a child must have been pretty dismal for mum. Her dad was a labourer and her mum a cleaner, little money coming in. Materialistic things consisted of a bed to sleep in and a chair to sit on, no more, but probably very often a lot less. To add insult to injury life dealt another blow to my old mum when her dad was killed on 21st June 1916 fighting in the First World War; mum was just five years old at the time and life was already dealing her some pretty shitty cards. As a token of their gratitude for what her dad had done, the British Government gave my grandmother three medals and a large round bronze coin on which was inscribed- ?He died for freedom and honour? Seven months, after his death, in January 1917, she was awarded a weekly pension of twenty-two shillings and sixpence, just over a pound. Crazy isn?t it? Three medals a coin and a ####ing pittance of a pension for being blown to pieces. Saying that, I have treasured those medals all of my life. How my grandmother survived with four young children and managed to bring them up with very little financial help I will never know; she must have had the strength of a lion and the determination of, I don?t know what, but she done it, and to me, although I never knew her, she was a bloody hero. As far as I know my mum didn?t have a particularly interesting upbringing, no rich relatives, no dad and no fine clothes. She left school at thirteen years old and went to work in a factory ?Can you imagine that?? Going out to work in a factory for 10 hours a day at just 13years old. Eventually she met my dad and they married. I will say one thing about my mum: unlike my dad, she had no friends to speak of. She was always somewhat cold towards strangers and she rarely let anyone into her heart or mind; but when she did you found a loving, kind person, full of humour, a person who would never let you down and who would give you her last penny. I know ? she let me in. Well that?s the background of my mum and dad?s humble beginnings. Now, sit back and let me take you into my childhood world, the world of the 1950s in Dulwich. Next chapter - Chapter 2 Tomorrow (Monday 01/02/21) at 3pm

If anyone is interested, from 3pm today and thereafter every Monday, Wednesday, Friday and Sunday, I will be telling my story of growing up In Rodwell Road East Dulwich in the 1950. "Wardy The Kid From The Rough End Of The Street" Is a book I published last year. If like me you are tired of this lockdown and are looking for something to do, then this may interest you and brighten up your day a little. So, at 3pm sit down with a nice cup of tea/coffee and enjoy the journey. Stay safe Wardy

ianr, I have sent admin a email with my request. Thank you

I think when it comes to language you will guess the real word. BTW Does anyone know if there is a maximum word count on here, if there is I will need to do each chapter in several boxes, if that makes sense.

Thanks for the response so far. You will find the stories funny as well as sad, it does contain some language but I thing those words will be blocked out. Its truthful and gives you a good idea how things were compared with today. Please keep the response coming in and if you know anyone who may be interested, particularly those who may be at home alone, let them know. Thanks

Hi, I said some time ago, my dad had written a book called "Wardy The Kid From the Rough End Of The Street" Tells of him growing up in the 50's and many of the people who lived in Rodwell Road and East Dulwich during that time. The book has sold well in the UK and for some reason America also. However, dad believes their are many who would like to read it but haven't had the opportunity for what ever reason. With these dark days of "Lockdown" he would like to, chapter by chapter, post the book on this thread for everyone to read and enjoy. The idea to post 1 chapter each Sunday, Monday Wednesday and Friday at 3pm. This way those who wish to, could sit back with a nice cup of tea and enjoy the read while others who may be struggling with the lockdown would have something to look forward to. The start date for this would be Sunday 31st January, about a weeks time. If you think this is a good idea please let me know, seemingly, if you feel there are some restrictions please let me know. Thanks

Hi, my dad is Eric Ward (Wardy) he was born in Rodwell Road in 1950. He has written a book about growing up in Rodwell Road in the 1950's. Very interesting and funny book telling of all the character's in the street like Charlie and Sis and the muffing man. Its called "Wardy The Kid From The Rough End Of The Street" Its on amazon :-)

Hi, my dad is Wardy he was born in Rodwell Road. He has just wrote a book called "Wardy The Kid From the Rough End Of The Street" Tells of many people who lived in Rodwell Road and East Dulwich, well worth a read, on Amazon. :-)