XVII. Vale Avenue

'HORWICH VALE'

When I saw the old map Mr. Saxelby
showed us, it gave me such a funny feeling.
He explained all the strange cartography,
'hachures' for slopes and the like, but what got me
was that all the new houses were concealing
such a fine landscape. 'Vale' Avenue, you see,
wasn't some councilman's feeble suggestion,
but there was 'Horwich Vale' there before, a wide-
spreading valley with fields and trees. Expansion
after the Loco Works came could only hide
that fine stream in a cobbled channel, and jail
all the open expanses of Horwich Vale.

THE DARKNESS BEFORE A STORM

It got really exciting when the clouds grew
so dark before a storm. There'd be no rain yet,
but the dryness seemed strange, and the wind blew
creepily, knowing how strong it would be soon
with the raindrops as whips, and how it would
get darker and darker, till, although it was noon,
Mammy switched all the lights on. I'd look up to
watch how the clouds bulged like kidneys
or that haemetite ore, their colours bruise-blue,
mousy, and pewter, hiding the storm's frenzies
up above in their secret interior.
Made all Lancashire dark as a cinema.

THE VALE AVENUE ELMS IN A GALE

In a gale down Vale Avenue the elms fought
hard with the wind. They were so high, like a tall
black cathedral, but seen through waves, sometimes taut,
bending together, shrishing their last-held leaves,
sometimes straining back loose, a gap in the squall,
snapping their whips, with the boughs making great heaves
to keep heads up aloft. The rooks were leaves too,
black ones that kept struggling back through the real
ones that flew helter-skelter off for Bob's Brew,
joining their mates. Knew that those elms wouldn't keel
over now, having lasted a hundred years.
I was safe standing there. No point having fears.

THE GAS-LAMPS IN A GALE

When you struggled down Mason Street in a gale,
fighting the wind which was pushing you sideways,
all the gas-lamps did something strange. They would fail
almost to nothing when a gust came shoving,
and the mantle would fade to red — in your gaze
spotted around with livid green prints jumping
about, images left by its glare — a dim
red like the end of a cigar, so the light
of the lamp on the ground, a disc, shrunk its rim
inwards, as if it hid from the wind in fright,
and the darkness rushed in just at the exact
moment, stumbling and struggling, you were attacked.

RAIN

It was raining so often you got to like
puddles with opening circles, the dim light,
leaning grey clouds that hurried over the Pike,
trees throwing spray, gurgling gutters with criss-cross
ripples staying in one place, and at night
seeing the big lamp, which a fierce gale would toss
side to side like a loose drooping daffodil,
flashing the chains of the rain into stillness.
And the smell of the earth and the plants to fill
all your breath and your life. This ceaseless
washing, cleaning and drenching made vale and brew,
field and street, unlike anywhere else I knew.

ON RAINY DAYS

It was fun on a rainy day. The window
sill was a thin sort of table. You could rest
your arms, sit on the bed pushed back, and you'd know
nothing could get at you. All those cold raindrops,
as they flew at the glass, failed in the contest;
all went down weeping. You'd hear their wasted plops
and their gurgles that you stayed cosy inside.
There with a lovely book or your painting set
you were warm and were safe. You could watch the wide
world all a-blowing and struggling, all the fret
of the grass and the trees. Man is so clever
with his walls and his roofs. We're safe forever.

VALE AVENUE IN SHOWERY WEATHER

What I liked when the weather was showery
was when some big Prussian-blue clouds darkened all
of the sky but a low evening sun, very
bright, shone its beams horizontally, lighting
up the houses and trees. It would so enthral
me, I would gaze at the amber and gilding
of the great elms, Vale Avenue's houses turned
palaces, chimneys, pinnacles of sharp gold,
and their smoke writing Arabic script that burned
bright on the blue that was almost black, and scrolled
some enchanted spell over Earth's lowly form,
making heaven below the hell of the storm.

REFLECTIONS IN THE PUDDLES

If you walked down Vale Avenue after rain,
you would see puddles scattered about. If you
went right out in the middle, each was a pane,
clearer than glass, through which you could look right down
to another world underneath where the blue
sky was so far below your feet you could drown
in the air falling upwards feet first. Walking
let you see more, the top of their big lamp-post
and the roofs of their houses. I'd be seeing
what was the hard road all ragged like a ghost
and so thin it might go crack. Down from a shelf
I would peer, and I'd see, looking up, myself.

THE FLOOD

After cloudbursts the corner of Mason Street
where it became Vale Avenue was flooded.
A triangular pond, too deep for your feet,
covered the pavement and road. The water
couldn't get to the stream, and was all muddied,
lapping about in the gardens, the smaller
flowers all drowned like seaweed. My boat would sail
over the road where it liked, leaving lovely
V-shaped waves where on dry days was only Vale
Avenue's grey tarmac. Mammy was fussy
if you got your feet sopping wet. "Can't blame kids,"
Daddy said, "when they never clean out the grids."

THE CALM

Was so calm on one Sunday morning. The trees
stood as they wished to — that was their proper shape!
They were not pushed about by the slightest breeze.
Even the grass, every blade was exactly
where its growth had been taking it. No escape,
not for a leaf, not a spider's web, twangy
on the twigs, that could shiver at all. The flies,
butterflies, birds — they all seemed to be quiet
too. The smoke from the chimney, you saw it rise
straight as a pillar without any effort.
Only people were moving about at will.
Was as if we ought not to, but stay quite still.

FOG

All the fogs were a mustardy colour. They
hugged you so close, wouldn't let you see, except
for a round little room that went on your way,
stopped when you stopped, ran when you ran. Was almost
as if it was the one taking you. It kept
bringing you things, hiding them away, a post
or a hedge or a corner. Shop-windows glowed
fuzzy, all hairy with light, and gas-lamps came
floating, big as balloons. Other people showed
up when they brought their rooms into yours, a game
just like halma, and then you heard each pace
going softer and softer away in space.

A GLAZED FROST

From the eaves there hung glassy carrots, parsnips.
Welded round pipes were crammed chandeliers. Pavements
stove-enamelled to thick gloss hard as warships'
armour. Each privet twig, locked in a crystal
amber, clinked at the touch of the wind. Pendants
strung on a web. The doorstep a pedestal
of gray marble. The puddles taut as jampot
tops with their blanched bubbles sliding underneath,
creaking, cracking. Scatter of old hail, white shot
stuck hard in corners. Each tree-trunk in a sheath
of dark varnish. This clear hard metal would fuse,
turn to flow and to vapour that life could use.

FROST ON THE BEDROOM WINDOW

On the window the frost. It was galvanized
iron like our bucket, in flakes that would flash
as you moved. It was frosted glass! Disguised
what the bright sun was doing to show you all
outside. Light was all shuffled to glint and clash,
sparkle and pin-sharp prickles, a window-wall
made out of water turned crystal. In order to
see you would breathe on one place. A round
soft dark spot became bigger and bigger. You
saw to the world through a porthole where the ground
had been starched and then blanched in the night. With hope
you peered this way and that, like a telescope.

LOOKING BACK ON THE GREAT WINTER

In that spring I would stand in the front garden,
look up around me and see myself walking
quite invisibly right on top of the frozen
snow of the winter, laughing to cross the high hedge
at a stride and skip back again, go stalking
up to the front door, see my foot at the edge
of the glass. Was a ghost now, gone who knows where.
Then I would think, I have gone on walking right
from that time up to this, a long thoroughfare,
sometimes on bicycle, sometimes, when it's night,
in my bed like a boat, with dawn as coast.
But the day it will come when now is a ghost.

DAWN IN VALE AVENUE

Being up before dawn you heard a cock
crow. Was the first of us living things saying
we were there, sort of knew that any old clock
couldn't keep up with the time. All was drenched still
with the dew. Was not one of us out playing.
Cool, and so quiet, except for the thrush shrill
on the aerial, one dog far away that
answered another much further. Wanted to
tiptoe, whisper, say nothing, and take your hat
off like in church. Everything was waiting. You
didn't want to begin. Before Genesis,
before paradise, God making a promise.

SUNSETS

Was when Daddy came home after matinées,
sometimes he'd call us all outside. 'The sunset!'
he'd say. There 'cross the sky to the west a blaze:
bright-glowing golds, yellows, pinks, vermilions
painted pictures of parapet, minaret,
terraces spread over oceans and gardens
and impossible plains, headlands and islands
reaching to heavenly distances. The sky
was reflected in Daddy's eyes, tinily,
twice, and he looked through them. I would wonder why
it was wonderful. Made for us, a huge screen,
miles across, but we made what was to be seen.

THE HEDGES

Down Vale Avenue all of us had hedges,
all the same privet, but everybody cut
them a different way. Some let the edges
stick out, all round and bulgy, tickling your hand
as you passed. With their shears some would make it jut
up and down jerky like on a castle, and
had a gateway of leaves. I could zoom my plane
over the waves of another, then right down
to the ground for a mingy one, up again
where Mr. Greenhalgh hadn't cut his, all brown
and all straggly, then through ours, just like a wall,
for our privet was private, cosy and tall.

THE GRASSES

All the grasses in the field behind the houses
opposite grew up to my waist in summer.
Lying down you'd look up to see the flounces
seed-laden heads made in the breeze. The cocksfoot
like a fleur-de-lis; to your finger coarser
than a moustache; it shook its head. Couch grass put
tracks of little green footprints over the blue
sky. Purple meadow-grass, its seeds on springy,
wriggly wires, softly tickled your face. Bamboo-
stiff, the long timothy-grass flexed its whippy
stalks, each topped with a grey-green sparkler. Was nice
as you watched them all waving. Like paradise.

THE BIG LAMP DOWN VALE AVENUE

Was a very big lamp down Vale Avenue,
right in the middle of the shrub plantation,
where the notices said it was up to you
there 'to protect your own property'. The light
in a gale would go swinging in rotation,
all of the shadows moving at midnight
hands of maniac clocks all over the ground
where in the day we played hide-and-seek. One day
there was something went wrong: when we passed we found
that the big light was still shining. Think — to pay
when the sun was about: Hadn't they checked it?
None of us could climb up there to 'protect' it.

MOONLIGHT

In the moonlight the railway sheds were an ice
palace of dim silver, a near-horizon
of still silence and steel that stretched its precise
crest right across my view from the back window.
In the foreground all flowers in our garden
zinc, aluminium, chrome — petals as echo
of the cold glare above. The lawn was ashes
smoothed; the hedges were Brillo pads; the hawthorn
tree, solidified smoke; the paths were sashes
gleaming with alien honour. Being shorn
of all colour, the world returned to a place
where it learned what it was to unmask its face.

THE PLANTATION

On the plantation they had notices which
read 'The public are requested to assist
in protecting their own property.' The pitch
wasn't as good to play on. It was just grass.
The plantation had bushes, like a forest
only much smaller, for children. You could pass
him unseen and then swim across the path that
stood for a stream and safety. You could shoot
him with caps and he's die, and you would fall flat
wounded, unhurt. Sometimes, though, you had to scoot
out of danger. A man would come running out
of a house. I was so frightened by his shout.

PIGNUTS

Used to eat pignuts. Grew everywhere on wild
land down Vale Avenue. Took a penknife to
dig. They tasted so nice, and even a child
couldn't mistake them for cow-parsley, their three-
stalked leaves anyone recognized. Got a few
saved in the hand before eating them. A free
food was swizz, like the blackberries. But Uncle
Richard was worried: a doctor like him knew
about hemlock, a poison so terrible
nothing could stop it, and, if you dared to chew
just a bit, you would die like a famous man
Socrates. But one can tell pignuts, one can.

FIRE

'Fire's a good servant, but it's a bad master!'
Mammy would say. The blue gas jets were allowed
to buzz under the pan. Churning like lava,
raw meat and cold carrots became quite tasty.
I remember the day, running with the crowd
down to the fire. Vale Avenue rookery
was a volcano, the great house its crater.
Roaring wherever it liked, rampaging fire blazed
all the upstairs and down into smoke. Later,
after the rain, you could see the timbers crazed
into charcoal. Yes, after the disaster,
all the owners were servants to that master.

VALE HALL AFTER THE FIRE (I)

We went into the ruins of Vale House fire.
Sunlight directly down inside the high walls
like a prison's, the slots where electric wire
ran, scorched to ochres, to mauve. The stairs a mere
bas-relief. Below, heaps of plaster, sprawls
of wood like black chocolate. All this was fear.
Underfoot, like iced puddles, glass cracked, and holes
threatened. The roses on wallpaper now made
a smashed basin the prettier. Shards from bowls
wound with a willow-pattern scattered their braid
among ash. Before, we could not show our face
there. We scrambled at will in that great rich place.

AFTER THE VALE HALL FIRE (II)

In my mind in the days after the Vale Hall
fire, I would daydream. There would be me playing
in the road by the hall, and my tennis-ball
goes all by accident into their kitchen
window. 'Lost in our kitchen? You go looking
there on your own. Come inside.' And so given
a free run of the floor, I now go peering
under the sink and the boiler, the table,
and the oven. 'What's this?' I say. 'A smoking
wire?' She comes and she looks. 'Oh, the cable!
It's come out!' And she fetches her husband. — 'Take
this!' So pleased with me, gives me a piece of cake.

LIGHTING THE FIRE

It was fun when you lit the fire. The paper,
screwed up like bows, went twisting about with flame,
turned from white to fans of light ash, stiffer,
weaker, which crashed like glass. The sticks spouted smoke
thick as clay, became glowing coral. Their frame
shifted, collapsed in sparks. You had not to poke
but to leave it to work by itself. The coal
made tiny prickling noises and the dust flashed
into stars in a second. Soon, in a bright hole,
bulbs of black tar waved dazzling plumes. The flames lashed
up the chimney. Staring, how warm we all grew.
Glowing front-lines crawled through the soot in the flue.

A CHIMNEY ON FIRE

'Someone's chimney's on fire!' We would go and stare.
Frightening to see just how fast all the sparks shot
in the air in jet, a flamy nightmare
roar from a dragon's mouth, the house turned into
an insane locomotive, boiling so hot,
looking as if it was going somewhere new,
didn't want just to stay in a road, a neat
garden, estate, even town. Made you look at
all the others beside it — no sign of heat
save a so peaceful dribble of smoke. They sat
quiet, so innocent, their smoke as a proof,
but still danger was hidden under the roof.

NEXT DOOR

When you went next door everything was left to
right, a Looking-Glass World. And Mrs. Crabtree
was our Mammy the other way round. If you
went in, she gave you toffees we had been told
not to take, but she would persuade us, you see,
whereas Mammy would never. She wouldn't scold
either. Noises would come through the wall when we
could not make them, but I could not see any
sign of bumps on her wall. And why did Mammy
always smile at the door, but then look very
cross at us? Just above our fire our mirror
made a parlour in which I was the neighbour.

THE SPASTIC FRIEND

When they talked about Catherine's legs their faces
went very serious. Just one day you found
that she couldn't come out to play. Wore 'braces',
jointed Meccano-like things and had to walk
with two sticks like an insect. So you were bound,
seeing her struggle, to feel sorry. She'd stalk
very slowly. You didn't want to run, but
you couldn't help feeling glad that you could if
you just felt that you might. We could run, dance, strut
round anywhere that we liked, not feeling stiff
in the slightest. It made you feel that danger
was in grass and in stones. Life became stranger.

THE BOY WITH THE VERY LARGE HEAD

Sometimes coming down Mason Street you would meet
him. Was a boy with a very large head. He
walked unbalanced, didn't know where his feet
were or were going next. Was 'meningitis'
that he'd had. When you met him, Mammy said he
would be so hurt if you stared. Made us promise
not to do it nor look away suddenly.
Noticed that when you tried to pass him as you
would a normal young boy, you caught a funny
look in his eye, which seemed to say that he knew
that you couldn't go play with someone so queer,
and his smile said he knew all about your fear.

THE COALMAN

When you opened the door, it was a shock at
first. A black face with white eyes, but not grinning
like Al Jolson. You hadn't, though, to mock at
him because his face was dirty. "Someone has to
bring the coal to the door. He can't be washing
all day," said Mammy. And he couldn't wear new
clothes. He'd strapped to his back some leather armour:
coal wouldn't hurt him through it. He had to grip
with both hands very hard, and, leaning over,
take all the weight. When he let all the coal slip,
I would really have liked to shake out the sack,
but was still so afraid because he was black.

ROLLING A DUSTBIN

Watched the dustbin men rolling the dustbin. So
heavy with ash, even Daddy could hardly
get it out of its corner, but they would know
just how to tip it to balance on its rim
at the bottom, then make it spin so calmly
tipped, like a top on its side, so it would skim
down the path, all its weight going exactly
where it was wanted, tamed like an elephant,
grinding smoothly along, matter-of-factly
sure, not a threat to his toes. Was a patient'
slave that had to flop down where he said, just pat.
Wished all threats in our life could be rolled like that.

THE RAG-AND-BONE MAN

There was Old Tong, the rag-and-bone man, His flat
cart was piled high with old fenders and kitchen
meat-safes (holes in their perforated zinc), hat-
racks, old tins, moth-eaten blankets, adverts in
stove-enamel all banged with black spots, broken
bicycles, kettles and lead pipes. With a grin
on his face always there, he rang his loud bell,
called something like 'Ah-ee-Oh!' People brought bones
and old basins and wirelesses. Wouldn't sell
anything. Gave dolly blues and scouring stones.
'Doing well is Old Tong!' Daddy said. Knew why
he was dressed in rags like a silly old guy.

THE RENT MAN

He would come every week this sharp-nosed man. Had
gaiters of leather like a military
man, a bag of thick leather, and he would add
pennies and half-crowns and pounds, jingling.
There were pockets for pounds and a battery
slotted with springs for the coins. Was no knocking —
popped his head round the door and called 'Rent!' Our book,
kept in the comb-box by the door, was all ruled,
lines in pink and in blue like nets, and he took
out a puce pencil so as not to be fooled,
though we wouldn't have rubbed it out anyway.
Couldn't tell him that we wouldn't disobey.

'TELL THEM WE DON'T WANT ANY'

She said, 'Tell them we don't want any.' Wasn't
usually two or three at the door, only
one. A big Sikh, all smiles, very insistent,
moustache and beard wagging, turban like a pine
cone, all browned from the foreign sunlight, dusty
suitcase that bulged with brushes and combs, shoeshine,
scented soaps, little elephants. Or a stout
gipsy, ears pierced with rings, arms clasped with bangles,
in a long patterned dress and shawl. 'Is she out
then, my duck?' Smiling too, with her bright spangles.
'Read your hand for a tanner?' And what did I feel?
They'd come out of the books to challenge the real.

'DON'T ACCEPT SWEETS FROM STRANGE MEN!'

She said, 'Don't accept sweets from strange men!' I'd see
sweets in my mind, all wrapped up in cellophane,
pretty colours and ribbons, offered to me
free for the taking, and they would taste so sweet,
but then something would happen — you'd have a pain,
you'd become dozy. They were some kind of cheat
for the men were so strange. What was it made
them try to catch you like that? Like that villain
in the Emil film glad to see you afraid,
he would be smiling. Why did he want children?
They'd nothing to pay for his nasty treats.
They could manage at home with just a few sweets.

THEIR SPECIALTY

Didn't quite understand some men. Were like boys,
having some special thing they were serious
about. Seemed just the same as playing with toys,
but somewhere else they won prizes, or people
would pay lots for the thing. It could be precious
roses — like Mr. McCluskey's, all royal
reds inside a big pew made of trellis; or
old Mr. Greenhalgh's pigeons, all facing
out in different directions, all ringed. I saw
under a cover of transparent tracing
paper Mr. O'Brien's six penny blacks.
All the time you were there, you couldn't relax.

THE POOLS

Through the letterbox came the pools
envelopes, fat ones. Inside there'd be funny
graph-paper. Mammy said that only real fools
did them. They tried to guess what the football teams
would be scoring next week. Thought they'd be lucky.
Mammy would say that it was not what it seems.
Just imagine you won. Who would like you for
giving up working? It was like going to
heaven all of a sudden when they all saw
God had not asked you. As well, everyone knew
that, like the rich, they were heading for a fall.
So, was it worth trying to be rich at all?

THE MAP IN THE KITCHEN

We ate meals by a map: a Philip's, of Europe,
both 'Political', 'Physical', with Wales like a pig
with a snout, and that Old English Sheepdog pup
looked at sideways was Ireland, and that Capstan
cigarette man was Spain, and Norway a big
bear, and long-legged Italy. No statesman
knew the shapes quite so well as me, from Hecla
to Mount Elbruz, from Urals to Pyrenees.
On a map I could put Rome or Geneva
(nearly blindfold) exactly in their places.
It was only a trick like knowing faces.

THE FLYCATCHER

Mammy'd hang up a flycatcher. It came
out like a Christmas decoration, curly
but all sticky. Would catch you too all the same
should you unroll it all wrong. In the kitchen
it would hang like a pendulum, all twirling,
twisting, untwisting, under the light, its spin
sending gleams up and down. The unsuspecting
flies turned in triangles round it, and you knew
they would sooner or later land, expecting
freedom to wipe their front legs together. Flew
in and suddenly stopped. Wasn't nice to know
there were flies up above you dying so slow.

THE METAL ORE

Was a 'mineral specimen', quartz crystals
locked with a shining metal ore, all solid,
sharp, unchanging. The ore, miniature needles
crammed like they'd fallen and stuck just anyhow —
but that anyhow stayed, you couldn't be rid
of it, as tiny as snips of hair, that now
were as fixed and as fine as they were when they
formed, Daddy said, millions of years ago. There
in our cabinet they stayed from day to day.
Time didn't bother them. Suns came and went, air
blew about, water came from the sea and ran
back again. Those fine needles kept to their plan.

MAMMY'S AMBER BEADS

Mammy's amber beads went from small to large two
ways round, one big one to finish, each facet
a neat diamond-shape, and if you looked through
one, you'd see everything break up into tiny
glintings, golden and bronzy pomegranate
patterns. A clear little sphere tinted winy-
strong that magicked plain light, turning it into
warm nut-like crystal that slid clicking from hand
to hand. Long long ago, said Daddy, a glue
oozed from a big fir-tree in a foreign land
and there hardened to amber. I wondered what
streams, what rivers had brought what my hands had got.

THE CHEST

In the chest was the past. It was our attic
down on the ground floor. Seven feet long, three deep,
in black panelled oak, tomb-like, it was a quick,
huge, omnivorous swallower of the used
and the read, paints, games, wireless parts, in a heap,
toys missing bits, toys out of fashion, confused
in impossible strata. We had our looks,
though; to explore it was fun, with the excuse
we were tidying it. Those Victorian books
(travel, geology) with engravings on loose
pages made all the past a wonder. Open-
eyed, I stared at the Spectre of the Brocken.

THE GLOBE

Had a globe in the front room. It was tilted
just like the Earth. And you could spin it around
but it always slowed down and stopped. They'd pasted
long strips of paper to make the map. Didn't
quite meet up, so the latitude lines weren't bound
ever to show the right places. Measurement
didn't matter too much — you could still decide
roughly the spot where we were, like a tiny
red Britannia with Ireland for shield beside
Europe's ins-and-outs. It was a shiny
football slung in a question-mark. We all twirled
along dizzily, trapped on a wurlitzer world.

THE HANDS OF THE CLOCK

It was strange how the hands of the clock fitted
what they were telling you. At noon they told you
that the sun was up high, he was permitted
now to begin going down. Quarter past eight
in the morning it showed the bend on the brew
going up Queen Street to school. You had to wait
till the four o'clock came before you were free —
that was a seat with a cushion. Five o'clock
was a radio-mast with a shadow — we
listened to Children's Hour. The quiet tick-tock
came to bedtime at ten: the fan of the day
closing up, for it vanished at twelve away.

OUR LINO

In the front room the lino had a pattern
all made of oblongs, some dark brown and some light.
There was one way you'd see the dark ones woven
under the light here and over there, or you might
trace out a zigzag or diagonals through
the whole pattern. I liked it. Lord Leverhulme's
ballroom I found had 'parquet'. I realised
that our lino had copied it so that rooms
would seem to have parquet; the floor'd be disguised
as real oak. On our lino my cars would fly
along. I didn't care what a lord could buy.

THE BEDROOM BOAT

On my window a bar you could swing in and
out like a tram. Instead of the clouds moving
you could see the room move. Guiding with my hand,
I would pretend I was going somewhere new,
past those islands and capes in the sky, floating
silently, hearing only how the wind blew
through the opening; then to thunder country
roaring with lightning tigers; past a red moon's
globe as beacon low down, then into dusky
fiords with glowing green water, to lagoons
among star archipelagos, into gloom
like a harbour. But I never left my room.

DOING WHAT MAMMY SAID

In the Coal-Place we had to sleep when the raids
became worse. Not that I could see how those walls
were much safer than upstairs. The cannonades
of the flak came like quarry-blasts. The ceiling
seemed so high from the floor. I thought, 'If it falls,
there's just nothing between.' I lay there, feeling
that at least we were doing what Mammy said.
'Look, my nipples are sticking up!' my sister
told me. I leaned across, shining on the bed
with my torch. At the doorway a voice hissed a
warning: 'Not modest, dear!' I shrank in dread.
But at least we were doing what Mammy said.

THE LIFT IN THE COAL-PLACE

I'd imagine our coal-place had a lift in
it, and that nobody knew except us. Went
down about thirty feet. A secret engine
hidden away behind the bath upstairs was what worked
it for us. At the bottom of the descent
there was a folding gate like scissors jerked
to the side and you stepped out into modern
rooms, all lit up and so warm, all carpeted.
A nice kitchen for Mammy with double basin.
Daddy would have a big workshop, all crowded
with tools. We'd have a toy-room. Always felt bad
at the end, for a lift wasn't something we had.

SCRAPING OUT CAKE TINS

I like scraping out cake tins. Mammy had to
leave some. She couldn't take it all out to cook,
and a raisin or two might be left. Like glue,
yellowy-creamy or toffee-browny sweet
smears would stick to the inside for me. I took care
not to say anything — got more to eat
if I didn't remind her. You had to scrape
round it in lines to get it best and then go
crossways over those so nothing would escape.
You could go crossways again or make a row
like diagonals, but, however you tried,
there would always by some sweetness left inside.

THE CRATER IN THE FLOUR

Was when Mammy was making a cake. The flour,
deep in the bowl, could be scooped out and it left
a smooth crater with sides so steep that would tower
sheer, overhanging, perfectly still; exact
model, down to its stones, every rift and cleft,
every sharp ridge like a steamer's bow, a fact
for your eye; here this awesome precipice — fall
down, it could leave you screaming for seconds. What
limestone 'pot', what Vesuvius, what vast cliff-wall
heaved in the Himalayas could match it? Not
wanting ever to spoil it, I would stare, but soon
I had smashed it away with the tablespoon.

THE RHYTHM OF THE MEALS

All our time was a roundabout. The year took
you past the Holy Days, Easter and Christmas,
but the week was the same, for Mammy would cook
different meals for each day. For the silent
Sunday, roast beef and brussels sprouts, and scrumptious
spotted dick. Monday dinnertime, the remnant
of the roast, cold with HP sauce and cabbage.
That matched the back-at-school serious living,
with the wind and the rain outside, and porridge
hot Tuesday morning. Potato-cakes fitting
Wednesday, meat-pie with Thursday, fish with Friday.
Saturday a surprise, to match the high-day.

HP SAUCE

Every day there'd be HP sauce at dinner.
Liked its dark plain-chocolatey colour, and taste
that would prickle your tongue, a sort of shiver
making the meat nicer, specially Monday's cold
cuts from Sunday's roast, but you had not to waste
it, 'cause it comes out in dollops if you hold
it the wrong way. I couldn't understand why
those who had made it gave it the name that
they did, 'Houses of Parliament'. To my eye
Big Ben became that savoury bite. Looked at
all those pinnacle-prickles and felt their stinging.
Was as if I was eating up a building.

NO FATHER CHRISTMAS

'No, there isn't a Father Christmas.' We knew
that and felt older. But wasn't it funny
how we went on pretending there was! No flue
wide enough, no getting around to millions
all in one night, all that talk about money
being 'not easy to come by', and children's
presents costing a lot. We knew where they were,
hidden on top of the wardrobe. And when we
were supposed to be sleeping (we wouldn't stir
even to scratch an itch), we were sure to see
Daddy tip-toeing in. So odd him keeping
a straight face, for he knew I wasn't sleeping.

MONEY INTO COAL

Was like money was magic. Notes, green, crinkly,
wavy with lines like harmonograms, exchanged
and became coal, a hundredweight, that Daddy
shattered with bangs from his hammer. Not until
it was burning did you feel all the pound changed,
warming you well in the winter, so no chill
could get into your fingers. You'd see tarry
flames that come spurting out like nasturtiums, and
all the faces inside the fire, and sparky
trails up the chimney, and glowing lines that brand
soot with creeping cloud-silhouettes. For your cash
all this pageant transformed your pound into ash.

LEARNING TO RIDE A BICYCLE

I remember the long arm of that smaller
steamroller, shouts from the man who controlled it,
but I couldn't control the bike, felt taller
even than Daddy, heading for that arm. Down
I came, hard on the tar and the new crushed grit.
Daddy was kind. There was not even a frown
for not learning so quickly as some. But I
still bring to mind, too, the day, long time after,
when he took me once more to the front to try.
This time I floated off easily. Laughter,
no more tears. I remember his smiles and mine
as I turned and I twisted, perfectly fine.

CYCLING ON SUNDAY MORNINGS

Sunday mornings were cycling times. About ten,
Daddy and I would cock on, ride off downhill,
down the avenue, heading for Blackrod, then
over the hill into a land I'd not seen.
All the serious cyclists, with their silent skill,
went by in squared shirts, a steep hill just routine
for their humped backs and wiry calves, and in the
Journal and Guardian there'd be reports about
them next week, just how sure they were they'd win the
trophy this summer. But I'd be looking out
over woods unlike ours as I puffed on my bike,
though far off you kept seeing Rivington Pike.

HAVING A SHOWER FOR THE FIRST TIME

In the Bridgeman Street baths I had a shower.
Never had had one before. Looking up,
saw the sun through a skylight make a flower
spread all alive over my head. Was made
out of petals of sizzling dots on the blue
sky. Were like gnats, but each gold and silver braid
of them dithered like lamps reflected on a
bus's vibrating window. I discovered,
if I closed my right eye all the sparks shone a
bright gold; my left saw them silver. I coloured
them all this way and that. Was entirely free.
It was fun that the world could be changed by me.

THE STEAM-LORRY

From the bleachworks the steam-lorry came up and
down our Vale Avenue, loomed like a barge
or a tram turned gigantic, a four-in-hand
without horses, or a locomotive
hissing backwards. A wild elephant's charges
trumpeting, chained, with its driver a captive
and a fire for its mouth. A bull out of hell,
massively shaking and rattling, volcanic
demon, high on its wheels, with a burning smell
breathed on our gardens. I'd stand there in panic
as if stuck at the gate, my hands on my ears,
though I staggered inside, turned into my fears.

A HORSE ON THE LOOSE

Very frightening! Why, though? We were inside,
sitting so cosy in the front-room. It seemed
we heard quite far off, as of a cowboy's ride
heard on the wireless, coconut shells that some
sound-effects man was clopping. It streamed,
though, on towards us in crescendo on drum,
real loud galloping hooves hard hard hammering
faster than any hammering could be, till
with a terrible suddenness, battering
us to our feet, we saw the great wild horse fill
all the window an instant, and was gone. Why
did it look just at me with its glaring eye?

OUR CANARY

Once we had a canary. Called it Micky.
Hung up the cage in the kitchen. In the sunlight
he would sing, with his throat feathers all frizzy,
beak all agape with his little tongue trembling.
He would finger himself sideways and back, light,
bouncy, excited there on his perch, sending
out a message that no other canary heard,
shrill as the sopranino recorder at
school. We let him fly free as a normal bird
just in the living-room, but he held on flat
on the wall on the rail, and there he would freeze,
as if being free made him remember trees.

THE LOST BUDGERIGAR

Mrs. Critchley one day lost her budgie. She
followed it, holding the cage 'Pretty Billy!'
she kept calling. Told us how he'd got free.
She'd let him loose in the house and forgotten
there was a window open. It was chilly —
March winds were blowing. He'd flown from the garden
to the elms at the bottom. You could see green
wings all a-flutter as he tried to steady
himself. 'Sparrows will mob him soon as they've seen,'
Daddy said. There he was, free. Couldn't be ready
to return to a cage, but where could he fly
for a feed? To be free meant you would die.

YELLOWAY COACHES

Was once Mammy and Daddy went down south to
see our relations at Watford, the Warrilows.
They sent Sarah and I to the Cottage. Knew
going so far was expensive, so they went
on a coach. Mammy said that's what they chose
'cause, though it took some hours, you could pay the rent
for a week with the saving. Was like getting
out of the rent for that week! Was a 'transport
firm' — and its name was 'Yelloway', and seeing
Yelloway coaches long after that, I thought
what a nice yellow! I was always so cheered,
until Yelloway coaches disappeared.

MAKING CHRISTMAS CARDS

Soon as Advent began, some nights had to be
specially kept for the making of Christmas
cards. Some dark olive paper, thick and very
fibrous, that cut with a 'dettled' edge, Mammy
said, and poster paints, every colour, gorgeous
scarlets and greens for berries and leaves, pearly
silver, dotted for snow, gold for an angel's
wings. See, we couldn't afford bought ones. Couldn't
leave out anyone. 'Oh dear, Mrs. Mansell's
sent us one!' Out came the paints, for it wouldn't
do to miss sending greetings. Thought, how jolly
if everybody sent to everybody!

THE CHRISTMAS DECORATIONS

Mammy, when it was Advent, would make a wreath,
yew bound with wire into a ring. She had bought
three red candles and red ribbon. Underneath
you could pretend it was a big green halo
or a way into heaven, a lovely nought
hanging up there in the sitting-room. The glow
of the fairy-lights all round the picture-rail,
those on the tree, and the holly and the ivy
made it marvellous, us singing the Wassail
Song. There'd be nuts and chocolates. So happy
it seemed everyone was, just like a concert.
To be happy you have to make an effort.

THE CHRISTMAS LIGHTS

In an old cardboard box, dusty, cracked, faded
labels of historical oranges
on its side, was a tangle of dark braided
wire with green cups just like acorn caps. It stayed
on the top of the bedroom cupboard. Fringes
glittered of tinsel from others. Daddy'd paid
for it all long ago. Downstairs in a tin
hidden behind the radio parts, coloured
bulbs like big sugared almonds, their glass so thin,
each with a stubby brass screw. They were covered
and forgotten all year. But then once, aglow,
put a crown round the room with their Christmas show.

CHRISTMAS-CAKE DECORATIONS

For the Christmas cake Mammy would buy special
miniature decorations: little fir trees
with their green branches tipped with the snow; petal
shapes to make flowers and patterns; a Father
Christmas, his sleigh and his reindeer, wouldn't freeze
wrapped in red and in fur; and next, much larger,
a bright robin so neat with its feet stuck out,
two pointing arrows; a tiny thatched cottage
all upholstered with snow. And scattered about,
best of all, silvery beads, just the image
of the frost on the icing. All to sweeten
up the cake. Lovely models to be eaten.

CRACKERS

There were crackers at Christmas parties. Before
eating the salmon sandwiches, the trifle
and the jelly, the mince pies, you had to score,
pulling so hard, with a cracker. Was a game
and a gamble. You had to find a rival.
Some children hated the bang, but all the same
they might win: where the paper tore was just luck.
If you were winner, you got a paper hat
and a toy, like a clicking frog. But they stuck
sometimes; grown-ups would pull them for you so that
there were prizes for everyone. No one lost,
and we all got a hat, whatever the cost.

CAROLS

How did carols match Christmas? You knew other
songs, they weren't carols and couldn't be. Holly
with its berries so red (and in the winter
up behind Grandad's in Rivington we knew
of a special tree), yew for the wreath, ivy,
snow on the ground, the crib at church, these were true
Christmas things — so were carols. Was it because
those songs were sung just at Christmas? That would mean
any song would have done for it, and that was
not what it seemed like. It just wouldn't have been
right to sing 'The Wassail Song' with keenness,
say, in March. Was just these songs that made a Christmas.

NO FATHER CHRISTMAS

'MOTHER GOOSE'

Father Christmas was not enough, even though
shops and the Radio Times and the papers
made a fuss in December, his face aglow,
red-cheeked and kindly, for, after a week, your
toys became so familiar, your destroyers,
bombers and tanks, your whole army, had fought more
battles than you remembered, had called a truce.
Mammy — she thought up specially a substitute
of her own, for, on New Year's Day, 'Mother Goose'
came and would post something extra that would suit
you, so some little toy was there on the mat
(but you couldn't pretend as easy as that).

TAKING DOWN THE DECORATIONS

On Epiphany night we'd take the Christmas
greenery down, holly and ivy, and the yew
from the wreath. In the fire all the resinous
twigs and papery leaves would always burn
with a furious crackling and spurts of blue,
violet and green flame. I thought the leaves could turn
green all over again if you could only
catch it before it vanished in the smoke.
It was fireworks on Twelfth Night. It was cosy
watching a holly spike fizzing like the spoke
of a catherine-wheel, the yew blazing green,
just as good as the decorations had been.

HOT DAYS

I liked hot days. The tar ran in shiny black
trickles between the cobbles. Rivington Pike
had its edges all melting, a chimney-stack
all on fire. Vale Avenue, if you put your
head sideways, became the sea: it was like
swimming and slipping around. Up on the moor
you saw smoke rising up, as if all the rock
soon would come running down like lava and your
house, all brick much too hot to touch, would unlock
every join, run away. Couldn't be sure
when I heard Daddy say, "Look, I'm melting — Phew!"
whether I wouldn't melt and run away too.

HOT SUMMER

See the kitchen door is always open in that
summer — but which summer? only one? The heat
is a weight from the sky. The paintwork has fat
bubbles that Mammy doesn't want us to prick.
On the lawn there are cracks like in cakes. The street
seems to be crying with tar, and our shoes stick
to its elephant-hide. See the railway shed —
all of its edges are rippling. We can smell
all the heather afire, and can see the red
flames that go flash in the smoke on the fell.
And my face it is peeling, baked in an oven.
In that summer the door is always open.

BUBBLES ON THE PAINT

In the paint on the kitchen-door in the heat
bubbles appeared, dry and hard, like a disease.
It was lovely to pop them, to make a neat
hole, press them flat again. Trouble was, the skin
fell away leaving patches. It didn't please
Mammy. Was naughty of you to take a pin
and go popping like that: it meant it would need
painting again and the Council couldn't come
back for ever so long. Each inviting bead,
bulging like bladderwrack seaweed, like a plum,
was so ready for piercing. Gave me trouble.
The temptation came back with every bubble.

A MIRAGE

As you came up the slope from Number Fifty-
Four on a hot day the rest of Vale Avenue
had a mirage that glistened in a shifty
way at the Mason Street end, a chromium-
plated pool with no edges. Slowly it grew
thinner the more you walked up, its minimum
a mere spindle of ghostly silver. If you went
back down again, you made the pool come back. I
would create my own lake from a filament
fine as a spider's line, all done by my eye.
But I'd think, a pure illusion it was not —
you could say that it really showed it was hot.

SUNDAY

Oh yes, Sundays were special. Breakfast after
mass. All the streets so quiet, and no hooters.
You were dressed in your best. All play and laughter
had to be 'modest'. I didn't much mind 'cause
there was dinner with roast and lovely flavours,
tea with the toast and the seed-cake. And there was
a good chance we'd have visitors and they'd bring
children. You could play carefully while they
all were talking, perhaps at cards or something.
I would think, suppose God didn't exist, say —
that made Sunday a sham. Needn't be the end,
though, I thought to myself: you could still pretend.

TWILIGHT

Just as soon as the sun had gone down, shadows
vanished. Instead, a cool quiet light was all round,
as if poured into stillness. Trees took a pose,
settling a bird now and then. If a car went
by, you heard it approach, and then the last sound
reaching to Blackrod; was as if it had meant
to say how it was sorry it made such a noise. If you
scuffed up the autumn leaves, they fell back down at
once to say, 'It's all over today.' You knew
suddenly all had closed in on you and that
it was darker. It wasn't the time now to roam:
it was time for the firelight back in your home.

LIVING

All around us were things living too. Cabbage-whites,
tortoiseshells, peacocks, red admirals, jiggled
about, poked for the nectar. Under stones, mites
cringed in the crevices. Thrushes and blackbirds
went inspecting the lawn, and pink worms wriggled,
caught in their beaks. In all the farms around herds
of cows, ploddingly bored, yielded a milk-flow
daily. Dogs lived in Dogland, sniffing for where
all the others had been. Horses worked for no
pay. And plants, every one of them blind, took care
to be seen. All the ants never stopped. This fuss
all went on 'cause it had to do, just like us.

THE HOLY PICTURES

Mammy hung up a crucifix, black, in the
bedroom right over the bed. Jesus would
keep a watch in the night in case a sinner
tried to do harm. He was looking down to see.
And then over the mantelpiece was a good
picture too, one of Our Lady. There were three
angels flying around, and Baby Jesus
there in her arms. They were in green and gold
like kings, queens and jacks. All true believers
put up some pictures like that because they bid
you to think about God all the time. Finding
you forgot, was best to have some reminding.