A request for an 'SAE'

Ralph Pennington-Forbes believed himself to be a well-balanced person. Some would smile at that. To put it plainly, he was a Burgher, born of English-speaking descendants of early Portuguese and Dutch people who settled in Ceylon, as it was called then. His parents had purchased a small valley close to Adam's Peak, clearing the land a little at a time and planting tea, when, at the time, a disease threatened to wipe out the coffee plants in the area.

Many had laughed at their venture believing the valley to be badly sited for tea growing and through which elephants roamed from time to time. It also boasted a rainfall six times that of London. Oh no, their critics smirked, they'll never succeed in growing tea there.

But they did and they prospered.

Their family motto: 'Do try it', was found by Ralph's father scribbled on the wall of a wayside long drop, and he adopted it as his own for the family. Whatever it actually referred to was never disclosed to Ralph. The illustration that accompanied the motto on the wall, seductive though it was, proved physically impossible to those Westerners who ‘did try it’, as it were.

As a young boy, with his parents much involved in setting up the plantation, Ralph had been fairly free to find his own amusements. Now in his late 60s, he smiled, reminiscing on the times he'd spent in the company of his friend, Lavinder, the son of one of the servants. His real name was ‘Ravinder’, but his father couldn't get his tongue round the ‘R’ so Lavinder he became.

Around the age of 10, there was some pressure from his parents to conform more to the social and class distinctions of the tea-growing society around them, however, his warm relationship with Lavinder, remained happy indeed. They'd become more like brothers and maintained their close bond over the years.

At some point, Lavinder's growing man hormones began to make their presence felt, assisted by a young lady who liked the swing of his dhoti. He was looking for a job, and he'd requested Ralph's help to obtain an ‘SAE’ as it was part of the requirements for his application for the position as supervisor of tea pluckers. A similar request to his uncle Pradish had been refused because he said he did not know what an ‘SAE’ was. Lavinder was stuck; in fact he felt himself wedged between an elephant with an ingrowing toe-nail and a water buffalo unable to pass water, so he turned to Ralph to help him navigate the English ways.

“I can't expect much from an uncle the crotch of whose dhoti hangs so disgustingly low to the ground,” he explained to Ralph.

'Tell me what you need and I'll see if I can help you', Ralph encouraged. He already knew what an SAE was, but the novel way Lavinder explained things was always a delight to hear.

Lavinder tweaked his moustache on both sides, bringing tears to his eyes since he hadn't much moustache to tweak. He cleared his throat with several hefty chesty coughs, glanced at a piece of paper in his hand on which the letters SAE were printed large, and began.

“‘S’. First I need to hire a suit. It isn't done to approach the nincompoop in charge of us bloody natives wearing a dirty working dhoti. Then for ‘A’ I need an ‘at, which I have to raise and then hold in front of me with my written request lying on top. See, we damned natives’ have our own eti ketti'.”

Ralph laughed. “And the ‘E’?”

“That's to show I have my ‘E license’, to drive an Elephant, that is,” he said, his eyes sparkling as he waggled his head from side to side.

“Seated up at the steering end an overseer of tea pluckers has an elephant eye’s view of all the tea pluckers. Also keeps them from sneaking away for a crafty brew up, or anything else they may get up to in the bushes. I'll get to keep the contents from an elephant pooper-scooper I've invented too. Should make a little on the side providing manure for the nincompoops’ wives roses. Not too dusty for an upwardly bloody mobile go-ahead native upstart like myself, eh my friend?”

He paused, looking keenly at Ralph.

“So, how about helping me get my SAE sorted, then?”

But Ralph couldn’t contain his laughter any longer; a simple 'self-addressed envelope' didn't seem quite enough somehow...

Dennis Crompton © 1997
(first published www.denniscrompton.wordpress.com 2013)

Our mental fight: primary school and thoughts of war

It was a long time ago when folk, for the most part, lived their lives in the district where they were born, shackled by a lack of money or opportunity to venture far. A few did raise their heads above it all, saw a future in the distance and with heart rending courage, wept their farewells and left. I saw and learned these things as a young boy, long ago now, attending Stoneygate Primary School in England in the 1930s.

Our school was built of stone from a local quarry, with a sombre aspect from the outside, and with little variation inside. It had high ceilings with large windows, and in the winter the rooms were nose-bitingly cold to such a degree that the cold made my eyes ache. The threadbare hand-me-down clothes most of us wore did little to keep us warm, but as many of us were in the same state, together we stamped our feet and blew on our cold hands, and managed as best we could.

The furniture was sparse and the floor of bare boards was hard underfoot and reverberated when we moved over it, or when our wooden clogs struck the legs of the chairs or desks. The largest feature in the room was a map of the world suspended above a blackboard at the front. Areas coloured in pink indicated they were part of the British Commonwealth which we were taught that, ‘Hitler despised.’ We learnt that he told the German people that they were the ‘master race’ and were destined to rule the world. The country of Poland was invaded by German jack-booted storm troopers, strutting their way through the shattered country leaving behind them misery, death and devastation.

At school and at home we had heard about the invasion of Poland and it seemed that nothing could stop the Germans taking over the world. We heard about the defeat of our armies; and the escape and rescue of many soldiers from Dunkirk.

Eventually, Hitler stood on the shores of France and looked across at Britain, and from there, echoing Napoleon just over one hundred years ago, boasted:

‘We shall soon conquer them; they’re just a nation of shop-keepers’.

One of his generals agreed:

‘In three weeks England will have her neck wrung like a chicken’.

Winston Churchill’s reply still stirs me deep inside:

‘Some chicken! Some neck!’

I wasn’t fully aware of what it all meant as Longridge, Lancashire, was still a long way from Germany; but we did prepare for it in our way. By our feet sat a small cardboard box containing a gas-mask, which we practised putting on under our desks during air-raid warnings. All the glass in the windows were criss-crossed with gummed masking tape in the hope that it would keep most of the glass from showering down on us if bombs dropped too close. We became familiar with air raid sirens, air raid shelters, and barrage balloons floating like large sausages a little distance above us.

In small parks and recreation areas anti-aircraft guns emplacements mushroomed; some even on the tops of buildings, their long, slender barrels pointing skywards with separate searchlight units close by. Deep anti-tank ditches zigzagged through fields, and barbed wire and landmines prevented anyone from using most of our beaches. The ordinary people of Great Britain had decided that Hitler would not conquer us as easily as he thought he would.

The lesson on general knowledge in my primary school classroom had just finished and our teacher looked more serious now. None of us knew then that she had a fiancé living in Iceland and that she would be leaving to join him in a few weeks. It was almost the end of the school day and we were asked to take out our song books. We didn’t mind, we enjoyed it when she accompanied us on the piano. We sang only one song that day; it was in the back of the book and the words were by William Blake. It was more like a hymn to me and stirred my emotions deeply as we stood to sing. I didn’t need to read the words, I knew them off by heart and hidden tears sprung to my eyes after the first few words:

‘And did those feet, in ancient times, walk upon England’s mountains green?’

The pictures in my mind varied between those feet and those of German troops marching along our country lanes.

‘And did the Countenance Divine, shine forth upon our clouded hills?’

Yes, I wondered about that too. Did the Countenance Divine shine upon Germany?

It was then I noticed our teacher’s eyes moving slowly from face to face around the classroom. They stopped on various faces as we sang: ‘I shall not cease from mental fight’. Our teachers had often told us to think for ourselves. Now she was having difficulty finding the notes on the piano and I saw her blink to clear the tears away. The few who noticed, like myself, tried to carry on singing with the rest, but I found it difficult with a lump in my throat.

Our teacher had taught at the school for six years or more; time enough to know those in the senior classes and know they’d soon be serving in the armed forces. Would they get the chance to go abroad at last, all expenses paid; free at last from the shackles that bound them to the ‘dark satanic mills’ all around? (Many years would pass before I learned that the dark satanic mills Blake wrote about had a great deal to do with the abstract mind.)

No arrows of desire would these young men receive; instead of spears, they’d carry rifles. Some would descend from the heavens in billows of silk, lucky to arrive unscathed, and those who did, still had to do battle with the waiting enemy. Others would operate midget submarines to sink Italian warships anchored in their own waters. Still others would appear in their tanks as chariots of fire, making their last brave dash across the burning sands of the Middle East.

Thus did former members of schools throughout England and the United Kingdom, together with our allies, find their way to fight against Hitler’s attempt to destroy us in order to create his master race. Family members and loved ones would write to those stationed at home and those still alive overseas on active service or in prison camps. They’d pray, and mourn, and remember them at church, at home and in memorial services.

With my teacher and all of my classmates, we played our part in the war too, striving against the mental oppression William Blake wrote of, and of which we sang from our hearts so many years ago. Whatever our teacher was thinking as she struggled through the song and shed her tears I’m sure she hoped that some of us would survive and live to be free to think for ourselves.

And did those feet in ancient times

Walk upon England’s mountains green:

And was the holy Lamb of God,

On England’s pleasant pastures seen!

And did the Countenance Divine,

Shine forth upon our clouded hills?

And was Jerusalem builded here,

Among these dark Satanic Mills?

Bring me my Bow of burning gold;

Bring me my Arrows of desire:

Bring me my Spear: O clouds unfold!

Bring me my Chariot of fire!

I will not cease from Mental Fight,

Nor shall my Sword sleep in my hand:

Till we have built Jerusalem,

In England’s green & pleasant Land

William Blake

Dennis Crompton © 1998

(first published www.denniscrompton.wordpress.com 2013)

Crompton Crompton, the grocer from Farrington

 
Here is a photograph of my great grandfather; his name was Crompton Crompton. It shows him standing outside his grocery business in Farrington, a few miles from Preston. The family connection is thus: he was the father of Lazarus Crompton who was my grandfather, and Lazarus was the father of my father, Fred Crompton. (I write about my great grandfather again in the poem on this blogsite: 'My great grandfather'.)
Crompton Crompton was born in 1834 in Over Darwen, near Blackburn. Apparently there is a Lower Darwen and an Over Darwen as well as just Darwen, and I believe a railway line or a river caused these divisions.

In 1856 on the 5 July Crompton Crompton married Mary Morris who was born one year after him. He lived a very long life (for those times): he lived until the age of 86, and died in July 1867. An uncle, Frank Crompton showed me Crompton Crompton's grave once. It’s in a corner of church graveyard, under a big tree.

So, Crompton Crompton had these children:

Julia, born 1858;

Louisa, born 1860;

Crompton Crompton, who died young at the age of 7;

Mary Elizabeth, born 1864;

Lazarus (my grandfather) born 1865;

Crompton Crompton (the second child to be named as such), born 1868;

Albert Edward, born 1870 died 1879;

and Benjamin, born 1874.

So there’s a small snippet about my great grandfather and a great photo of him, whiskers and all. It’s not a great picture but it’s the best I have, and I guess I’m lucky to have it.

Dennis Crompton © 2013
(first published www.denniscrompton.wordpress.com 2013)

Rock my equilibrium

With the children off to school I have a moment to myself

 sat at the kitchen table surrounded by their mess.
*

Tears aren’t far away, it’s another of those days, 

feeling down and quite dismayed by the burdens that I face.

*

Life goes rushing by, 

I only stand and see imitated copies of what I’m supposed to be.

*

My mirror mocks me so, confirms what I believe 

of Hollywood items shown in my weekly magazine.

*

Then on the radio I hear the celebrity speaker say: 

I’ve never had, you see, children of my own,

cleaned and fed them, wept over them and sent them off to school, 

never heard them clatter back again

to balance my equilibrium.

*

And it does.

*

Dennis Crompton © 1996

(first published www.denniscrompton.wordpress.com 2013)

Book week, and happy children

The weather was fine and clear for the final day of the Book Week at the small country school where I had been invited to speak about stories and writing. A few adults appeared as I talked to the teacher who had invited me to speak. Parents, she explained, nodding in their direction. I felt a twinge of nerves; children were one thing, parents were another; and they were then joined by the school bus driver, a vet, the principal of the local high school, a teacher from another school and the mayor and mayoress of the district. Two policemen who had arrived earlier, were already seated at the back chatting with the children. They were to hand out awards for those who had accomplished a Safe Bicycle Ride programme earlier in the week. Other awards for spelling, writing and reading were to be given out by teachers at the school.

Just as it was almost time for my talk, a bright-eyed pupil asked me if I was a celebrity, and I laughed. But he was serious. No, I said, nothing like that. I just write things. He gave me a cheery grin, which was encouraging.

I began. The children were great with lots of smiles and enjoyed my readings and stories. Quite a few were dressed as characters from story books. There was a Robin Hood with a broken bow, Caspar the ghost appeared twice, and both of them were too friendly to have frightened anyone. Jane Eyre was there next to Anne of Green Gables, while seated behind them was a witch with an enchanting smile and sparkling eyes. I saw several assorted supermen, and there was a Noddy; a petite, shy little thing, and she won my heart.
The children enjoyed everything that was going on, dressing up, parents and special visitors. Their delight was infectious too; the adults had lowered their normal barrier of reserve, it seemed to me, as they chatted freely with those around them. Children do that for us, don’t they? It was good to be here I thought, and relaxed even more, so that as I finished I was pleased that I’d said yes to taking part.

The school song was sung, a modern, bouncy number in keeping with the lively spirits that filled the room, and then other guests added their part adding more variety to the day. Towards the end of the programme as pupils went forward for their awards, Noddy’s little figure stepped to the front. Good for you, I thought, as she was given her award for best handwriting for her class. When it was all over I saw her standing on her own and went over to her and asked her if she was going home on the school bus.

No, my Mummy will collect me, she said softly. That’s nice; I said. And my Daddy; she added. Then she gave a little shiver in the slight wind, blowing keener now. So small and so very vulnerable, and I suddenly thought of the primary school in Dunblane, Scotland, a school like this one that had seen so much horror not so very long ago. Then Noddy saw her mother and ran off, waving and smiling.

Maybe that’s why, before I left the school I said to the teacher who had organized the Book Week how much I’d enjoyed my visit.

And I meant it. I know my inner enjoyment was more than just seeing the children eager, happy and surrounded by so many willing to encourage them in their learning. They were also safe; and it came to me that we ought to enjoy to the fullest such moments, for things can change so easily, and suddenly, change.

Dennis Crompton © 1997
(first published www.denniscrompton.wordpress.com 2013)

The Dunblane school massacre occurred at Dunblane Primary School in the Scottish town of Dunblane on 13 March 1996. The gunman, 43-year-old Thomas Hamilton (b. 10 May 1952), entered the school armed with four handguns, shooting and killing sixteen children and one adult before committing suicide. Along with the 1987 Hungerford massacre and the 2010 Cumbria shootings, it remains one of the deadliest criminal acts involving firearms in the history of the United Kingdom. (Wikipedia)

The lamp-lighter, Berry Street, Preston

Heading home from Stoneygate Primary School in winter was a bit of an ordeal for me, as dusk came early and the dark narrow streets looked quite foreboding. At times, strange figures stood on corners, or in doorways, some of them muttering strange words to themselves and looked at me oddly. No, I didn’t like going home up Berry Street, Preston, when it was getting dark.

But there was one thing that made me breathe easier when I stepped out of the school doorway and walk down the short paved pathway into the street. Sometimes I’d be in times to catch the lamp-lighter just starting his rounds up Berry Street. I’d give a little grunt of pleasure as I quickly crossed Avenham Lane to fall in behind him. The first time I didn’t know what to expect but caught on quickly enough.

Approaching the first street lamp with a long pole carried on one shoulder, he’d stop and swing the pole round and look up at the lamp. The pole had a small hook sticking out at the top, with a small lighted wick a few inches away. He’d reach up with the pole and using the hook, open the glass door of the lamp, reach in with the hook and turn on the gas, all in one smooth move. A quick turn of the pole brought the lighted wick close enough to ignite the gas and the gas-mantle would light in several colours, faintly at first, before settling down to glow with a warm and steady light. The door would be closed, the pole placed back on one shoulder and with measured step he’d proceed to the next lamp up the street. It was so very comforting to walk up the street behind the lamp-lighter.

At the top of the street we’d part company, for I had now only to open a small door set in a wall and I’d be safely in the grounds of the Shepherd Street Mission Children’s Home. I’d often pause for a moment while the lamp-lighter was still around and gaze down the street, now illuminated by a line of lamps. Berry Street had lost its dark and dreadful aspect and taken on a more cheerful face. Gas lamps and cobbled streets had a charm of their own at times.

Dennis Crompton © 1995
(first published www.denniscrompton.wordpress.com 2013)

Seasons to cry

In the midst of an ordinary day there's a Thomas with a mind out of balance ready to snuff out the lives of anyone for no valid reason. And he did. He killed sixteen children along with Gwen, their teacher, that ordinary day. A shocked Dunblane policeman, his brain in neutral running on a kind of official automatic statement, said to reporters, “It was a random attack. We are not aware of any motive.” And the world cried for the children, their parents and relatives, their teacher and playmates, and for that sad bereaved community. Yes, and even for those who'd loved Thomas, knowing that there but for the grace of God... I wonder sometimes where he is now. What he's doing. How he, and especially his mother, are coping. It could have happened to anyone: it does. Cruelly. Savagely.

In my study I have a list of pupils who attended the schools where I've taught. Most died by accident, some through sickness, a few by their own hand. They were aged from between 14 and 23. The list reminds me that each person was a distinct and unique personality living with ne’er a thought that in the midst of life, in the twinkling of an eye, life could be snatched away. Sometimes I look at the school magazine to jog my memory as to what they looked like. One pupil I'll never forget. She's fixed in my mind forever. A seventh former looking forward to her next year at university, except another mind temporarily out of balance got in the way.

It was close to the end of the last term for the year. Senior exams had finished. Textbooks had been handed in. Lunchtime was halfway through and the seniors were gathering in the assembly hall to hear a visiting speaker. He promised to be interesting having appeared several times on TV as a radical and a stirrer. I was free, so I went along too. From the back of the hall I watched this particular student seat herself on the top step leading up to the stage, place the guitar she carried across her knees and tune it, leaning forward to hear the sound of the strings. When she was ready, she looked up, smiled and waited. The hubbub gradually subsided and when all was quiet and without any introduction she started to sing: 'Don't cry for me, Argentina'. She captivated us as her voice, soft and beautiful carried the words clearly and distinctly around the hall. (Of the speaker who followed, I recall only that he was a radical. Abrasive and blunt he strutted the stage, his message lost in the arrogancy of the delivery. I've never forgotten that student, or her presentation.)

A few months later I heard she'd been killed not very far from her home. Some youth, keen to impress her of his driving skills, persuaded her to accept a lift the short distance into town. She never made it. According to the report that came out later, a witness who was with her at the scene stated that when she discovered he'd been drinking it was too late to get out. He'd refused to stop and while she was terribly injured and knew she was dying he was not badly hurt at all. Sometimes the song brings it all back to me. Sometimes it comes back on its own, and sometimes I cry. Thankfully, there's a time and a season for that.

© Dennis Crompton 1999
(first published www.denniscrompton.wordpress.com 2012)