Walks with my dad

 
A few scenes with my dad are rather special to me. Times when I discovered something about how he felt; things that helped shape the way I see and feel about things today. I was about eight years of age at the time of the following events.

There always seemed to be so very many people in Lune Street, Preston; a busy, bustling street with so much to see and take in. I guess we had gone about a quarter of the way along it when I heard the sounds that roller skates make as they move across flagstones – a sort of click-clack as the wheels cross the join between two stones.

The sound quickly got closer, and suddenly there he was: a man aged about 55 with thin, grey hair, scuttling in between the legs of the passersby whilst seated on a square, padded piece of wood with small metal wheels at each corner. He propelled himself along with the aid of two short sticks, his hands protected by pieces of cloth. Very skillfully he manoeuvred himself around, and was gone as quickly as he had appeared.
There was something else about him, something that only registered in my mind after he had passed by. The man had no legs, just two short stumps also wrapped in pieces of cloth. I was just about to as Dad about him when we came across this next scene.

An elderly man was seated on a box in a doorway to our left. His fingers were moving slowly across the page of a large open book that he held on his knees, and he was talking at the same time. The man was blind, and he was reading from the Bible which was in braille. On the ground at his feet was a cloth cap into which people had thrown a few coins. Dad dropped something into it too as we passed by, and the man paused in his reading to quietly say thank you.

When we had gone a little way down the street I asked Dad what had made the man blind (because Dads are supposed to have the answers to many questions, aren’t they?). “I don’t know, lad,” said Dad as he stopped and looked at me. “But every time I see him there like that, it makes me think how fortunate I am and I thank God that I have my sight.”

Those two encounters have stayed with me all of my life.

Dennis Crompton © 1994

The rent man

We lived in a stone cottage in Preston in the 1930s – two up, two down – and shared an outside loo with the folk next door. So the rent wasn’t much, one shilling a week, but it still had to be found in the days of the Depression.

The rent man was pleasant enough, with a voice that seemed too quiet for such a big chap. He would arrive on his push-bike, remove the cycle clips from the legs of his trousers, then placing them in his raincoat pocket. I thought he had rather big feet, but never said so. He also wore a Trilby hat, “a little ahead of his time,” according to my father, who wore either a flat cap or a bowler, depending on the occasion.

Once inside the house the rent man would remove the rent book from his jacket and open it on the table. Each time he did so, my eyes were taken by the neatness of the columns of figures and signatures in his book. The money was picked up and placed carefully away, then, writing his signature in the rent book and, after a few friendly comments, on would go his hat, his cycle clips, and off he would go.

There were one or two times when he was not able to collect the rent, either that, or we just didn’t have it for him when he came. He never got angry or raised his voice. I’m sure he understood the difficulties we faced as a family. He would just say in his quiet way to my father, “Perhaps next week then, Fred?”

I took the rent to his home on two occasions. His wife opened the door and led me through to the living room. She was rather house-proud; dust dare not settle while she was around and if it did it wasn’t there long. Everything was where it should be but it didn’t seem comfortable to me. I wriggled in my seat, a big, padded armchair. My feet kicked the base and the sound reverberated around the quiet room. The rent man’s wife looked at me and shook her head. It happened again – my feet kicked the base. This time her look was icy. I hated that chair and the house and was glad when I finally left to go home. I felt sad for the rent man to be married to a lady like that – it didn’t seem right to me.

We didn’t have much in the way of padded armchairs and the like, but our rented house was a home and it felt good to be there.

Dennis Crompton © 1997

Competitors

‘Share and share alike’ was one of the things taught to us when we were young. I found it difficult at times but in the presence of older people it was best to comply. There were a few times when uncensored, I’d surprise myself by sharing something, prompted by a spontaneous surge of generosity from within. I’d feel quite saintly for a while and believe I should have been treated more kindly by folk, had they but known.

I can’t remember when it started but it probably began with a simply unhygienic sharing at school. My mate had an apple. I did not. So placing my arm around his shoulder as I’d seen other boys do, I said to him, “Give us a bite then, Jim?” And without any further persuasion, I enjoyed my first bite. Later, on observing other boys, I added, “Save us t’core too, will ya?” Over a period of time, the bite or the offer of the core would be shared as naturally as others had shared theirs. (I never extended my request to share oranges though. It was far too cold where I lived to be eating those anywhere but in the warmth of home. I also confess to an inbuilt aversion to tasting the juices of an orange watered down with the dribblings of a runny nose.)

Time and experience have brough competition to bear. There were other mates without an apple, so I set about acquiring skills to cope with the situation. It wasn’t long before I would hone in on an apple breathed on and being polished by a schoolmate as naturally as a female Codling moth’s antenna could pin point the male she sought. My oral seductions for a bite and the core had to be pruned and tamed; and they were.

After a bout of measles I was forced to wear spectacles, and the bottom dropped out of my persuasive approach, finely honed. Overnight I became a has-been mate, with four eyes. Then the school bully took to calling me ‘Skenner’, everyone laughed and I was relegated to a small group of forlorn no-hopers. My self-esteem plummeted. I was the last to be picked for soccer played with an empty tin – exciting within the four walls of the school yard where it was banned. I stood on the furthest boundary for cricket (played with a ball made from rags), if I was picked at all. No wonder I lost something of the bubbling infectious enjoyment of just being with my mates, especially when I we tried to see who could pee the highest up the wall in the boys’ loo (I could only reach the half-way mark). As a competitor I’d become a non-entity. A dreadful label for anyone.

I decided I’d become a monk. I’d be safe behind the cloistered walls of a monastery. I could have, if I’d lived in the Middle Ages… Many of my ideas and inspirations sprang from, “I could have, if…..” The monk idea didn’t last. I looked up the word in an encyclopaedia and pictures of them put me right off. They all looked so woe-begone, and it was obvious they could only reach the half-way mark too.

Anyway, it didn’t take me too long to accept being called four eyes, or Skenner. There seemed to be nothing I could do about it, so I’d grin and make some humorous comment…and in the process I gained a couple of great new mates. No point being woe-begone if I wasn’t even a monk, I thought.

Dennis Crompton © 1997

I am here

I wrote this poem in 1994 after I was prompted to think back to when I was still a Minister of Religion at Mt Eden Baptist Church, Auckland, some 30 years prior. As part of that role, I became a visitor at the nearby Mt Eden Prison, where I was free to come and go, having no past connection with the inmates or their families. I was also there in case an inmate wanted to see a Minister of Religion, and though it was rare for that to happen, a few times it did. I’d see the inmates in the prison chapel, to listen mostly, never to preach, admonish or suggest what they should do to change things – they’d worked through all that themselves in their prison cells.

I was moved one time as I sat in the visitor’s room, taking in how women (wives, sisters, daughters or mothers), waited for their man, some with small children in varying stages of awareness, quiet and new to the hostile environment, waiting for their daddy to walk out and hug them close and whisper his love for them. Man and woman whispered together in case fellow inmates should hear and see them in their tender moments, a few with tears flowing. And then they held their child or children, and their faces softened with love as they held them close, feeling and breathing their tenderness deep inside, learning what it was like now, to be a father, as well as a husband, a soul-mate, and an inmate.

So, this is what I wrote of my memories of that time…

*

May I tell them of the anguish that you feel deep inside,

outsider, oh so lonely, even ‘midst the noisy thronging crowd;

tell them you don’t fit the scheming pattern of their minds,

deeply hurt by their unthinking laughs and taunts and cruel jibes?

*

May I tell them that the lack of confidence you often feel within,

at school, in sport or following the well-known family tune;

is because you are afraid, and you don’t want to let them down,

from those high ideals they’ve set for you all along the line.

*

May I tell you too, I also know at times you are so scared,

condemned by your own feelings, fearing you have lost your way;

I know you sometimes want to run and never stop,

to end the dreadful nagging pain, or else you’ll blow your top.

*

I know the inmost thoughts that often haunt and torment you,

know that your body will dictate and yes, at times, embarrass you;

I know you are afraid of the long nights and the days,

I know you can’t just pack up your bags and vanish clear away.

*

The lecture they have given you, you know it off by heart,

heard it so bloody often that it’s forcing you apart;

you know you cannot reach the goals they have damn well set,

hate the thought of growing up like so many people you’ve met.

*

May I tell you know, for you need to know before this day is through,

your parents, friends and loved ones really do deeply love you;

they hesitate and do not speak, not sure of what to say, so

scared of hurting you, lest you take flight and hide away.

*

Let me tell them then, who love you, of the things you cannot say,

that life is so frustrating dealing with each muddled day;

there are times you know you need them, and times too when you don’t;

why do they get so angry when you rock the blasted boat?

*

I am here, an intermediary, only a step away – I wait,

knowing I could stand between those close to you who care;

now, you must learn to trust me, that I see both sides and know,

I am the answer to your question: look around you, I am here.

*

Dennis Crompton © 1994

You can read an interesting blog post about conditions and riots in 1965 at Mt Eden Prison by a fellow New Zealand, here:

The spinsters' code

 

Across the street from our home in Pump Street, Longridge, was a pebble-dashed house in which two spinsters lived.

(Swallows built their nests each year under the eaves of this house. They came in spring and left in autumn, and there was a constant swooping and diving in smooth, graceful sweeps back and forth across the street by these beautiful birds. It was always sad to see them leave but they would return, we always knew.)

The two spinster ladies were a bit of a mystery to me; I can’t remember ever having seen them clearly in full view, and I certainly never saw them outside of their home. I did catch occasional glimpses of one or the other of them, behind the white, lacy curtains across their windows. But nothing more than glimpses; nothing substantial. They did use what I thought was a code to communicate with our neighbours on the right, Mr and Mrs Wilks. I discovered this code quite by accident one day as I sat in one of the favourite places I had for playing, reading or whatever, the broad, wooden window-sill of our window looking out onto the street.

Things were fairly quiet on this particular day when I heard the sudden clatter of wooden clogs from next door, and scurrying across the street to the spinsters pebble-dashed house went Mrs Wilks, apron strings and hair flying in the wind. She cut a fairly dashing figure as I recall. A sash window opened briefly at the spinsters’ house, something was said, then back across the street Mrs Wilks came, faster I think than she went. The spinsters’ window was slid quickly down and I just caught sight of a small white card being whisked away from the upper section of the window that had opened. That was the code. Whenever the spinsters required something from the shops, a small, strategically placed white card would bring a speedy response from the two furiously pumping legs of Mrs Wilks.

I would then picture the activity of Mrs Wilks next door: a quick flick of a comb through wispy, grey hair before her hat, now nicely warmed after the cat had been evicted, was placed on her head with a quick downward thrust of both hands. Her ears had disappeared and you could only just make out two eyes peering out from under the brim. Almost ready. I would imagine Mrs Wilks mentally ticking items off her checklist of ‘things to do before I go shopping for t’ ladies across t’ street’, then off she would go, the front door slamming behind her, the rapid clatter of her wooden clogs, the blur of her form bent forward like a sprinter in a race as she flashed past the window. The sound of her clogs grew fainter as she rounded the corner of the street towards the shops, until all was quiet again. The message had been received and understood, and the latest mission for the spinsters was under way.

I wondered if those two spinsters knew of some deep, dark secret concerning Mrs Wilks and were threatening to expose her is she didn’t cooperate. (My boyish mind sought answers down some rather strange pathways at times, I can tell you.) The truth was probably much simpler, that Mrs Wilks received some small financial reward for her kind services rendered.

Whatever the situation, she was a goer, and active with it, our Mrs Wilks.

Dennis Crompton © 1994

Step into reality

By gum, it's quiet, I thought to myself as I walked over to the style, the vantage point where I kept my eye on things. It was about 9.15 am on a Bank Holiday Saturday in August, in about 1938, and the weather was warm. There should have been people about. They wouldn't all be sleeping in, would they?

Then my ears caught the shrill sound of a distant train whistle and I turned to face the direction of the railway line. Yes, there it was - pulling up the slight incline with a line of carriages behind it, puffing and panting, smoke and sparks flying out of the funnel. Of course! The realisation now came to me. It was the holiday train, come to take people from Londridge to Preston and then on to Blackpool! (Once a year a passenger train would travel up on the line for the great event, a distance of some seven miles. At all other times only goods trains travelled the line.)

I remember suddenly getting quite agitated thinking of who I could ask so that I could go on the train too. I knew deep down that it just wasn't possible, but my mind wouldn't let go of the idea. My excitement at seeing the train made my brain think furiously hard. What could I do to make it possible for me to go?
The the train whistle sounded again. It was coming back down the line! Little sounds of frustration bubbled up from my stomach into my throat, in small panicky snatches as I hopped from one foot to the other. It was all so unfair, I said to myself, very close to tears now.

The train was now picking up speed as it moved down the incline. Its carriages were crammed full and people were leaning out of every window, waving or holding long coloured streamers and calling out happily to other people leaning out of their windows. As their journey began they were unaware of the lonely boy standing on the style watching them go, with a very heavy heart, taking another step on his journey into the world of reality.

All too soon it was quiet again. My mind turned over the various reasons why it was not possible for me to have gone to Blackpool too. It was all very clear really. We just couldn't afford it. I knew, that if it had been at all possible, my Dad would have made sure that I was on that train.

I didn't tell anyone how I felt; we all had to face such times of disappointment. So, I brushed away my tears and after a while found something else to occupy myself. But that is one Bank Holiday that stands out very clearly in my mind, to this day.

Dennis Crompton © 1997

Sundays and pastry

We didn't have much in the way of furniture or clothes, etc, during the Depression, but from my point of view we still enjoyed many things as a family. Our Sunday dinners saw the table full of good food and the sideboard loaded with pies or cakes my eldest sister, Hilda, had baked. Hilda faced a daunting task in looking after us. (Note: our mother had died when I was one year old, and when she was old enough, my eldest sister, Hilda, left school to look after us all.)

Hilda had only just turned 14 but she and Dad and felt that we could manage if we all did our bit. For Hilda, it was a very large bit, but she gave it a go. Sometimes the baking or cooking would not be quite right and she would worry about it, and there were probably a few grumbles, but they were few and far between. We dined very well indeed.

Today, sometimes, a tune from the radio will strike a chord and my mind will fill with scenes from the times when Hilda would be baking. First, the dining room table would be scrubbed clean. Then the flour would be weighed, other ingredients added, mixed then turned out onto baking trays or cake tins.

The fire would have been stoked beforehand, or the gas oven set to heat up. The radio would be playing and I knew that soon, deliciously mouth-watering smells would start to fill the room. I helped, along with my sister, Jean, to mix the butter and sugar, clean out the tins and bowls after mixing, and tasting this and that to make sure that everything was right.

Pastry seemed so easy to make watching Hilda. It was allowed to stand before cutting, otherwise it would shrink when it was baked. The pastry would be placed carefully over the plate already greased lightly with a piece of butter, pressed gently down, then, holding the plate up in one hand, it was turned slowly around while the excess pastry was cut from the outsides of the plate, to fall in a long string on the table.

Next, the filling - apples, rhubarb, blackberries, blackcurrants, apricots, or whatever we could gather or find. After the fillings, the top was carefully trimmed as before. Then the prongs of a fork would put in a nice decorative edge to the pie along with three cuts in the middle to let the steam out when it was baking. The pies looked so neat and scrummy lined up on the table ready for the oven. And later, when we sat down to our meal, there would be a spread of good wholesome food on the table, and more on the sideboard, just in case.

Depression there was, all around us. But somehow we, like lots of others, found in the ordinary things of life, something to sustain, delight and encourage us.

As I think over those times today, I marvel at the way my sister, Hilda, managed to cope with all the things that faced her. She did cope, and in the coping made it possible for us to be together as a family in our own home, and for that I am so very grateful to her. And when I think of 'home', the picture in my mind that best describes that word to me is the image of the family times we shared together at 1 Pump Street, Longridge, enjoying food around our table for our Sunday dinner.

Dennis Crompton © 1996

When I was a boy

Here are some various memories of my boyhood.

Sometimes a song on the radio takes me back to when I was a boy, back to before transistor radios and TV which were still progressing through their pregnancy, back to the days of monotonously grey Sunday afternoons. There was one thing that lifted my spirits though, as my eldest sister, Hilda and I would sometime visit friends in Lytham St Annes. There were two people living in their fine big house and though I met the lady, I only heard the man’s voice - one of those deeply masculine voices that strongly suggested he’d be interesting to meet. A pity I didn’t, but I smelt him, or rather his cigars. The aroma filled the house, came out to meet you as the door was opened, and then, reluctant to let you go, clung to your hair and clothing for quite some time after you’d left, but it was such a delicious aroma to my young senses. My dad only smoked cigarettes, the smoke from which would catch at my throat and make my eyes water so that I often had a headache, but it did put me off smoking for life without dad’s lectures.

‘Now lad’, he’d say, ‘I don’t want thee takin’ up smoking fags, tha’ can see what its doin’ to me … and another thing, I don’t want thee takin’ to drink, it’s a mug's game, and another thing, leave women alone too’.

I can laugh now, I mean I was still wearing short pants. I never had any money to buy fags and if I had it would have gone on sweets, but the lecture would be given at various stages of my development, even to when I was home on leave as a soldier in the British army... But back to our friends at Lytham St Annes.
Their sitting room was very much in the grip of Victoriana; it enveloped you as you entered, its heavy atmosphere aided and abetted by the sombre colours of the wallpaper. An attempt had been made to lighten the effect with a frieze at picture-hook height, but failed. Anonymous drapes and floor coverings continued the theme for those imprisoned there and for those visiting. I usually sat at the table, covered with a thick velvet cloth; the table, is, though I wouldn’t be surprised if children were also similarly draped if their decibel rating dared to quiver a notch or two above low. The cloth helped absorb the sound of small hands fiddling with children’s books, selected for their contents of an uplifting nature, the illustrations of which were drawn by some poor mind in the grip of, 'Thou shalt not amuse, enlighten nor arouse interest with thy work’. There was a piano in one corner but it was always closed and another cloth was found to cover it.

The quietness that reigned was disturbed from time to time by the occasional shuffle as a body repositioned its uncomfortable part on a chair or someone stifled a cough; then the rustle of thin paper as a page was turned in a book, the very sound informed you it was of a religious nature and therefore allowable. Thus to my young mind was the silence followed by more silence; long, dry, heavy silence so that even the sound of birds seemed muted, like the soft whisper of feminine voices anxious not to disturb religious conventions or dear papa; at least the cough indicated someone was alive in there. Hand in hand with such dreary formalities went a certain imprisoning of the body, and with the body, the mind.

There was little knowledge of anything concerning differences between the genders, discounting outward appearances, voice, occupation and cigar smoking. To have mentioned that certain three-lettered word would have brought down a heavy cloud, dark looks, shallow breathing and a tight-feeling in the stomach for all within earshot of the offending remark. Worse still for me, do-it-yourself pastimes were still in the future with a whole range of woebegone looks and embarrassing hot flushes just waiting to confuse growing boys even more.

I liken those days to a song of that time. My Dad hated it, and so did I. It was dreary, sad and monotonous; the words were grey, the tune was greyer and the singer, usually a woman, was up to her knees in mire: “Can’t help lovin’ that man o’ mine” … still can have that effect on me and bring back those memories and feelings. And then just before World War II started and things in general started to brighten, Dad changed a few of the words to: ‘When he’s been away-hay, it’s a lovely day-hay …’ which went down so well in our family that he changed another, about rain: ‘It looks like rain in cherry-blossom lane’; became … ‘It looks like rain in Pump Street once again’ … as Pump Street was where we lived at that time, and it made us all laugh.

Dad was often a stern and demanding person but now and then he’d let that persona slip and out would appear a warmly humorous and likeable father, the one I’ve come to remember with much affection these days. Especially when he smiled with his eyes smiling too and he’d make a place for me to sit up close to him, hugging me tightly to him. I probably was favoured a little being the youngest of four in the family, moments I recall with much affection. He was my father and I was his son. Happy, happy days!

Dennis Crompton © 2013

A journey

Today on my journey into town

a youth rode by.

His bicycle, with its wicker basket

(a relic from the past)

reminded me of journeys I had made

feet draped over handlebars

of the farm hand's bike.

*

How the wind whistled in my ears,

forcing tears from my eyes.

Sometimes he'd whistle or sing,

and an inner surge of joy

made small irrepressible laughs

bubble from my lips

as we hummed along.

*

Fairgrounds, swings, roundabouts, or

roller-coaster rides never could compare

to riding home that way, for me,

when I was seven.

*

He was young, quiet,

not given to saying much,

but he smiled a lot in a basic friendly way.

He had a good clean country smell

of animals, the barn and hay,

a homely smell to me.

*

He went away,

took another kind of journey,

and the war, you know...

and he never did come back.

I was glad, and sad,

as I remembered him today.

*

Dennis Crompton © 1998

Black Magic

It was dreary at times, going through the Depression years, but one day I discovered that Dad had a way of his own to brighten things up a bit. When it happened, it would be on a Saturday afternoon. He would suddenly look at me and say, "How about some Black Magic then, Den?" Smiling, I would agree. He would produce half a crown and off I'd go to a pub about 10 minutes walk up the street.

As first I felt very small and uncertain going into the pub. What if a policeman should see me? But Dad had said it would be alright as I would only be getting Black Magic chocolate , or icecream or even dandelion and burdock fizzy drink. And in I'd go.

It was a strange place to me at first. The gleaming glassware, the solid timber and highly polished furniture, but I did enjoy the heady assortment of smells. I'd take several slow deep breaths; it was so nice.

None of my mates ever saw me going into the pub. I always hoped I'd be seen going in there. I wanted to hear them ask me what I was doing, going into t' pub. I would have felt just a little bit superior-like, being able to say to them:

"Oh, I often go into t' pub; I'm well know there you know."

But they never did ask me and my moment of superiority was lost.

Well anyway, that's where I got those special little Depression-time treats - the Black Magic chocolate, the icecream and the fizzy drink. If I had bought the icecream, then by the time I arrived home it would be just at the right stage of runniness that I liked. It tasted so rich and creamy, and was worth a few minutes walk up the road. Then, the Depression didn't seem so bad.

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

I am a father now

I am a father now, I tell you, I was there …
feeling and sharing in a secondary way
something of the searing pains my dear wife felt that day.
*
It was interminably long for her
as slowly, push by gasping … crying … straining … push
those intermittent hot pulsating surges
stretched more her pelvic frame and cervix.
This, midst low caring murmurings of her doctor and the nurses
who came and checked and whispered
went … came back again … assisted
then left us for a while, mother- and father to-be.
*
And I, helpless and with deep concern did watch
I squeezed her hand and wiped her brow
and kissed her damp, untidy perspirated hair.
From time to time, staff came and went
in crisp clean antiseptic gowns
and in-between they peered and talked and peered some more
and she, submitted to all this invading hurt
as on her crumpled sheets she wrestled there.
*
At least that’s what I thought, imagined it must be for her
I had not realized she saw beyond the drawn-out anguish of her bed.
She knew her body must become a door to motherhood
paining life’s miracle to the light of day.
*
And as a father I can tell you now, it was most wondrous to
behold the moment when my daughter entranced forth,
her tiny body holding so much hope,
as her first blessed helpless human sounds my heart did touch.
*
I had not thought when first began the process to this did span,
that it would be as I experienced now, and I first kissed this babe
of ours upon her lovely, soft and tender brow.
*
And even now, these many years gone by
my arms do feel again in memories treasured times,
her so small body snuggled warm against my chest.
And ‘membering when I first did look upon her face,
I feel those unashamed tears again spill from my eyes.
*
I am her father still, my wife and Love’s best gift,
and will they ever know what word means to me?
I, am a father now.
*
© Dennis Crompton 1994

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

Images

'Clear Thinking' by Richard Price, www.richardprice.nl

In a small back room or cloistered cell

recalling things we know so well

our minds a store of cascading scenes

a glorious kaleidoscope of inner dreams.

*

In country now mid-grove of trees

breathe delicate aroma of scented breeze

beneath my feet the good rich earth

enchanted by choir of wind and birds.

*

Oft' in the darkness of the night

with wonderful eye of inner sight

strolling again remembered places

kiss and caressing familiar faces.

*

Stored personal images we thus renew

uplifting spirit with treasured views

so may people where'er we be,

blessed with our own humanity.

© Dennis Crompton 1996

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

A good time?

How good it was to be alive,

feeling, enjoying my exuberance of spirit,

slim teenager then, still foot and fancy free...

I strolled with ease the main streets of our city,

looked kindly on those who looked kindly on me.

*

Then there came towards me, smiling,

a slim and fresh teenager like myself.

In the midst of people passing on the pavement,

she came up close, and speaking softly said to me,

Hello. Would you like a good time, with me?

*

I smiled, shook my head, and walked on

before what she'd said had registered with me.

I stopped, turned  'round, saw people watching,

knowing, as I knew, what she'd just offered,

bewildered she'd just propositioned me.

*

A few work mates would have laughed

and mocked my quick innocent rejection.

What they'd have done had they been in my place...

but, oh, how sad I felt as I looked on that maiden,

I never could have used her as she'd suggested then.

*

Where is she today, I wonder?

How often have I thought on that,

that and her thoughts on my refusal that day.

Was it her looks, her form or personality

I disapproved of, rejecting what she had to say?

*

I do wish I'd had

the chance once to meet her,

on equal terms, both innocent and unstained.

How different then would have been our conversation,

leading to who knows? Well, I think a better way.

*

© Dennis Crompton 1985

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

Poised in time

Now in these golden moments poised in time

despite age and growing quantity of years

my mind an open window on the past

recalls selected scenes banishing errant fears.

*

How far I’ve come, experienced so much

stored deep now in the library of my mind

and just to think presents choices I may make

re-liveable in such depth for me to contemplate.

*

Now it seems I sense a wonder deeper different intent

permitting more enjoyment than at their first event

as if time has added its own surprising invention

bestowing them with distinct extra dimensions.

*

Some recollections sad maybe or too depressing

I filter out keep separate most of the time

knowing they’re there balances my considerations

imparting light and shade to the continuum of my life.

*

An insight now suggests humanity’s real aim

is above and beyond that of daily sustentation

our body a mere container of some unseen chrysalis

transforming more dare I say by inner revelation

of earth’s humanities special chosen destination.

*

Should I be wrong some critics surely will inform me

let them prove it, good on them if they can

I’ve merely used the things as man inherited

bestowed at birth, fulfilling part of the Designer’s plan.

*

So now in golden days still remaining to me

despite age and growing infirmity of years

I view with my enriched mind’s almost completed journey

reliving moments to cherish and to cheer.

*

Dennis Crompton © 1995

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

My father's fare-welling eyes

When last I looked

on all that was precious to me then,

life before me ever widening, so exciting,

fighting so strongly those inner young man urges …

stay… or… go!

and thus my mind in quite a turmoil reasoned.

 *

‘I’ll go,’ I’d say,

‘No opportunities available here;

nothing really to make me stay.’

Then this thought, conqueror for a while,

eased the struggle, made me smile.

New country, opportunities to make new friends

‘Yes, it’s time to get away,’ I’d say.

 *

Wait a minute now, are you sure?

What of your family?

Winter’s coming and Dad’s not well …

This inner battle surged to and fro,

but I accepted at last the challenge to go.

 *

In some ways that part was easy

with me still wet behind the ears.

So with brother, two elder sisters

and father beside me, I took me leave,

whispering tearfully my choked goodbyes.

 *

The years have passed quickly as they do,

my last goodbye often accusing -

somewhere deep inside my head -

wishing I could relive again

the words I spoke back then:

 *

‘Only five years, Dad.

Just a few years, Dad, I’ll be away.

You know I must go, Dad?’

And his eyes taking their last look of me

so nearly persuaded me to stay.

 *

He knew, of course

our hold on life is so very tenuous,

no guarantees that our mortal plans

will necessarily reach their end …

and so it’s often been since last I looked

into my father’s fare-welling eyes.

 *

Dennis Crompton © 1995

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

Mind reading

I was in a gathering of people in a building where a guest poet of no mean reputation was presenting one of her poems, shown large on a screen for all to see (the poem, that is to say).

The poet wandered round, reading with hand-held microphone, her voice adding meaning not discernible in the words on the screen. Her reading ended, we were invited to respond, some did, and then she came over to me.

I told her my mind had been side-tracked at approximately line eight …

‘Would you mind reading it now, aloud, and then perhaps you could explain what side-tracked you?’ she asked me. So, I did and at the end, I explained that I had recalled an event when I was about 17, and carried along with my remembrances, her poem slipped from my mind … and I apologised again for my lack of concentration.

I’d been reminded of a girl I knew back then and wondered why she’d put on such false airs. Why couldn’t she just be herself? Was she afraid of letting those around know what her real self was like? I said it made me angry when she spoke in her small, pretended shy and self-effacing kind of way … as if her listeners would be shocked, offended if she was to talk naturally, be straightforward in what she had to say. I thought, perhaps she was inhibited by the body language and social standing of those around her, though I wasn’t sure what that meant … I was confused, I said, and then fell silent … but the poet urged me to continue …

‘I saw that girl again tonight,’ I said, ‘clear and unconfused now in my mind; what I’d said of her was just not true, the problem was with me, not her… At 17 I was still immature, inhibited, afraid, held back by what others might think of me … and had been until I accepted the ethic of my own true self.’

She smiled, and just before moving on, one point of her poem was made as she asked quietly:

'I hope you didn’t mind reading …?'

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

George, and leaving England

Here’s a picture of me as a happy chappie working at Ribble Motors workshop, Frenchwood, Preston, where I worked alongside (George) Jersey Fijalkowski from Radom, Poland, over two years from 1952-1954. He was very important in my life at the time because he was the one who pointed me in the direction of New Zealand.

One day George brought me a cutting from the Lancashire Evening Post, regarding the Royal New Zealand Air Force seeking recruits from amongst ex-British Service men.

That got me thinking. Did I want to stay in this life, or forge a new life for myself? Here were some of my thoughts at the time as I continued working with my colleagues amongst the noise and bustle of the Ribble Motors workshop:

• I had all sorts of chats and discussions with mates on the floor of the bus chassis reconditioning team, including a chat with Paddy who told me that, ‘All the world’s a stage. Do you know that Dennis?’ Paddy was someone who made Shakespeare come alive before my very eyes as he quoted, danced and acted, on the shop floor;
• Pat, well he was a thinker, a philosopher and my first ‘university teacher’, teaching me to think beyond myself;
• Tony was in charge of our work bench and was my immediate under-boss; a quiet and ordinary, patient, likeable man, who encouraged me;
• Another round-face jovial type (whose name I forget) who ‘annealed’ the copper tubing which carried grease around the chassis of the bus; he annealed the tubing by throwing it onto a heap of red-hot embers then dumped the piping into cold water. This then made the piping soft and pliable ready to be replaced around the chassis to take grease to vital points such as the brake pedal and clutch pedal;
• Plus others who gathered around our work bench for stolen moments to chat, exchange ideas or plan to walk somewhere on Saturday in the country together to enjoy each other’s company. We had some hilarious times together, with many of us joining Harry Freeman’s group as we planned where to take our August holiday that year…;
• Harry Freeman was a secondary-school teacher who led a group of young people at a Boys’ and Girls’ Mixed Club. He taught us that an interesting world lay outside Preston, a world comparatively easy to travel around, proving that by having a group at his home once a month to decide where, for how long, and how we would manage a holiday away. And we did just that in 1951 by having a week’s holiday at a big house that we felt looked like a castle at Lochgilphead, in Scotland. We had a great time, showing ourselves that we could escape the grime and humdrum life of Preston as we began to explore the world around us.

This picture of George is exactly were he used to stand re-assembling the diesel motors, while I, to one side stripped them, placing the parts in wire baskets for Jock to put through the degreasing plant. Skilled and semi-skilled side by side were great boosters to me 'shifting miself' so that when the question came: 'Why don't you go to New Zealand?' I was ready.

• Lastly, as mentioned, there was 'George' (Jersey Fijalkowski from Radom in Poland), who must have seen my wonderings and mind wanderings as I questioned my work mates, increasing my general knowledge on a whole range of subjects. He took an interest in me and decided it was about time I lifted my sights; it was time to move on. I didn’t know where to think about going until George asked me: ‘Why don’t you go to New Zealand?’ And he handed me the clipping from the Lancashire Evening Post….

George's home town of Radom in Poland

Looking back, I know I was the lucky one in our street who escaped to New Zealand. Thank you George.

Dennis Crompton © 1998
(first published www.denniscrompton.wordpress.com 2013)

Financial enterprises

I'm sure you've heard it said that, 'Money makes the world go around’; usually by those who have plenty. We of the, 'Never have enough to go around’ brigade also know that money has to be earned before it can be spent. Or does it? Examples abound of people using a variety of methods to get their sticky hands on someone else's hard earned cash. Believing in the law that there is one born every minute, they operate, I'm told, under the guise of second-hand car salesman, consultant, solicitor and accountant. You probably know some of them.

I must have been about nine or ten when I learned to use my ‘thinkery’ to get some money. It was spring. The weather was warm and sunny and none of my friends were in sight. I was alone. Something was needed to put an end to the feeling of despondency growing within me. An ice-cream would help, that, or some lollies. I did torment myself at times. But I was still a few years from puberty, you see, and my stomach was sort of stand-in for what I came to know later, as my sex-drive. It's not so far fetched. Satisfy the stomach and you've got a happy male. It's also true with sex, I'm very pleased to say. The thing was, I had no money. No one I knew had money for such luxuries.

The decision to walk slowly down the street looking closely at where the pavement ended in a gutter for rain water was my first attempt. My thinking told me that this was a regular bus stop from where I lived then for a seven mile bus ride into the main town, Preston. Folks getting onto the bus sometimes dropped a coin or two as they fumbled in their purse or pocket and didn't always find all the coins lost. Great place to start I reckoned and if I told you that I'd only gone a few steps when I found my first penny, you'd probably raise an eyebrow and question my memory. But it's true. There it was, round, copper-brown and lovely, just off the footpath. It was instant happiness the moment I picked it up. Oh yes. I resisted the impulse to dash to the shop and splash out and with head down continued on down the street and found another penny. There was no stopping me now. I took to my heels for a real splurge. I don't remember what I bought but I enjoyed the experience very much. There was such a selection. Chocolate walnut whirls, Spanish rolls, liquorice sticks, sherbert dabs, and assorted toffees to chew until my jaw ached. And the rest of the day went very well. Oh yes!

I didn't tell anyone else, that would have meant a decrease in the potential for success later. I did discover another way of getting my hands on some sticky money. At that time on most streets where I lived, each house had a cellar. The cellar had a window and to let in some light a metal-grating was fixed into the footpath above the window. Sometimes, if you looked down through these gratings you could see the odd coin amongst the accumulated rubbish. More, if the gratings were in front of shop windows. It was a case then of having some collateral to start you off on a new financial enterprise. You had to have some chewing gum, some chewing gum and a stick, the stick had to be long enough to poke down through the grating; now, with the chewing gum at one end of the stick you were in business. Find a shop, sweet or cakes shops were usually the best. Look for a coin, lower the stick down through the grating, pop the sticky end onto the coin and carefully lift it up. It works. I've done it, several times. The shop-owners don't like it. They move you on, sharpish like. 'Come on now. Don't stand there cluttering up the footpath. You make the place look untidy. Off you go.' The truth is, they don't like to see their fringe benefits being whisked away from under their noses by kids.

But for enterprise and cheek, one kid I saw outside a shop took some beating. As a youngish woman came his way, he started crying, with real tears. The woman stopped and asked him what he was crying for. He pointed down the grating, sobbing that he'd lost the sixpence his grandmother had given him to buy some bread. The young woman opened her purse and gave him sixpence, patted his head, smiled and walked on. He must have pocketed quite a nice little sum in the short time I watched. It ended abruptly as his last victim was opening her purse. Another lady hurried over from across the street. Seized the boy and boxed his ears soundly, explaining as she did so that she had watched him pull the same trick for the past ten minutes.

I don't know if the boy stopped earning money that way. If he did, it would be because he'd come up with a better scheme for getting ladies to part with a portion of their house-keeping, without getting his ears boxed. Today, he's probably the chairman of some corporate business organization, pension fund, or employed as a financial consultant for the government. I'll tell you this though, if he is, he'll never get his hands on any of my money. I don't make enough you see. Well there's P.A.Y.E., G.S.T. tax on savings and numerous other taxes whilst I'm still alive. And it doesn't stop when I pop off; then there'll be death duties, the undertaker's fee and plot fee, and in order to ensure I stay where I'm put, the family will likely insist on a headstone. For a fee of course and another for keeping it free of moss and lichens. The list is endless.

There must be some way of getting a bit of it back, surely. If I could only contact the young lad I saw that day; he may have already passed on of course, if he has, I'll bet he came up with something really novel, like earning a steady income from passers-by at the cemetery, dropping coins into a slot he had fixed into his headstone, with the words:

'Need a friend on the other side? Your donation will help.'

Which I think is the last word on the matter, until we get to the other side, that is. Goodness only knows what awaits us there.

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

Shepherd Street Mission Children's Home

The interior of Shepherd Street Mission School showing a class in session

Here's some more information on the Shepherd Street Mission, Preston, Lancashire, the organisation that ran the Children's Home where I spent the first six years of my life, along with my two sisters and brother after our mother died. Our father was eventually able to take us home again, more of which I have written on my blogsite. The text in this post is taken from the website, listed below.

In 1876, Joshua Williamson, a Preston grocer was so moved by an encounter with two homeless children that he resolved to tackle the growing issue of destitution in the town. Joshua established a Mission, holding non-denominational meetings in Rose Street. The organisation rescued children and provided temporary accommodation for homeless adults.

In 1879 the charity acquired an old weaving factory in Shepherd Street which could accommodate a hundred people. Just a year later it was extended to accommodate fifty more.

The charity, initially called the Shepherd Street Mission, grew rapidly as the need to rescue children from the dangers of homelessness and poverty became critical. The mission was not state-aided. It maintained itself with subscriptions and donations from the Preston public, along with initiating and operating its own firewood business.

In 1900 Joshua Williamson gave up his business in order to devote himself to looking after the children. The charity by now had acquired property to accommodate the needy - both adults and children - in Laurel Street, Berry Street and Oxford Street.

Crow Hill House, in Oxford Road became the primary children's home and underwent much adaptation through the vast social changes of the last century.

The main premises were eventually sold to the NSPCC in 1989. The Shepherd Street Mission became the Shepherd Street Trust.

A committee was now formed to manage the Trust funds raised from the sale of the Mission's assets: the achievement of the people of Preston.

For more information, go to www.shepherdstreettrust.co.uk

The Trust is still very active, assisting those in need, under age 21, within a 50 mile radius of Preston Town Hall.

My lone search

It was a cold December day when I walked from the bus stop towards the church where my mother and father were married. St. Nicholas’s church was about five minutes’ walk from the bus stop and I had to walk briskly to keep warm. I’d made the journey from New Zealand back to England in search of my family history, particularly about my mother who had died when I was a baby, and who I had never known.

It took me some time to find the vicar who was on his way out of the vicarage to visit a parishioner. He was very helpful however, as he opened up two safes and left me to it. The Banns, Marriages and Death Registers kept me busy for some time as I was really keen to find my mother’s signature in the Marriage register. Seeing it, I thought, would help to give me a clearer image of the mother I never knew.

I found it, and I treasured the opportunity to see it. It was more than enough to see that, and to have walked up the path and into the church, down the aisle to the front, where I imagined my Mum and Dad holding hands, and gazing into each other’s eyes. They would have been hearing the words I heard then in my head:

“Whom God hath joined together, let no man put asunder”

…and no man did. Instead, death came and took her away, and separated them forever.

It was years later before I quietly asked my father when were alone one day: ‘Dad, what was my mother really like?’

I’d asked him a couple of times before but he could get no further than saying wistfully, and with emotion, ‘She was a lovely, warm-hearted woman, Den; we were soul-mates…’ and he could get no further as his eyes filled up…

I stopped asking after that, as I could see that it distressed him so. But it distressed me too for I longed to know more of the mother who had loved me; the mother I never knew. That day in December though I’d gained a little more for my mind’s picture. I’d been in that church, seen their signatures together, stood where they stood, and some years later I was able to get a copy of their Marriage Certificate.

As I left the church, the vicarage was closed and I had nowhere to leave the keys entrusted me by the vicar. I would loved for him to have been there to chat with me about the history that linked me to his church. I walked back across the main road to a school, which was probably the church school and found two or three people in the staffroom. After introducing myself, I gave them the keys and then because I was so very cold I requested a cup of coffee. They were very happy to oblige, offered me a seat and some biscuits too, and were keen to ask me about New Zealand and hear about the reason for my journey.

It was almost 1.30 p.m. as I left to walk back to the bus stop. The grey skies and the penetrating cold, combined with the fact that I was on my own made it easier to leave. St Nicholas Church records, otherwise I may have stayed there forever, connected slightly to my mother.

And I offer my thanks to the vicar for the willingness to assist me and to entrust his valuable records and keys to me. He had helped me in the search for my own identity, for which I am most grateful.

Dennis Crompton © 1998
(first published www.denniscrompton.wordpress.com 2013)