Month: July 2017

Posted on

The younger years

Originally posted 2 July 2017 via Blogger. Copied over like for like 18/03/2024.

 When most people talk about the good old days they remember a fun and adventurous childhood. A childhood that every child should have, a real childhood.
Unfortunately I don’t remember much of my childhood and what  I do remember isn’t anything to shout about..

Until recently I only had a few memories of life before my fifth Christmas. I remember that day very well as it was the last Christmas I received loads of gifts that I wanted. Just a shame they were broken by the adults but we’ll talk about that in a bit.
The majority of my memories now (since I started unlocking my memories) from before the age of five are bad ones. The way I am able to understand which are memories from before five and which are after is where the location was as we moved home at the age of five down the road from the old house.
The not so bad memories are stuff like running up an embankment and throwing thistle thorns off the top of the embankment at people over the hedge. It was fun until one landed on a police mans head, then it was historical to a 4 year old boy I can assure you. I would also go up there around the neighbours garden to the corner house and pick the apples & pears from the trees. Then I would run back with them in my top to a confused mum waiting for me in the kitchen. I remember brief bits about my dad from that age but they are very faded compared to my other memories. Don’t get me wrong I do have memories of a faded figure but it is only the last year I have been able to place most of them as my father as I have only been in contact with him for the past year but we will go into that on another blog.

Other memories are not so good but not as bad as others. Memories like running into a barn door that was closed at the top but not at the bottom. I ran at full speed and pushed the door open only to be wacked in the head at full force with my legs flying up in the air like an animated cartoon. One time I do remember was the cause to my dominant scar on my forehead. I had the scar before Harry Potter made it famous but a strange man without a nose didn’t do this to me, instead it was one of my sisters friends. I was in the front garden playing golf with the clubs my dad left behind when he left, I was having fun knocking the ball from one side of the garden to another where I had dug a couple of holes. My sisters friend came along and asked for a go but I remember telling her no as they were my dads. Next thing i remember she is swinging this club up in the air full force. I am telling her to give it me back but she isn’t listening instead she is still swinging it so as a young boy would I kept on creeping forward telling her to give it me. Next thing I know she is swinging it full force and clobbers me right on the forehead knocking me over and I think even out. Next thing I remember is me on the way to hospital with a tea towel on my head and my mum yelling at me like it was my fault. What did she think I as doing? Committing suicide at the age of 4 with a golf club. I do remember she was more concerned with the fact she was going out that night than my head but hey that’s normal. I don’ remember much more apart from that.
I do have some memories of digging in the garden, riding bikes and playing ball games in the garden as well as in the next door garden. I also remember the beautiful cakes Mrs Cooper used to give us when we played near her garden.

 They say a picture tells a thousand words. These pictures fail to tell me anything as they contradict my memories. The only one I do remember is the Christmas one, that is the fifth Christmas I talked about earlier. I remember getting everything I wanted. I had a football (as you can see in the pic) and I kept that for a few years before it ended up under a van on the lane. I also got a multi game table which had football, snooker and air hockey on it, another smaller pool table and another smaller game table. Unfortunately the “step dad” went out to the pub on Christmas day and came back with a few of the locals who decided they wanted to play with them and break half of them. They were nice like that. I would mention names but it’s best to be nice.
I didn’t have that ball pumped up for a few weeks as no one would pump it up for me. If I remember rightly I asked the neighbour to do it for me eventually.

I also have a few memories no child should have to remember, I have blocked some of these out but not all of them unfortunately. I feel it fair to say before I talk about these I am not doing it to cause any upset or malice, more that I need to get these out of my head. Also a lot of things I write all come together to explain why I am the way I am today.

Anyway as I was saying, a few of my memories start the same way. Myself and my sisters are locked in our rooms whilst my mother and “step dad” are out at the pub. When I say locked I mean there is a rope tied around our door handles with the other end around the hallway banister. One technique I had from a young age is the ability to escape from anywhere. At first I was able to pull on it strong enough to get just enough gap to squeeze through, after the first couple of times I hid a screwdriver in my bedroom (at the age of four) and I would use it to hold the door open. I would then unlock my sisters door so they could get out also. The downstairs doors would be locked as would my mothers bedroom so we were unable to get into any other room other than the hallway (Front door was double locked also) and out rooms. One of the advantages was that they were so drunk when they got home they wouldn’t notice the doors had been opened, I managed to get the ropes back on before they got back but not exactly how they had done them. The first few times when we got out we would just play games with each other but things changed when we were locked in all day whilst they were at the pub and we hadn’t had any tea. It was a warm summers night and we were all starving, My older sisters were thinking of ways to get food however they were unable to open the doors. One of them had a bright idea, lets lift Stevie out of the little window (big one was locked also) so he can go get some food. And so they did, I climbed out of the window and they held a hand each lowering me down. Below the window there was a balcony overshadowing the door and I landed on that. They threw a quilt out for me which was dropped on the floor next to the balcony and I jumped off it onto that. I remember it did hurt a little but I was a typical lad so I didn’t show it. I remember standing there for a couple of minutes whilst my sisters shouted different places where I should go so we can get fed. Eventually I went to the only place I trusted, next door!!! I don’t remember much more about that day apart from the next door neighbour getting angry and marching off to the pub effing and jeffing out loud to go get them.
Another couple of times I remember was my sisters standing at the window shouting to the neighbours that we were in alone with no food or drink. Various neighbours would post biscuits or treats through the letter box for us. One neighbour would give us food to hide in our rooms in case we were locked in’ in the future.

When I say my mother and “step dad” would lock us in…… they weren’t on there own with this action. After the neighbours started getting involved they would get a so called babysitter (once again I won’t mention names despite wanting to so much) who would lock us in the rooms and either go out himself or have people round. Safe to say the neighbours weren’t a big fan of my mother.
Not long after this the local council decided to renovate the houses on the lane and move people around whilst doing so. It was at this point we were re-located just down the lane from 10 to 19.
I will never forget the way we moved that day. Stuff being pushed up the lane on a makeshift truck whilst we were made to carry bags back and forth all day. I will never forget sleeping on the hard wooden floors that night but not caring where I was. I just wanted to sleep.

The other memories I have of my early years were as mentioned above of my father. Some vague some mixed up and some exactly as they were. Until recently my last impression of my father was of him getting angry and putting his hand through a window. I remember seeing the blood everywhere and the next door neighbour hosing it down as it trickled down the driveway.
I do remember playing in the garden with the dogs and him being there sitting on a stool tinkering with  bike. I also remember digging up the garden looking for worms and I am sure he was in the garden with me then also. Apart from that my memories were of him shouting at my mum whilst walking down the road with me and the window thing as mentioned above. That was the last time I was to see him until last year. And so became the placement of the “step father”.

So that’s my younger years in a nutshell. There is a lot more I can add to that but we’ll keep that for another blog.

Thank you for taking the time to read my blog and thank you for the support.

Little Stevie 

Cookie Consent with Real Cookie Banner