May 2022 – only here for the cricket

Grown-Up Wisdom and the Boy Wonder Jnr

My sister’s brood of three collectively straddle the Threshold of Sleep Attractiveness, that point in one’s life where sleep changes from being a nuisance—something that gets in the way of relentless energetic activity, to an impossibly addictive drug that one simply can’t get enough of.

Thus the elder two are largely impossible to prise from their beds of a morning, whereas the youngest still rises early, and forcibly resists all encouragements to return to his bed of an evening. I am unsure as to when exactly this threshold is reached in life, but suspect it is automatically awarded to a child upon attaining the status of Teenager.

So it was, as I descended kitchenwards on Saturday morning, somewhat bleary-eyed after a night of fighting for sleep against the noisy soundtrack of a neighbour’s garden party (having triumphed in the fight only when I belatedly remembered the existence of my earplugs at 1.30am), that I was accosted by The Boy Wonder Jnr, who appeared to have been up for hours, demanding to be taken to the park. He needed to do an experiment, he said, having watched a YouTube video which had demonstrated that it was possible to drop a raw egg from a helicopter, several hundred feet above the ground, onto grassy turf, and the egg wouldn’t break. It was in the Guinness Book of World Records, apparently.

I was sceptical, and attempted to stave off the park excursion, protesting that I didn’t have access to a helicopter. I even tried applying Grown-Up wisdom, suggesting that it really might not work, but he was adamant in the way that an excitable nine-year-old sometimes is of a morning, and after I had breakfasted we set off to the park, armed with permission to raid two eggs from his mother’s kitchen, and some gloves and a food recycling bag, just in case.

On arriving in the park he threw an egg as far up in the air as he could, to replicate, as best he could, the altitude of a helicopter, and watched as it came down.

It exploded on impact. With quite a satisfying “pop”.

We repeated it with the second egg, over a patch of slightly longer grass, so as to make it scientifically official, or something, but only managed the same result.

The Boy Wonder Jnr was crestfallen. I was secretly pleased, that Grown-Up wisdom had triumphed over YouTube.

The previous evening, Radio 2 was playing in the kitchen during dinner, when the opening bars of Sweet Caroline drifted over from the portable speaker, bringing a degree of animated excitement from the Grown-Ups present. It’s very hard to not experience a lift in your spirits when Sweet Caroline comes on, at least if you’re a certain age.

Alexa was instructed to turn up 3, and I was so inspired I grabbed the nearest musical instrument and played along. Regrettably, the nearest instrument was a recorder belonging to the Boy Wonder Jnr, and it’s been a number of decades since I tried my hand at recorder-playing. Accordingly, the resulting accompaniment was subtly off-key, perhaps on account of my rustiness, and perhaps not being quite in the correct key to start with. And a slightly out-of-tune recorder, being played badly, is quite something.

Inspired by his uncle’s musical virtuosity, the Boy Wonder Jnr commandeered the instrument, and began to play something that was, if anything, even more tuneless and out of key.

And so it was that the recorder was wrestled from his grasp by my sister and deposited unceremoniously in the food recycling bin.

The Boy Wonder Jnr was, again, crestfallen, and tried to remove it, whereupon I realised the genius of my sister, who has been a nanny/childminder for decades, and has learned a trick or two.

‘No! It’s been in there with the raw chicken. It’ll need sterilised before it can be played again…’

This was perhaps more Grown-Up Cunning, than Wisdom, per se, but worthy of respect all the same.

I mentally doffed my cap.

In the footsteps of Beckham

Hackney Marshes, 6am. The sun is up, but only just, and the vast expanse of grass is still damp with dew. There are a few fellow runners out at this hour, along with a dog walker or two, as I circumnavigate a number of cricket outfields, and several football pitches. It was on these pitches that a young David Beckham honed his skills, maybe even was spotted.

I am reasonably confident that any athletics coaches in the vicinity will not be spotting me today, as I lumber around the white-lined perimeter of pitch N7. The mercury is to hit 26C today, and even at this unearthly hour it’s warming up.

Multiple circuits complete, I run back along the towpath by the River Lea, over a deserted footbridge, and past several tied-up barges with quirky names.

A fox emerges from the bushes, and darts back in again, before I have time to question if it was the culprit responsible for distributing the contents of my sister’s food bin across the garden path during the night, and then defecating in the middle of the gateway. On arriving back home, I find myself increasingly keen to find a fox to help me with my enquiries in this matter, as I clear up all the food detritus before the heat of the day causes a stink.

Today’s work venue is Chingford, where David Beckham went to school, as it happens. It’s my sixth day there, and all has gone well, apart from some momentary confusion on Day 1 when I blindly followed the citybound crowds at Clapton down to Platform 1, when I really needed to be on the quieter Platform 2, heading out of town, towards Essex and the M25.

I experienced the glory of the M25 on Friday night, heading north to visit some old friends for the weekend, but despite my trepidation it was child’s play compared to the static queues on the M1. However, I was in no rush, and made it in time to have a decent burger near Kenilworth Road, prior to taking in a raucous first leg of Luton Town’s Championship play-off v Huddersfield Town.

There followed a weekend of mostly sitting around in the sunshine, watching play at the local cricket club, who conveniently have their ground just on the other side of my friends’ garden gate, making it perhaps the best back garden known to man. Cricket-loving man, at any rate.

So, the London leg of the tour has been a reasonable success. I am developing quite a fondness for bagels from the Jewish bakery on Brick Lane, and crumpets, and the warmer temperatures.

This weekend I head southwest to Horsham for the next date on the tour. I am unsure if David Beckham ever made it to Horsham. I shall enquire.

Moments on the M6

Thursday in Wombourne was a picture of how I imagine an English country village looks in the summertime. The sun obligingly came out, and the first floor windows of the practice where I was training overlook the village green – an immaculate cricket ground in the centre, flanked by tennis courts and leafy trees. There was no cricket on Thursday, but there was some village tennis going on from time to time.

The day’s work done, I pit-stopped at McDonald’s, and then hit the road for London.

Prior to leaving Edinburgh, conscious of the amount of time I would be spending in the car, I lined up a few playlists for the journeys. I’ve been doing this since the days when making an actual mixtape was required. It is a somewhat faster process in the mp3 era.

For this trip, I decided to playlist some classic albums, all of which I worked my way through as I headed down the road from Edinburgh on Monday.

For the Wolverhampton-London leg on Thursday I kicked off with August & Everything After.

Something I love about music is the way that a single specific phrase in a piece can arrest your attention, and no matter what you are doing at the time, compel your attention to drop everything else, tune in, and savour that one moment again, every time you hear it. It doesn’t matter how many times you’ve heard it, and the song itself might not even be a favourite – the moment itself transcends the song.

There’s a syncopated horn part right at the end of U2’s Stuck In A Moment You Can’t Get Out Of. It’s subtly low in the mix, you have to listen to pick it out. And it only appears once, in the penultimate repeat of the chorus. But I can feel its approach as the song nears its conclusion, and it brings a smile every time. Many times I’ve wondered why they didn’t make more of it, even give it a second airing. But they didn’t, and it remains an almost-hidden gem, and maybe that’s better.

Grieg’s Piano Concerto, second movement. Starts with two full minutes of lush but muted orchestral parts, setting the scene. Then…the piano comes in. A single note, high in the register, not clamouring for your attention, but completely unmistakable. I think it’s the most quietly dramatic entry in music.

And, as ever, it’s all about context. You can’t smash all these little moments of genius together in a highlights reel…they have to be listened to in the surrounding environment of their song to appreciate them.

Arguably, in the same way, songs benefit from being listened to embedded within their albums. It’s where they make the most sense.

Raining in Baltimore is a largely morose, perhaps unexceptional track. But there’s a moment, just before the two minute mark, when the accordion comes in with a slowly descending motif, and it just…lifts.

I enjoy this moment somewhere on the M6, working my way south-eastwards. It might be raining in Baltimore, but the Midlands are dry and warm, the clouds gradually dissipating as the evening wears on, the sun sinking lower, catching my wing mirror first, then appearing in the rear view.

I don’t think I’ve ever driven into London before, certainly not from this direction. I negotiate my way through bustling Wood Green, and feel transported back in time as I reach Stamford Hill, with ultra-orthodox Hasidic Jews materialising in every direction, on foot and on bicycles, sporting black hats, coats and long sidecurls. It’s genuinely surreal.

With the sun now below the London horizon, and just as fat Charlie the Archangel slopes into the room, I turn into my sister’s street in Hackney. A fox darts across the road.

On arrival I learn that Maggie has, this very day, acquired a bass guitar and a practice amp.

I am earplug-ready.

The Boy Wonder and Wolverhampton

On a Saturday, early in April, the Boy Wonder and I made our way east along the Golf Coast Road. He and his mum – my sister – were in Edinburgh for a long weekend. It was a breezy and mostly sunny day in East Lothian. We made quick work of Longniddry, Aberlady and Gullane.

‘Turn your phone off and talk to me,’ I said.

He killed his screen and put it back in his pocket, only semi-reluctantly.

‘Can I drive?’ he asked.

‘You’re thirteen,’ I reminded him.

He seemed to find this an unacceptable reason for his request to be turned down.

On the beach at Yellowcraig, we kick a ball about, with the wind making it awkward, and a bit chilly. We passed and volleyed our way along the beach eastwards.

‘Hang on,’ he said. The football was suspended for a time, while he found a rock pool and attempted to recreate something he saw in a TikTok video. It didn’t work. I suspect trickery may have been involved in the original.

Back in the beach car park, he suggested I let him drive for a bit. I resisted. We set off for North Berwick, and the conversation turned to lunch options. Having earlier hit up McDonalds for Second Breakfast, the gastronomic bar for the day had been set high. My suggestions of “fish and chips” or “a sandwich from Costa” were met with a disapproving silence.

We were no further forward on this most important of issues as we rolled into the neatly kept streets of the East Lothian seaside town, round the one-way loop, past the award-winning toilets, and back up the High Street, passing Greggs.

‘Oooh, Greggs,’ he said. ‘I’ve never been to Greggs, but my friend says you can’t beat it.’

And that was the lunch decision made. We sat on the beach and ate sausage rolls and chicken bakes in the spring sunshine.

‘Well? Was your friend right?’

‘He wasn’t lying.’

Now, one month later almost to the day, I find myself in Wolverhampton. A change of career has landed me here, on three days of training courses, learning about outer ear disorders and cerumenolytics. All in all, I expect to be away from home for a full month. How does one pack for being away for a month?

I wasn’t sure, so I threw the limoncello, some chocolate and a spare pair of pants in the car and set off. I stopped in Moffat, having taken rather longer to get there than I would have liked, finding myself behind an especially-slow-moving caravanette for a long stretch of the Beeftub road.

The public toilets in Moffat, I discovered, are most definitely not award-winning. It’s been a long time since I drove south with any regularity, but many things remain the same. Most of the buildings and shops in Moffat, for example, and certainly their paintwork, which doesn’t appear to have been refreshed in the last twenty years. And the increasing southward busyness of the M6, peaking around Manchester, and settling down thereafter.

Wolverhampton is a new destination for me. It has an interesting-looking mosque, a lot of roundabouts, a city layout designed by someone with a one-way street obsession, and a grimly industrial vibe.

My travelling companion Shona and I were booked into a country hotel near our training venue. I collected my room key at reception, made my way along several corridors, through multiple double-doors, passing bizarrely mirror-lined alcoves along the way, and found my room. On entering it, I was reminded forcibly of Mordor, although I confess I’ve never been.

The paintwork was in poor nick, the taps were tenuously attached to the bathroom sink, the light switch for the bathroom gave way a little on pressing it. There was a bare bulb in the light fitting beside the bed, the shade having been broken by some earlier occupant. The mattress springs in the bed introduced themselves to me, individually, when I lay down. The mains socket nearest the bed didn’t work, but the lamp on the dresser did pass a PAT test in 2018, so that was something.

We stayed one night, Shona faring much worse than I with a sleepless night brought on by a full-scale domestic abuse situation unfolding in the adjacent room, before she headed home, and I beat a retreat to an Airbnb in Wolverhampton.

Tomorrow is the final day of courses, and then it’s on to London, where the Boy Wonder will no doubt want to drive my car again.

I shall resist, again.