The Week That Was – 18th March 1979

Record of the week: Car 67 – Headlight
Highest Entry: Art Garfunkel – Bright Eyes – 27

28th Dec 2021 – I think I checked out the Car 67 song again back when I initially wrote this entry and now, can’t remember a damn thing about it. Art Garfunkel though – ugh. These were the times of realising that popular music was quickly becoming something I hated. I don’t hear this song anywhere in popular culture these days either so perhaps it has been justly forgotten.

18th March 1979
Clocks forward
Boring day
Really
Most days are now
2p 1p

19th March 1979
Same as yesterday
2p

28th Dec 2021 – It’s a shame I couldn’t find anything to write about, or thought that was worth writing about at the time. It was definitely an effort to try to put anything down here every down and there would be long periods when that became normal. I don’t think I have any diaries between 1986 and 1994. I seem to be fairly regularly making 3p per day – making my mum a cup of tea and something else, maybe washing up, though I can clearly view the sink and often still have dreams in this kitchen I don’t recollect ever washing up!

20th March 1979
Got new pair of shoes, wedged
2p 1p

28th Dec 2021 – I was probably costing my mum a fortune with my dodgy feet. These ‘wedged’ shoes would’ve also made me more conscious of standing out from everyone else. It felt like a negative for me and I didn’t appreciate at the time that I was receiving help from others. I found my life to be a hell that everyone wished on me. A lack of self-esteem. I can’t really identify where I developed this from. Perhaps from not having a father figure around? I did often wonder how different my life would have been if my father had been alive for my childhood.

21st March 1979
European Cup Quarter Final (2nd Leg)
Barcelona 1-0 Ipswich
Colehill P-P Cranborne
2p 1p

28th Dec 2021 – There were three middle schools in the catchment area for Queen Elizabeths (High School) in Wimborne. I was at St. Michaels (up the hill in Colehill), Allenbourne was down in the town and Cranborne covered all the rest of the countryside to the north. My house was along one of the catchment borders, or thereabouts. A bit further north and I would have been going to Cranborne too. The bus route is etched in my memory and it always weirded me out that we drove a long way down one road to pick up a couple of kids and then the driver had to reverse into a side track and drive on back again. It felt like it added so much extra time to the journey but it was really only a few minutes.

Throughout this school year and the next, I developed a habit of getting up earlier and earlier, even before the TV programs started in the morning at 6am. If it was too early for TV I would find something on the radio. I would eat biscuits for breakfast with a cup of tea. I encouraged my mum to buy more and more different types of biscuits and I would eat two of each, lining them up in the order of least tasty to delicious. I would take a bite and suck in a mouthful of tea and feel the biscuit crumble in my mouth dispersing its taste within. On and on…if I ran out of tea before biscuits I would make another cup.

22nd March 1979
1. Gloria Gaynor – I Will Survive
2. Elvis Costello – Oliver’s Army
3. Lene Lovich – Lucky Numbers
4. Sex Pistols – Something Else
5. The Real Thing – Can You Feel The Force?
2p 2p

28th Dec 2021 – Seeing Sex Pistols videos on TV was thrilling as all hell to me. Who were these crazy people? There was nothing I could identify with from my beautiful green countryside surrounds. I thought Sid Vicious came from another planet. More and more I wanted to be like that. To shock, upset and offend. This would develop much more strongly in the next school year, got me in a stack of trouble and ultimately confused me and made me bitter. It was a lot of fun at the time, a way to express myself and I soon discovered how boring and straight most people are.

At this stage though, I was just beginning to dive in. I was still teetering on the edge of being a good student and being a rebellious one. It’s fantastic to recognise these exact same traits in some of the kids I teach now. I try my best to encourage them but, fuck, I know exactly what I was like at their age and wouldn’t listen to anyone – especially teachers!

23rd March 1979
Rev.’s got more boring since a couple of weeks ago
2p 2p

28th Dec 2021 – Rev. must have been Religious Education but what the hell did the word Rev. actually mean? I wonder if subjects are still called this?

24th March 1979
Liverpool 2-0 Ipswich
10p

28th Dec 2021 – 10p – I was a money-making machine! It wouldn’t last.