Chapter One from 'Somewhere To Lay My Head'

It was 1955 - the year I turned sixteen - when I first experienced that Proustian thing when the smell of something instantly evokes a memory. Puts pictures in your mind. Of course, in those days I'd never heard of Marcel Proust. During that same year I found there was something else just as effective at stirring up memories - music; old records. Proust maybe got the 'smell thing' all to himself, but it was Noel Coward who pointed out that hearing a few bars from a once favourite song could do the same. 'The potency of cheap music' he called it. By 'cheap' he meant popular.

During my first fifteen years I'd had no experience of this phenomenon. I'd had no need of it. I was too busy living my young life - and storing away the memories; good and bad. It was from sixteen onwards, after I'd lost my ma, then was taken away from everything I'd known, that, unbidden, sounds and smells began to regularly flash pictures from my childhood into my head. They were nearly always welcome. Perhaps I'd catch a few bars of the Glenn Miller Orchestra playing 'American Patrol'... immediately I'm four years old and Ma's dancing me round our tenement single-end. If it's not a song, it's a smell. Just a whiff of carbolic soap... I'm up at the Steamie (public wash house) sitting on the draining board reading the Beano as Ma does her weekly wash. The merest hint of Jeyes Fluid... I'm standing in the small toilet in the Blythswood Cinema, short trousers pulled to the side as I have a wee-wee.

* * *

Even now, aged sixty-seven, the stimulus of some song, smell - or sometimes a taste - is enough to open a little door and bring fourth a memory so fresh you'd think it was new-minted. Three cheers for Marcel and Noel!

The Tannoy in the hut blares into life. It's always tuned to the Light Programme. Eddie Fisher's singing 'I Need You Know'. At the same instant the lights are snapped on. I screw my eyes tight shut. Ma's always doing that. For a delicious second I'm in my bed-chair in our house in Maryhill and she's starting her morning routine for getting me up. Then Corporal Graham goes and spoils it. 'HANDS OFF COCKS AND ON WITH SOCKS! C'mon, let's be 'aving you, rise and shine!' It was funny when I first heard it two weeks ago. Now now. It just reminds me where I am - and how I got here. Ma's dead and my father's unloaded me into the RAF Boys Service so he's free to go off with his fancy woman. Everything's gone. Ma, our house, my pals, Glasgow. I've just turned sixteen and the life I've known has been taken away. All I have is Ma's wedding ring and a few photos. And my memories. Lots of them. All locked up in my head. I'm NEVER going to let them go.

Ahead of me is twelve years in the RAF. I don't want to be here. Each new morning is a repeat of the one before; the lights go on and I always think I'm back in Glasgow. Then I realise where I am and I'm instantly depressed.

The covers are snatched off me. My willy is 'piss proud' so I scrabble to tuck it into my pyjamas. At least part of me is standing to attention. 'UP! NOW!' Some of the lads laugh as they hurry by, anxious to get into the washroom before the hot water runs out. It's the end of February 1955. I've been at RAS Cosford since the 16th. How can I get out of here? If I get out, where can I go? I won't go and live with my father's fancy bit. I hate the mornings most of all. I grab soap, towel and razor and head for 'the bogs'.

Boys are standing two and three deep at the inadequate number of basins. There are just twenty to serve two huts - over fifty lads. I'm shaving three times a week now. Today is a shaving day. Someone has opened a bottle of Drene shampoo, the smell is unmistakable... Ma is washing her hair in our sink by the window. She always gives me a threepenny bit to go down to Lizzie's shop and buy the small bottle with its ribbed sides for her. Lyn Thomas lets me share his basin. We both try to see in the small mirror at the same time. Now and then I glance at his face. Lucky bastard! He has unblemished, lightly tanned skin. I look at mine, pale and covered in acne. I've already nicked two of the angry, red spots. They bleed profusely. I'm near to tears. My life is nothing but a misery. God, why don't you just give me cancer like my ma and finish the fucking job?

I thought I'd be unhappy during the two months from Ma's death until coming into the Boys' Service. But at least I was still living in our house, could see my two pals, Sammy Johnston and John Purden, all the time, go to see a film at the Blythswood, sit in Cocozza's Café. Not now. My father is also in the RAF. He's given our house up. I'm hundreds of miles from where I want to be. The two spots still bleed. I fetch a couple of pieces of totally non-absorbent toilet paper from a cubicle, I don't want to stain the water in the basin. I wonder if I'd be as good-natured as Taff, sharing my shaving water with someone who's bleeding all over the place.
'I'll let you finish, Lyn.'
'Okay, Boyo. Won't be long.'

We all skitter back into the billet on tiptoes, chittering and chattering with the cold. The hut is only marginally warmer than the washroom.

'Why didn't I join in the summer?' complains a Scouse accent.
'They think they're toughening us up,' says a Jock.
'I'll be fahking dead soon if it dahn't warm up,' states a Londoner.
'Southern softy.'
'Get fahked, Jock!'
'Ah'm a Geordie!'
'Same fing.'
Everybody laughs.
Minutes later we trot over to the mess for breakfast. We never do anything at a leisurely pace. As Corporal Graham informed us on our first day, 'For the next two months you'll be chased from arsehole to breakfast time.' It was the first I'd heard that. I didn't quite understand it, yet knew EXACTLY what it meant.

There is a warm fug in the mess hall. It seems to enhance that smell, which, I'll eventually find, is peculiar to all mess halls; a mixture of meals past and present with a permanent background of greasy washing-up water. There is always a long queue. Almost every day someone drops their china mug. At the sound of it smashing on the concrete floor, a cheer goes up. It costs a shilling to get a new one from the quartermaster's stores. I decide to have porridge. I've been brought up to put salt on mine. And milk. The RAF doesn't cater for this. The lukewarm milk in the large aluminium bowl as sugar in it. I have to take the sweetened stuff. It breaks me of the habit of eating it salted. For the rest of my life I'll put sugar on my porridge.

I sit beside Ian Douglas, an Edinburgh boy. Lyn Thomas, my shaving companion, joins us. During the last couple of weeks the three of us have 'palled-up' in the billet. Lyn is from Camarthen and is quite happy to be called Taff. He doesn't like 'Lyn' because it sounds like a girl's name. We are all to be trained in various electronic trades. I am to be a Ground Wireless Mechanic. I'm totally uninterested. As we eat our over-cooked, lukewarm breakfasts, Lyn and Ian blether away to one another. Now and again I force myself to join in. Every couple of minutes I dab my face with a hankie; the two spots are still weeping. Other boys from our billet sit nearby. They are all nice lads. Just like Ian and Lyn they actually WANT to be in the RAF. From listening to conversations over the last few weeks I find that they almost all could hardly wait to leave school and join up. I, on the other hand, didn't even know the Boys' Service existed until three months ago when my father pressured me into signing on.

After breakfast we just have time to brush our teeth before the shout goes up, 'GET ON PARADE!' The D.I.s (drill instructors) chase us out onto the parade ground and we line up in three ranks. A biting cold wind blows and there is an occasional flurry of snow. Jeez! I really do NOT want to be here. I watch as Corporal Graham, with much crunching of tackety boots, takes up position in front of us, brings us to attention, then slowly walks up and down our ranks, inspecting us. The good corporal is in his thirties; a regular. He has the hoarse voice, bristling moustache and stern persona that D.I.s are supposed to have - according to British films of the last thirty years. We are his squad and he is always around; morning, noon and night. He often wanders into the billet late in the evening just to see what's going on. He walks along the rear of my rank and stops behind a gangly youth called Ryder, who hails from the Isle of Wight. Ryder has had his hair cut really short; 'into the wood', as they say. Unfortunately it has accentuated his very thin next and large, knobbly head. Below the leather rim of his beret there is no hair to be seen, just stubble. Corporal Graham has been standing behind Ryder for a minute or more. Just staring. He utters, 'Back of your 'ead fascinates me, lad. Just a fucking duck's arse at Christmas time!'.

We usually have two forty-five-minute drill sessions a day. After a fortnight, the majority of us are beginning to 'get it together.' Alas, there are two or three who aren't picking it up as quickly as the rest. They are normally referred to as 'the awkward squad' by the corporal. Then there is Depenning, who is in a class of his own. Depenning - nicknamed 'Tuppenny' - is Asian. Small and slim, he is consistently good-natured, excels in all aspects of his trade training, but is a disaster on parade. He is totally uncoordinated. He will turn left when the rest of us turn right. It always takes him an extra second, at least, to react to word of command. This makes him stick out like the proverbial sore thumb. It also makes him a D.I.s nightmare. Corporal Graham appears to be on the verge of a nervous breakdown...
'SQUAD! Wait for it. SQUAD! Right turNN! I said RIGHT, Depnning. Cor, do yo think you're ever, EVER going to learn your right from your left?'
'Sorry Corporal, I am trying very, very hard.' This is said in Depenning's melodious Asian accent. The corporal marches over and, with a crescendo of crunching boots, halts in front of the diminutive, ever-smiling Depenning. He is greeted by flashing white teeth.
'I've just 'ad an idea that'll 'elp you tell your right from your left, lad. What had do you use when you 'ave a J. Arthur Rank?' Graham is actually serious. We stifle giggles.
The rhyming slang is lost of Tuppenny. 'Jarther Ank? What is that, Corporal?'
Graham looks heavenwards. 'What hand do you use when you're playing wiv' yourself?'
'Oh, goodness me, Corporal. I do not do such a terrible thing.' I can hear one or two moans as a couple of guys in the rear rank take a stitch. The corporal persists.
'Well all right then. Just say you DID 'ave a toss - which hand would you use?'
'Oh please, Corporal,' Tuppenny nods his head continually, 'I cannot contemplate such a question.'
Graham gives up. 'Are you telling me you've never 'ad any kind of sexual experiences in your life, Depenning?'
Tuppeny puts on his best Peter Sellers accent 'Well, sometimes I waken up in the morning, sir, and find that during the night I have been visited by a damp dream!' From the corner of my eye I see somebody fall, helpless, onto the tarmac. Corporal Graham shakes his head.
'It's a WET dream! WET dream, not fucking damp dream.' He smartly turns and marches back to his usual position on the square, muttering to himself as he does.
Tommy Green leans toward Tuppenny and speaks out of the side of his mouth 'Ah could have sworn blind ah heard you having a wank after "lights out" last night.'
'Sorry,' says Tuppeny. 'I shall be extra quiet tonight.'

After our drill sessions the rest of the day is taken up with trade training, lectures and PT (Physical Training). Like all growing lads we are always hungry. Twice a day, Monday to Friday, the NAAFI (Navy, Army and Air Force Institute) van comes round. We only get ten shillings a week. This isn't enough to cover two NAAFI breaks per day AND buy me a snack at night in the canteen before I go to bed. I'm always hungry by late evening and would prefer to keep my few precioous shillings for some supper. But, when the van comes round during the day and I see others buying mugs of tea and thick slices of 'fly cemetery' (Sly Cake), I can never resist. Consequently, I'm usually skint by Monday evening and go to bed three nights a week on an empty stomach. Just about every boy gets regular postal orders from parents or indulgent aunts and uncles. My father sends bugger all. About once a month I might get a letter in his hard to read hand. Ma isn't quite three months dead when he informs me that he and Beenie - now I know her name - are to be married when he finishes with the RAF later this year. There is no mention of me being asked. He knows I wouldn't go.

The last weekend in February we are allowed out of the camp for the first time. On the notice board I spot that the film White Christmas is on at the Queen's Cinema in Wolverhampton. It seems ages since I was last at the pictures. I used to go two and three times a week with either John Purden or Sammy Johnston. From my locker I take out the programme for the Blythswood Cinema on the Maryhill Road. I took it as a keepsake when I left. There's an illustration of the main entrance on the front. Jeez, how many times did Ma and I pass through those doors. It's still the current programme. Just. February 1955. I sit on my bed and look at the films I've missed... Frank Sinatra in Suddenly, Elizabeth Taylor in Elephant Walk. Sammy will have gone to see the Sinatra one. We both like him. So much has happened since I took this from the pile by the pay kiosk at the end of January. White Christmas has already been on at the Blythsie. As I look at the entry in the so familiar programme I have to fight back tears. Ma and I would have been queuing up for it, we loved movies like that, 'Cheery pictures' she called them. I know: When I'm allowed out that weekend I'll get the bus into Wolverhampton and go see it by myself.

The Queen's Cinema is located in the main square in the centre of town. Wearing my uniform, I stand on the pavement and look up at the colourful poster. I love movie posters... 'Bing Crosby, Danny Kaye, - Rosemary Clooney and Vera Ellen in Irving Berlin's "WHITE CHRISTMAS" in VISTAVISION!' Once I'm seated and the lights go down I can imagine I', back in the Blythsie. I take a seat next to an older woman. If I don't look at her I can pretend it's Ma. The lights dim and the programme starts. Within minutes my pretence falls to bits. Even in the dark it's nothing like the Blythswood. The hall is too big; the proscenium arch surrounding the screen is a different style, the exit lights along the walls differ in shape and colour. The woman wears a nicer perfume than Ma ever had. If she'd been using California Poppy or Evening in Paris it might just have worked. I decided to give up trying to imagine I'm somewhere else and just enjoy the film. It's very sentimental and finishes up with an all-singing, happy-ever-after ending. As the smiling audience and I leave, I wonder if I'm the only one sadder than when he came in.

After four months at Cosford I realise I'll never settle in the RAF. Sometimes I toy with the idea of making a go of it, but not for long. The main reason I want out is because of the way my father pressured me into singing on. The day after Ma's funeral he'd give me a 'choice' - I can go and live with his fancy woman or join the Boys' Service. He knows that out of loyalty of Ma I'll choose the RAF. Within two days he has buried his wife and set the wheels in motion to unload his son. I remembered how he'd gone about the house whistling to himself. Another reason I want out is the fact I've signed on for ten years; the minimum. The ten years doesn't start until I'm eighteen. As I joined up just a week after my sixteenth birthday this means that, in reality, I'm doing a total of twelve years! It's too big a commitment. A third reason I want out is simply because it'll piss him off. It'll show he no longer controls me, I've broken away. But how do I go about it? I don't know what to do. Where to start. My salvation is called Ron Mason.

Everybody knows Mason because he's always on 'jankers' (punishment). He's only a few months older than me, but wise for his years. Early one evening he's trudging back to his billet weighed down, as usual, with his full kit, the FSMO (full service marching order). He is, yet again, on jankers. When you are serving this punishment, usually for a period of three, seven or fourteen days, you have to pack all your kit into various heavy webbing packs, strap them to yourself and, after the day's work, report to the guardhouse at six p.m. There, the Orderly Officer and Sergeant inspect you. If your webbing isn't 'blancoed' and your brass buckles not highly punished, you might finish up getting put on a 'charge' - and receive a few more days jankers! After the six p.m. parade you have to 'double away' back to your billet, change into your denims (working overalls) and report back to the Orderly Sergeant for an hour or more fatigues. When that task is done you have to return to your billet, put all your kit on once more and be on parade back at the guardhouse for nine p.m. and final inspection. All this is designed to take up what little leisure time you have of an evening and make you mend your ways.

I know Mason only by sight. In fact, Mason IS a sight. When you are on punishment you're supposed to keep your kit immaculate. Mason doesn't. I stop as he approaches.
'Can ah ask ye something?'
He halts, half bent under the weight of the webbing. He has a long, saturnine face, dark hair and looks like a young John Le Mesurier. He gives a tired smile. 'If I can understand a bloody word you're saying, Jock.'
'Can ah ask why you're always oan jankers?'
'S'easy. 'Cause I'm wanting to get the fuck out of this lot! The only way to do it is by working your ticket, refusing to obey orders. Eventually they'll realise you mean business - and chuck you out. I hope!' He looks closely at me with his intense, black-button eyes. 'Why you asking? Do you want out?'
'Aye.'
'How old are you?' He leans back against the wall to ease the weight he is carrying. We're standing in a long, empty corridor between huts.
'Nearly sixteen and a half.'
'That's good, you've still got time. If you're over seventeen there's no good starting. The bastards just put up with you 'til you turn seventeen and a half, then they transfer you into the adult RAF and that's you stuck in that for ten years - without a trade. If you keep causing trouble in the men's service it won't be jankers anymore - it'll be the Glasshouse!'
'Whit's that?'
'Military prison, me old jock. Makes jankers look like a fuckin' picnic!' He unleans himself from the wall. 'So, if you're going to do it, you'll have to start now.' He shrugs the large pack on his back higher and hooks his thumbs through the shoulder straps. 'It's hard work, mind. See yah!' He staggers off in the direction of his billet.

That evening I lie on my bed, my mind full of the conversation I've had with Mason. At last I can see a way out. I feel better than I've done for months. The Tannoy, as usual, is tuned into the Light Programme; Sandy McPherson is knocking seven bells out of the BBC organ. Ian has finished with this week's Rover and passed it over; poor old Alf Tupper. 'The Tough of the Track', every time he has an important race to run next day he ALWAYS gets an urgent repair job into his workshop under the railway arch. I bet he'll just have a fish supper for dinner, the job'll take him 'til two in the morning... eventually I'm distracted by the furtive actions of a little Scots lad called Forsyth, who hails from Dalkeith. He's a real dour little bugger, doesn't seem interested in making friends with anybody. As Ian says, 'He wouldn't give you a nod in the desert!' He receives parcels from home on a weekly basis. Unlike most of the lads, he never shares. Now and again someone will cut up a home-made cake and pass some slices round. Not Forsyth. Often, an hour or so after 'lights out' he can be found sitting up in bed guzzling Dundee cake in the dark. I pretend to read the Rover but watch him from behind it. He has a hand in his pocket and there is a certain amount of movement. I don't think he's having a stand-up wank. Whenever the hand stops he looks slowly around, then, if he thinks no one's watching, the hand makes a quick visit to his mouth. He then ambles past the waste bin and deposits something in it from his pocket. A few minutes later I go over and look; there's a dozen or more toffee papers on top. I look at him. He never seems to be short of money. What a greedy little git. Watching him has made me feel quite annoyed. 'He lads!' Everyone turns to look at me. 'You'll not believe it. I've been clocking Forsyth for the last twenty minutes. He's unwrapping caramels IN HIS POCKET and slippin' them intae his gob when he thinks naebody's looking.' Forsyth goes bright red.
'Huh! That's nowt,' says 'Red' Skelton, 'I watched him peel an orange in his pocket the other night and slip...'
'Did not!' says Forsyth, 'It was already peel...' he goes even redder as everybody laughs.
'No wonder us Jocks get a bad name,' Tommy Green shakes his head in mock sorrow.
'Howay then, pass them round.'
'There's only three left.'
'Well, you've had your share. Pass the buggers round.'
Reluctantly, he distributes them. I don't get one.

At last it's 'lights out'. I lie in the dark, my mind buzzing yet again as I think of my conversation with Mason earlier in the evening. All round the hut guys are talking, laughing, playing tricks on one another. Jeez! I feel really good. my mind is quite clear about what I have to do. Simply refuse to cooperate. I don't think I'll be any more miserable on continual jankers than I am now. Now need to cry myself to sleep tonight. Tomorrow I start working my ticket.