probably the first natural comedian I ever met. He had a gift for mimicry and a highly infectious sense of fun, and the girls liked him, too. Soon we became friends. We would hang around after school, playing football—the real kind, using our feet—smoking cigarettes, and talking about the violence we’d be sure to dish out if we were to be provoked by, say, Catholics guys, or English guys, or English Catholic guys. We would chat up the really pretty girls, like Dawn Harrison or Maxine Hawthorne, even though they had rumored connections to boys even more dangerous than we imagined ourselves to be. Sometimes we would just sit on a wall and spit.
There was a lot of spitting. It was the Scottish version of gum. Everybody spat. It looked kind of mean and suggested you didn’t care for the bourgeois attitudes held by people less cool than yourself.
Stuart and I hung out in a little posse with some other boys. One was David Simpson—a freaky-looking kid with a giant nose who lived in a wealthy part of town and eventually married and divorced Dawn Harrison. Stuart Gillanders was another rich kid who was so blond he was almost albino and had the worst acne I have ever seen on a human. I also hung with the badder kids—Shug McGhee and Billy Thompson, personality types I would later recognize as uncannily similar to characters played by the actor Joe Pesci in Martin Scorsese films. Guys who could be your friend oneminute, then turn on you violently for no reason the next. Small evil men who had a kind of bloodlust I didn’t understand. I imagine Stalin and Hitler were pricks like these, on a slightly larger scale perhaps, but with the same essential rottenness.
The rallying ground for the diminutive tyrants of my neighborhood was that ever-present fertile shiteheap of religious bigotry.
Sectarian violence was an odd little civil war where I grew up. Kids who you knew and liked could become your enemies under the right circumstances. Protestants supported the Glasgow Rangers soccer team and wore orange in allegiance to Protestant Holland, which had battled with Catholic Ireland in the late 1600s. Catholics supported the Glasgow Celtic soccer club and wore green in support of Catholic Ireland who…etc., etc.,…blah, blah,…late 1600s. It was just an excuse for gang colors really. Morons battling from an early age over medieval religious hairsplitting that they didn’t really know or care about. It’s a popular pastime in many parts of the world.
There was plenty of encouragement for this hatred from shameful clergy who stoked and provoked the fires of conflict, and from striving needy politicians who used the discord for their own advancement and should have known better. One day during a routine battle with the boys from Our Lady’s High School, with the usual pushing, shoving, cursing, kicking, punching, and sectarian blasphemies, I observed the gear-change from pubescent swaggering to a more mature brutality. I saw Billy Thompson pull a sword from beneath his coat, a giant fucking broadsword, not a toy or a prop. A battle weapon. As he started swinging wildly he cleared a circle around him, everyone desperate to get out of the path of the blade. Billy grabbed a Catholic guy, Paul O’Conner, who I knew a little bit. He was the paper boy for our street and he lived near me, a nice guy, I liked him. Billy threw him down and held the sharp edge to his throat.
“Don’t, Billy, fucking don’t, fucking don’t, man!”
Everybody was yelling, our guys, their guys. Billy pushed the blade against the skin.
“Beg for yer fucking life, ya poof!” Billy screamed at Paul, who was white with shock and was crying. Some of our guys laughed. I was terrified but hid it. No one was looking at me anyway. Paul begged for his life.
“Please don’t kill me, please don’t kill me.”
Billy looked at him, put his face close, hocked up a giant mustard-colored ball of phlegm, and spat it fiercely into Paul’s face. Then he got
There was a lot of spitting. It was the Scottish version of gum. Everybody spat. It looked kind of mean and suggested you didn’t care for the bourgeois attitudes held by people less cool than yourself.
Stuart and I hung out in a little posse with some other boys. One was David Simpson—a freaky-looking kid with a giant nose who lived in a wealthy part of town and eventually married and divorced Dawn Harrison. Stuart Gillanders was another rich kid who was so blond he was almost albino and had the worst acne I have ever seen on a human. I also hung with the badder kids—Shug McGhee and Billy Thompson, personality types I would later recognize as uncannily similar to characters played by the actor Joe Pesci in Martin Scorsese films. Guys who could be your friend oneminute, then turn on you violently for no reason the next. Small evil men who had a kind of bloodlust I didn’t understand. I imagine Stalin and Hitler were pricks like these, on a slightly larger scale perhaps, but with the same essential rottenness.
The rallying ground for the diminutive tyrants of my neighborhood was that ever-present fertile shiteheap of religious bigotry.
Sectarian violence was an odd little civil war where I grew up. Kids who you knew and liked could become your enemies under the right circumstances. Protestants supported the Glasgow Rangers soccer team and wore orange in allegiance to Protestant Holland, which had battled with Catholic Ireland in the late 1600s. Catholics supported the Glasgow Celtic soccer club and wore green in support of Catholic Ireland who…etc., etc.,…blah, blah,…late 1600s. It was just an excuse for gang colors really. Morons battling from an early age over medieval religious hairsplitting that they didn’t really know or care about. It’s a popular pastime in many parts of the world.
There was plenty of encouragement for this hatred from shameful clergy who stoked and provoked the fires of conflict, and from striving needy politicians who used the discord for their own advancement and should have known better. One day during a routine battle with the boys from Our Lady’s High School, with the usual pushing, shoving, cursing, kicking, punching, and sectarian blasphemies, I observed the gear-change from pubescent swaggering to a more mature brutality. I saw Billy Thompson pull a sword from beneath his coat, a giant fucking broadsword, not a toy or a prop. A battle weapon. As he started swinging wildly he cleared a circle around him, everyone desperate to get out of the path of the blade. Billy grabbed a Catholic guy, Paul O’Conner, who I knew a little bit. He was the paper boy for our street and he lived near me, a nice guy, I liked him. Billy threw him down and held the sharp edge to his throat.
“Don’t, Billy, fucking don’t, fucking don’t, man!”
Everybody was yelling, our guys, their guys. Billy pushed the blade against the skin.
“Beg for yer fucking life, ya poof!” Billy screamed at Paul, who was white with shock and was crying. Some of our guys laughed. I was terrified but hid it. No one was looking at me anyway. Paul begged for his life.
“Please don’t kill me, please don’t kill me.”
Billy looked at him, put his face close, hocked up a giant mustard-colored ball of phlegm, and spat it fiercely into Paul’s face. Then he got
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