On My Way to Samarkand: Memoirs of a Travelling Writer by Garry Douglas Kilworth Page B
Authors: Garry Douglas Kilworth
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gut with a razor blade by my grandmother, Nan Kilworth. I was allowed to fire Peter’s 12-bore shotgun occasionally, though it hurt my shoulder like hell, always leaving a bruise.
On those days I spent alone, I would lie down in lush meadows and watch the clouds scudding over a summer sky and roll in the snow of a winter’s day with just as much enjoyment as I now feel when I go to see a show in London. The year 1955 marked a beautiful period for me, when sex had not quite put its head above the parapet and boyhood had not yet completely vanished. Time itself seemed elongated then, the years like decades and a long long life stretching ahead.
Still, the hedonistic existence of a boy without parents to curb his excesses continued only past conker time, then my brothers and I were sent to join mum and dad at RAF Bridgenorth in Shropshire, where dad was now a drill sergeant training National Service recruits.
In Aden I had wanted to live the life of Kipling’s Kim but in Rochford I did indeed live the life of another of my heroes, Richmal Crompton’s William Brown.
~
Bridgnorth Married Quarters, where we found ourselves living, were separated from the main camp by playing fields. I quickly made friends with a boy with rufous coloured hair. To my disgrace I can’t remember his name now, yet he was my best pal for the next year. I called him Ginger. Well, you did in those days. I found a another girlfriend, also named Rosemary, but I guess I really only wanted to be with her because of her name. She insisted I join the Ballroom Dancing Club at school, which wasn’t half as much fun as the Bee Club had been at Robert Thoreton School. I learned to do the waltz, foxtrot and quickstep.
My school was St Mary’s Low Town Secondary Modern. It was situated close to the River Severn. Bridgnorth is split into two halves, Low Town and High Town, with a connecting hill or a funicular railway to choose between to get from one to the other. The headmaster was Mr Gower – the kids called him Donkey, as kids will always find a suitable nickname for headmasters – and I believe he was a relation of David Gower, the ex-captain of the England and Wales Cricket Team. Mr Gower was not a man I liked. When I left the school a year later he took his pipe out of his mouth and called after me, ‘You’ll never amount to anything, Kilworth.’ I pretended I hadn’t heard him.
There was the usual mix of pupils at the school, mainly farmers’ boys who often failed to turn up for lessons on market days. Looking at my old school report, I see two subjects on there which reveal the nature of the area: Rural Science and Agriculture . I see I got Good for both in July 1956. Surprising. The only subject I got excellent for on that report was Maths (note the abbreviation – not a posh school at all) which astounds me as I’ve always considered myself a bit of a dunce at mathematics. English has Very Industrious beside it. Any school that equated English with industry was not the school for me.
~
Ginger and I used to walk home over a wooded hill called the Hermitage. There was a school bus, but we only caught it if we felt we wanted to riot with the rest of the kids. I was becoming intensely interested in sex at the time. I had no courage at the game and here I confess that I never touched a girl in a sexual way until I reached the age of 18. I did a lot of kissing and cuddling in the back seat of the bus, and in the long grass around the playing fields, but nothing more. I wanted to do more, I dreamed every night of doing more, but I was scared of rejection and being accused of molesting a female. I didn’t know in those days that many girls would have liked to experiment just as much as I wanted to. I thought they were above it all and only let boys touch them because they wanted to be cherished by someone. I was good-looking, but only five feet tall at fourteen, so my pick of the girls was restricted by their respective heights. The tall
On those days I spent alone, I would lie down in lush meadows and watch the clouds scudding over a summer sky and roll in the snow of a winter’s day with just as much enjoyment as I now feel when I go to see a show in London. The year 1955 marked a beautiful period for me, when sex had not quite put its head above the parapet and boyhood had not yet completely vanished. Time itself seemed elongated then, the years like decades and a long long life stretching ahead.
Still, the hedonistic existence of a boy without parents to curb his excesses continued only past conker time, then my brothers and I were sent to join mum and dad at RAF Bridgenorth in Shropshire, where dad was now a drill sergeant training National Service recruits.
In Aden I had wanted to live the life of Kipling’s Kim but in Rochford I did indeed live the life of another of my heroes, Richmal Crompton’s William Brown.
~
Bridgnorth Married Quarters, where we found ourselves living, were separated from the main camp by playing fields. I quickly made friends with a boy with rufous coloured hair. To my disgrace I can’t remember his name now, yet he was my best pal for the next year. I called him Ginger. Well, you did in those days. I found a another girlfriend, also named Rosemary, but I guess I really only wanted to be with her because of her name. She insisted I join the Ballroom Dancing Club at school, which wasn’t half as much fun as the Bee Club had been at Robert Thoreton School. I learned to do the waltz, foxtrot and quickstep.
My school was St Mary’s Low Town Secondary Modern. It was situated close to the River Severn. Bridgnorth is split into two halves, Low Town and High Town, with a connecting hill or a funicular railway to choose between to get from one to the other. The headmaster was Mr Gower – the kids called him Donkey, as kids will always find a suitable nickname for headmasters – and I believe he was a relation of David Gower, the ex-captain of the England and Wales Cricket Team. Mr Gower was not a man I liked. When I left the school a year later he took his pipe out of his mouth and called after me, ‘You’ll never amount to anything, Kilworth.’ I pretended I hadn’t heard him.
There was the usual mix of pupils at the school, mainly farmers’ boys who often failed to turn up for lessons on market days. Looking at my old school report, I see two subjects on there which reveal the nature of the area: Rural Science and Agriculture . I see I got Good for both in July 1956. Surprising. The only subject I got excellent for on that report was Maths (note the abbreviation – not a posh school at all) which astounds me as I’ve always considered myself a bit of a dunce at mathematics. English has Very Industrious beside it. Any school that equated English with industry was not the school for me.
~
Ginger and I used to walk home over a wooded hill called the Hermitage. There was a school bus, but we only caught it if we felt we wanted to riot with the rest of the kids. I was becoming intensely interested in sex at the time. I had no courage at the game and here I confess that I never touched a girl in a sexual way until I reached the age of 18. I did a lot of kissing and cuddling in the back seat of the bus, and in the long grass around the playing fields, but nothing more. I wanted to do more, I dreamed every night of doing more, but I was scared of rejection and being accused of molesting a female. I didn’t know in those days that many girls would have liked to experiment just as much as I wanted to. I thought they were above it all and only let boys touch them because they wanted to be cherished by someone. I was good-looking, but only five feet tall at fourteen, so my pick of the girls was restricted by their respective heights. The tall
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