My Family Heirloom - Debbie Young's Writing Life

From Diamond to Silver: Remembering the 25th Anniversary of the Queen’s Coronation

Posted on May 29, 2012March 9, 2013 by Debbie Young

What will you remember about the Queen’s Diamond Jubilee? In a town like Tetbury, so conscious of its royal connections, there will certainly be plenty of celebrations to choose from. But in twenty years’ time what will be your most vivid memories of the occasion?

If my experience is anything to go by, they may surprise you.

My daughter recently announced what for her had been the best thing about William and Kate’s wedding a year ago. (To you and me, the passage of a year is nothing, but when you’re eight, that’s a big proportion of your life – certainly long enough to make you nostalgic.)

At the time, she celebrated the event in all the ways I thought she should: watched the wedding ceremony live on telly, joined in our local street party, had a non-uniform day at school, went to a party at Brownies. But her fondest memory was none of these things.

“I was thinking of writing a letter to Prince William and Kate,” she revealed, “to thank them for making it such a special day for me.”

I raised my eyebrows. “And what are you going to say?”

“Well, I was going to thank them for getting married because if they hadn’t, there wouldn’t have been a street party, and it was at the street party that I started to become really good friends with Nicola, and we hadn’t known each other very well before then.”

And there was I fondly hoping that my invention of a Hunt the Corgi game might have been the highlight.

photo of Virginia Wade, Wimbledon women's singles winner 1977 — “I did it for you, Ma’am.”

I shouldn’t have been so surprised. My own recollections of national celebrations when I was young are equally unexpected. I was a teenager during the Queen’s Silver Jubilee. Though living abroad, I was spending the summer in England staying with my grandmother, and I had my teenage Dutch boyfriend in tow. I remember my grandfather giving us each a Silver Jubilee coin, and there being a lot of silvery stuff and British flags in the shops, but my most vivid memory is of the rivalry with my boyfriend over whose country had the best Queen. To my mind, there could only be one right answer. My faith in Britain’s supremacy was a little shaken when he told me proudly that his forebears had once sailed up the Thames in anger and taken possession of the Isle of Sheppey, something the history lessons at my school in England had singularly failed to mention. By the time the Wimbledon finals came round, our rivalry was intense.

It astonishes me now to have to relate that in 1977, both our nations were represented in the Ladies’ Singles Final: Virginia Wade playing for England and Betty Stove for the Netherlands. To get that far, they had put out in earlier rounds – wait for it – tennis legends Martina Navratilova, Chris Evert and Billie Jean King. It was as if this year’s tournament had been fixed specifically to emphasise the differences between me and my boyfriend.

Betty Stöve, Dutch tennisplayer — Betty Stöve: no contest (Photo: Wikipedia)

So my strongest memory of the Silver Jubilee is of sitting on the swirly carpet of my grandmother’s living room, tense and shouting alongside my equally vociferous boyfriend, as we watched our nations do battle on the tennis court. I was convinced that Wade would win, as if by some kind of divine right – which was only as it should be in our Queen’s special year of celebrations. And win she did, but only after dropping the first set, to the detriment of my fingernails. Watching her hold her silver plate above her head was a truly historic moment. Gracious and elated in my victory, I didn’t realise the Dutch boyfriend would soon be history too.

However you choose to spend the Jubilee weekend, may it bring you many happy memories.

This post was originally written for the Tetbury Advertiser, June 2012.

If you enjoyed reading this, you might like this post about last year’s Royal Wedding: Saying It With Trees

Or if the postage stamp at the top turned you on, try this one: The Power of the Postage Stamp

Personal life

Changing My Spots: How I Evolved From Sloth to Jaguar

Posted on May 25, 2012July 18, 2016 by Debbie Young

In the last 10 years, there’s been a new and recurrent theme in my life: running. Mostly I’ve not run more than 5K at a time – a nice round number, long enough to impress but not far enough to exhaust. I’ve done Race for Lifes, the Chippenham River Run (no, it doesn’t involve walking on water), and a couple of 10Ks too.

My first 10K was meant to be in Cheltenham. But then the organisers had a difference of opinion with the Town Council and relocated the race to the Moreton-in-Marsh Firefighters’ Training College. Instead of pottering gently round the elegant streets of a sedate Georgian town, we were faced with a route like Armageddon. We were surrounded by fake disasters that trainee firemen use to hone their skills: derailments, plane crashes, overturned cars and burnt-out buildings. There’s nothing like fleeing disaster to make you run a little faster.

And now there’s the first ever Hawkesbury 5K to look forward to. If the sun’s shining, that section of the Cotswold Way fondly referred to by some as The Yellow Brick Road will be glinting and golden. It will be hard not to slow down to enjoy the view.

I have not always been a runner. In school, I ran round at the back on cross-country, chatting away to my best friend Elizabeth, who was equally unenthralled with running. We kept our tights on under our shorts. She was my partner in crime in Geography too. The teacher scrawled in my exercise book “Why are you and Eliz. being so slow?” The reason: we’d got carried away with our drawings of an Oil Derrick, going on to design an Oil Graham, an Oil George, and an Oil Stanley. Our hearts were simply not in it.

Yet now one of my chief pleasures on holiday is to run in new territory. Round castle walls, along seafronts, down cobbled streets – it’s a great way to unite my adult interests of running and geography. The teenage Debbie would have been astonished at what she grew into: this leopard really did change her spots.

So if you’re not a runner yet, don’t write off the prospect. The new Hawkesbury 5K on 16th June 2012 might be just the thing to convert you. One of the great things about running is that your age doesn’t matter – you can still be running marathons when you’re 90. I’ll report back on that one. See you at the 2050 Hawkesbury 5K, if not before.

Start — And she’s off… *(Photo credit: Wikipedia)*

(This post was originally written for the Hawkesbury Parish News, June 2012.)

If you’d like to read more about running in Hawkesbury Upton, try this: Running In Wonderland (You Can Call Me Alice)

Or for more nostalgia about my schooldays, how about this tribute to my former history teacher, Ms Trebst.

Family, Writing

The Pencil Mightier Than The Sword

Posted on May 9, 2012July 18, 2016 by Debbie Young

An array of colored pencils, these pencils are... — An array of colored pencils, these pencils are made by Crayola. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

I have a penchant for pencils. And biros and felt tips and roller balls. Whenever we visit a museum or other tourist attraction, the first thing I check out in the gift shop is their range of pens. To me there is no finer souvenir of an enjoyable family day out than a pen with the name of the venue on it.

Provided, of course, that the shop’s stock matches my high standards. The perfect souvenir pen must write a fine line in blue or black ink, have a durable casing in a tasteful colour, and sit comfortably in my hand. It must have a slogan or logo that I’m not ashamed to be seen with, although in a moment of weakness I can be persuaded to invest in one of those with a small perspex chamber, filled with liquid, in which something moves up and down – a boat afloat on a river, perhaps, or a soldier on parade outside a palace.

I have been known to seek out a National Trust shop specifically to buy one of their Biros. Anything rather than use the cheap, scratchy pens that Gordon, my husband, picks up free from the bank, or worse still, an Argos midget.

A merry band of souvenir pens permanently inhabits my handbag, segueing slowly into a different mixture as one after another runs out of ink, to be replaced next time I visit a museum. (And I visit a lot of museums.)

The cheering power of the pen is not limited to those from famous places. Lately I’ve been particularly fortified by a beautiful set of Penguin branded pencils that I won in a raffle. I love classic, simple branding, and Penguin fits that bill (or should that be beak?) Each is in a different, mouthwatering colour and bears the title of a great book in an elegant, spare typeface.

But today an unbranded pencil stops me in my tracks. I pick it up at random from one of the many pencil pots that populates our desk-heavy house (five desks for three people), to scribble an addition to my Ocado shopping list. It makes an annoyingly thick line on my tiny square of paper; it’s like writing with molten lead. (And yes, before anyone points it out, I do know they put graphite, not lead, in pencils these days.) I stare accusingly at its shaft, wondering where it has come from. And then, for a second, my heart stops. For it’s an artist’s 7B, bought by my first husband John.

John died twelve years ago, ten days into the new millennium – but here his pencil remains. Who’d have thought it? To be outlived by a throw-away item that cost him less than a pound.

John’s addiction to graphic designer’s accoutrements was as entrenched as my own to the writer’s tools. His desk was littered with Rotring pens that had to be used at a precise 90 degree angle to make the ink flow properly; crispy,ancient half-used sheets of Letraset; chilly metal rulers, used with a Stanley to cut a perfect line in a piece of paper. (Oh, how he’d have loved the new Pantone Hotel that was recently featured in the Independent’s Traveller supplement!) Here was a man who really appreciated the precise gradations of Hs and Bs in pencils. He always found the commonplace HB an unsatisfactory, sad compromise: it was neither one thing nor another.

I resist the urge to take my revenge on the poor pencil by sharpening it away to nothing in my battery-powered pencil sharpener. (Who doesn’t love those?) And then I realise with a start that as my need to write anything in 7B is very rare, this wretched pencil will probably outlast me too.

I cast it aside and grab from my handbag one of my faithful museum biros. Ah, the one from the SS Discovery! Now that was a lovely day out. I resume my shopping list, a little calmer now. But deep down, I’m wishing that Ocado could deliver an elixir of eternal life.

It’s not just the pen that can be mightier than the sword.

Family

Don’t Leave Her Hanging on the Telephone

Posted on May 2, 2012July 18, 2016 by Debbie Young

photo of old bakelite telephone — A little drawer pulled out at the bottom in which you could store your friends’ numbers

Against my better judgement, I’ve allowed my eight year old daughter her own mobile phone. Well, my old mobile phone, actually. In a moment of weakness I gave it to her when I upgraded to a smartphone. I don’t approve of mobiles for children – I don’t think they have the emotional maturity to manage them – but now that she’s having sleepovers, it gives us both peace of mind to know she can call me if she needs me, day or night. (Her type 1 diabetes can quickly escalate into a medical emergency.)

Of course, my own childhood provides no precedent to help me judge what an eight year old might do with a mobile phone. Not only were there no mobile phones when I was a child, there weren’t even landlines in many homes.

I remember well the telephone from the house I grew up in. It was a classic, heavy, black bakelite number with a clicky, cold metal dial. By contrast, my grandmother’s new Trimphone, circa 1970, was considered revolutionary. Like her new bathroom, it was in fashionable avocado green. It didn’t last long, though. A bird in the garden learnt to mimic its shrill ringing so she never knew when a call was coming in.

Photo of a green trimphone — The revolutionary trimphone in avocado – ironically a popular colour in the 1970s when most British people would not have tasted avocado or be able to identify one on the greengrocer’s shelf

My other grandmother had a neighbour who subscribed to a party line. This arrangement allowed two households to share a single number across two hard-wired handsets when there weren’t enough lines available to go around. These days, the idea seems an unthinkable invasion of privacy – though it would have made phone-tapping a lot easier, saving certain journalists a lot of trouble.

Many people got by without a phone at all. There were alternative communications systems available. One university friend’s local MP was happy to relay urgent messages from his home phone to constituents. It must have been a great vote-catcher. (I don’t think “I’m on the train” would have counted.)

The fact of my husband’s birth was relayed to his father, just home from his shift down a Scottish coalmine, by a knock on the door from the local policeman. “Mr Young, you’ve got another laddie,” he announced.

Even so, I was astonished when my boyfriend at university would go home for weekends without heralding his arrival with an advance phone call. But he had no option. His parents weren’t connected to British Telecom (the only, nationalised service provider.) His father was holding out against installing a phone for as long as he could, fearful of the bill his garrulous wife would run up. A few years later, he gave in and his worst fears were realised. She used the phone during the day when he was at work so as not to incur his wrath about the bill, with the net result that the bills were even higher. She made up for years of being incommunicado with endless, pointless calls to her sister in Liverpool. “What are you having for your tea tonight, then? Oh? Will you have peas with it?” Ironically that boyfriend’s first job on leaving university was with British Telecom, about to be shaken out of the dark ages by privatisation.

Cover and 45rpm record of Blondie's single, Don't Leave Me Hanging on the Telephone — We didn’t have CDs either

I still don’t like making phone calls, always thinking of the phone bill as I dial. My fear is misplaced. All calls from home are now free after 7pm and my mobile package offers me more free calls in a month than I am likely to use in a lifetime.

Not so my daughter’s phone: she’s only allowed Pay As You Go, a small balance provided for emergencies only. I am therefore annoyed when in my study this evening, working just a room away from her, a text message from her pops up on my mobile. I grab the phone crossly, rehearsing a diatribe against inappropriate use of her phone credit. But my wrath is shortlived when I read it: “I love you, lovely mummy, even though you work so hard.” A message like that is worth 10p any day.

If you enjoyed this piece of nostalgia, you might like this one about my childhood Christmases.

What’s your attitude to mobile phones for young children? Do leave a comment if you’d like to have your say!

Family

Another term, another topic, another school trip…

Posted on March 29, 2012July 18, 2016 by Debbie Young

These days, it seems a term does not go by without the children being taken on a school trip. This policy is especially valuable in these rural parts, where our children do not have as much opportunity to travel as their city-dwelling peers. I’m quietly envious every time Laura comes home clutching a permission slip for the current term’s trip. I was raised in suburbia and by the age of 12 I was regularly taking the 30 minute train ride into London to visit museums and parks at weekends. Not only did I travel without an adult, I also used to take my much younger cousins – unthinkable these days for reasons you don’t need me to go into here. But we had very few school trips, and none at all in primary school.

Laura’s school outings are always carefully planned to enhance the term’s topic, and the destination is not always obvious. I wondered where on earth would they go to study the Second World War. It emerged that for visiting schools, the Steam Museum at Swindon will recreate an “evacuee experience”. I had a lump in my throat as I packed her off to school that day. She had to wear a 1930s frock and take a teddy, wear a gas mask box over her shoulder and have a luggage label bearing her name pinned to her cardigan. However did my grandparents cope with those farewells? (I’m thankful that they did: it was my father’s evacuation to the Cotswolds and his consequent love affair with the area that made me realise at a very young age that I wanted to live here too.)

Demonstration of Roman army shield formations — Taking health and safety precautions a little too far on the Roman topic school trip

I thought I’d guessed the destination for Laura’s “Ruthless Romans” topic trip. Surely it had to be either Cirencester, Chedworth Roman Villa or the Roman Baths at Bath? But no, they headed off to foreign parts – across the border into Wales for a fabulous day at Caerleon Roman Remains. The photos of the children dressed as legionnaires made it look as though they’d travelled back in time. It was a trip they will remember for the rest of their lives.

Where, then, would they go for this term’s topic? It’s “The Awesome Outdoors”, and not, as one child first reported, “Automatic Doors”. (Her mother thought this unusual theme would lead to some interesting science and technology lessons. It was several days before she realised her daughter’s mistake.)

I love the alliterative titles teachers give to their topics. It’s great psychology for generating excitement. I wondered where would their “awesome” destination be. I thought about my own travels when I was Laura’s age. I was lucky enough to spend my ninth year in the USA, where my father was working. We saw Yellowstone Park’s geysers, the Badlands, the Grand Canyon, the Great Lakes – all pretty awesome to a child who till then had thought Sidcup was the centre of the world.

Laura produced the note from her bookbag with a flourish.

Spring blossom at Westonbirt Arboretum — Westonbirt Arboretum - just 5 miles away

“We’re going to Westonbirt Arboretum!” she cried excitedly. A pause.“Where’s that again?”

Of course! Where else? The environment on our doorstep is hard to beat in terms of awesomeness. The Arboretum’s education department is second to none, so I know her class will have a fabulous, memorable time and come back filled with wonder.

To children, any trip is far from school if it requires a coach to get them there – and there should just about be time for a sing-song on the way. There’ll be plenty of opportunities for globe-trotting when she grows up.

(This post was originally written for the Tetbury Advertiser, April 2012)

If you enjoyed this post, you might like to read about another of Laura’s outings in The Ring of Truth