Last shows of the year

Well that’s it. 2014 all but over and a time to review and predict.  My last show at the rather bleak Brookfield shopping centre in Cheshunt was relieved by the very welcoming and friendly people who work there and who manage to keep the whole site immaculate, safe and welcoming for the thousands who shop at the two giant supermarkets.  I do mean immaculate too.  I didn’t see one cigarette end on the carpark and no abandoned forgotten trolleys in the far corners and every morning forecourt was swept and scrubbed by guys who really take particular effort and care to make it so.  And all achieved with a smile and a friendly approach to what could be a daunting and dismal occupation.

Sadly I couldn’t say the same about the previous week at Aylesbury where predicted high winds (which in the end didn’t materialise) meant that the event was transferred to the bleak soulless mind-numbingly awful Friars Square shopping precinct.  Like every precinct in every town across our country, it is an amazingly different environment from the quaint cobbled Town Square outside which for the last few years has been transformed into a magical Victorian Christmas market and in which my stage has looked perfectly suited.  The antithesis inside as I tried to interest the bored passers-by in that bleak place was, like the architecture, insipid, dull and uninspiring.  And without my stage the show has considerably less impact. I don’t think I’ll be there next year as I heard that the organisers preferred the indoor event.  Ah well, one door closes…

Earlier this week I visited wonderful Wallingford and spent a great day with Mr Alexander’s Ragtime Band at the recording studio.  Hearing Maff’s original music grow in the hands of the talented band of musicians was an enormous joy and I am really excited to hear the end result which will be soon.  I am hugely grateful to those who pledged money to this project.  The next step is to spend time with Rhys the film maker to edit and add the music to the DVD. I will be contacting all those who helped fund the project with more updates about the release date for the DVD.  For those who would like a copy when it does come out, watch this space.

So it’s now back in my yard in Chester to prepare for the down time.  Except it’s not really down as there’s loads to be done to prepare for the 2015 season.  Everything has to be taken out of the trailer, assessed, repaired, repainted and varnished.  I am going to spend some time on the outside of the trailer this winter as it has taken some bashing over the last couple of years and needs to be refreshed.  I would dearly love to have the other side of the lorry painted too, but need to find another artist to take that on. If you know of anyone…

There is also the new backdrop to the stage to be constructed, painted and installed. Cheshire artist Liz Ellis has designed a very special new moon cloth and cabinet maker, Suzanne Hodgson are going to paint it in the next few weeks.  I’m very excited about it so another new element to the show for 2015.  And maybe the Materialising Motorbike will materialise in 2015.

When I remember my mental state this time last year, I have to say that things are considerably improved now.  In fact it’s a world of difference. Although I’m not exactly well off, at least this year I think I shall survive financially without the generous assistance of mystery benefactors or credit cards.  Many people helped me psychologically through the difficult times and I need to thank them.  I won’t name them but they know who they are, and thanks, very much, for what you did.

So all is good and can only get better.  The next blog is part of my series of stories from my youth and includes the copy of a real letter I sent home after one of my escapades at Christ’s Hospital.  It’s very revealing.

All the best from a road near you,

Mr Alexander

First day

The knot in David’s stomach had been there for days on and off, but for the past two or three hours it had grown to a state of permanent and unavoidable presence.  Nothing Pat or Richard said would shift it.  His mum tried to make him feel better by saying how soon it would be before they would see him on a visit.  His dad was impressed by the architecture of the school and tried to encourage him to see it too.  Nothing helped.  All there was to do was to pretend to be brave and he wasn’t doing that very well.

The morning had started early.  They had to be two hours away in Horsham by noon and the car had to be packed.  A typed list sent from the school four weeks earlier made it clear what was and what wasn’t allowed.  Most of his favourite stuff had to stay at home.  The drive had been uncomfortable with his father talking about how proud he was and what a good opportunity it would be and what a great school it was.  His mum kept quiet and David felt her anxiety.  His brother and sister, stiff in their best clothes sat alongside him in the back of the Rover, making occasional comments to pass the time.  ‘I spy’ was tried without any enthusiasm.  They were all mostly silent with their own thoughts.

The first impression as they drove through the ornate iron gates to the school was of a long country house drive with red brick houses either side.  It felt very different from the photos David had seen in the brochure. It felt hard and cruel in the September sun. They drove slowly, wide-eyed faces peering nervously from the car windows, following the signs put out to direct new parents.  Various cars had recently arrived and David saw other worried-looking boys arriving with their families. Once parked more signs directed them to a big hall overlooking a grassed quadrangle, a chapel on one side and another big hall opposite.  Cloisters ran along two sides and as the family walked silently along one they passed notice boards giving information about school activities, lists of rugby teams and faded notices.  A silent wait as they gazed around the hall with plaques dedicated to famous old blues as old boys of the school were called. They listened with all the other families to a speech by the Headmaster, a small, unsmiling, owl-faced man with a Cambridge gown who then directed the new boys to their various houses where it was expected that they should attend to matron’s office for uniform fitting. The parents and families were free to wander around the school while this happened.

For David the next hour was a strange and worrying experience.  Suddenly and unexpectedly split from their parents, David and three other boys found their way to their allocated House and once there were directed to Matron’s office. The old woman was fat and unsmiling. Fitting the uniform meant David had to strip to his underpants in front of her as she tried on various sizes. Matron’s gaze frightened him and even though he had known about it, he hated the uniform from the start.  Through his last years at Primary he had been looking forward to wearing long trousers, but what he had been given to wear today was a pair of thick wool breeches with silvered buttons just below the knee, long bright yellow wool socks, a shirt stiff with starch, clerical bands at the collar which had to be fastened with two safety pins and to top it all a heavy dark blue wool coat reaching to the floor with silver buttons down the front and a leather hip belt.  It all felt heavy and itchy and alien. From the time he had put it on and was passed as fit by Matron, he knew this was for real.  The reality at that moment was that this was his new life, this discomfort in a place with no warmth, no friendliness, no understanding of what was going on inside his head.

Meeting up again with his family dressed like this was difficult for them all.  Surely they could see how much he hated it?  Nothing was said though and almost without any more discussion it was time for them to part.  Goodbyes were awkward and dreadful but nothing more was said. 

David watched as the Rover disappeared back down the drive.  It would soon be teatime and uniformed boys were gathering in the House Day room.  David had unpacked his trunk and put the box of Quality Street, Miss Heathcott’s gift to him, in his locker. He crept into the dayroom.  In one corner a group of boys were listening to a radio.  They ignored him. Pop music David didn’t like.  He was feeling desperate.  He fetched the Quality Street, opened it and offered the tin to one of the boys. 

‘You don’t offer us sweets.  You don’t talk to us.’ The boy sneered and turned away, laughing at the squit’s audacity.

Life would never be the same again for David and he knew it at that moment.  His past life was forced to fade into distant memory by the sharp pain of rejection. Instantly he was on guard, ready for the next assault.  It wouldn’t be long in coming as the Christ’s Hospital bell rang for tea.

All the best from a road near you,

Mr Alexander

Candlelight living

One of the few trials of living on the road is the generator.  I have spent a fortune on generators in my time.  You would think that, given our dependence on the internal combustion engine, it would not be beyond the wit of man to build a reliable one.  I look after my generators too.  My latest version, bought this year; an electrical start Hyundai with a supposed excellent reputation has only the very best petrol, augmented with fuel improver.  I have it serviced, in fact, it has only just returned from being serviced, but will it stay running?  No.  So, far from being able to spend my evenings while down at the Portsmouth Victorian Christmas, with the luxury of electric light and the joy of evening tv, I am reduced to candles and a tranny radio as I have to conserve the leisure battery.

There is something I like about not having electricity.  A certain sense of solitude, amplified by the silence with only the occasional crackle of the fire.  Candlelight is mellow and soothing, reflecting around the lorry.  And I can charge up the laptop in the Dockyard during the day so I can write this blog and check my emails at night.  So I shall survive and aim to thrive, as Maya Angelou (RIP) said, ‘with some passion, some compassion, some humour and some style’

The Portsmouth Dockyard Victorian Christmas is supposed to be the largest Christmas event in Europe and my pitch there is lovely.  With my back to the Second Sea Lord’s private residence and facing the Spinnaker Tower and the afternoon sun, it’s a splendid space for the show.  Alongside Santa’s reindeer too, so there is a good footfall.  The only downside is that dogs, apart from the working ones, are forbidden on the dock site so my two are not with me.  I watched a VID (Very Important Dog) check my stage for explosives.  Very serious worker and a joy to watch the bond between him and his handler.  I hope he has some time off with rewards.  A little break from my two is a good thing though and I am enjoying being completely alone.

I have always liked my solitude.  Those following my ‘every other chapter’ stories will gain a flavour of the start of this from my next story.  The experience of an 11 year old on his first day at Christ’s Hospital in 1961.  For many years I have kept quiet about the CH experience but I feel now is the right time to tell a few of the stories.  It really was a horrible place and it changed me forever.  Some have said it was for the better, but I’m not so sure.  I will never know of course, ‘what might have been and what has been point to one end, which is always present’ (TS Eliot).  The door I never opened may not have led to Eliot’s rose garden but may have opened to a life of petty crime with Geoffrey Monk.  I am sure that’s what Pat and Richard thought in their worst nightmares, and as a believer in the power of education, Richard justified his decision to send me and my brother there by thinking of the possibilities that a good education could provide.  I know he regretted the decision all his life and never really spoke of it. He wasn’t to know at the time that the education there, far from being good, was elitist, conservative and could be cruel. Apart from my occasional roles in school productions, it offered me little but hardship and pain, and taught me only the fact that I hated the place, hated the establishment and hated the people who ran it.  There were three sorts of boys I met at CH.  Those who accepted the system and blindly supported it, a few who rebelled against it and who grew with their belief that the system was wrong and that there had to be another way, and those who were crushed between the two.  I had pity for the first and the third as I became a proud rebel. I have never regretted that.

So surviving on my wits alone has always been part of my life.  Who’s complaining about a generator that refuses to start? 

All the best from a road near you,

Mr Alexander

One last playtime

It was Geoffrey who had found it, so it was always his den.  He guided David down an alley between two rows of shops, along an overgrown path and through a broken fence panel into the secret world.  The sun scorched the ground and there was a smell of grass and creosote in the abandoned yard.  A few houses overlooked it but there was no main entrance the boys could find.  It looked like a bombsite and, as it was only fifteen years after the war, it probably was.  There were piles of building materials, bricks, tiles and sand.  Nettles and cow parsley grew nose high everywhere.  Butterflies and bees flitted around them.  It would be their secret summer hideout.

Geoffrey showed David around the kingdom.  He was the taller boy, a tassle of ginger hair and freckles all over his face gave him a look of Swallows and Amazons.  David, still in shorts, a constant embarrassment, and a recent haircut by his mother made him look even younger than his eleven years. Geoffrey’s long trousers and height confirmed him as the leader.  Geoffrey showed David the Headquarters.  A broken down greenhouse with most of the glass gone but it would serve well as den HQ.  Geoffrey had found some old paint tins for seats and the boys sat to plan their last summer together.  Geoffrey was signed up for the local Secondary Modern School and David was going to Christ’s Hospital, a boarding school in Sussex.  But that was six whole weeks away.

Through the summer weeks the boys met at the yard almost daily.  They reenacted battles, made sorties out to the corner shop for supplies of sweets and grog and made the yard their Shangri-La.  As the weeks wound on they explored the far corners of the yard, dragging back logs and broken fence panels to serve the games they played.  Geoffrey would mostly be the leader, but occasionally would let David take over, particularly on dangerous missions where a lone soldier was needed to rescue the platoon.  If it was Dan Dare then David would be Digby, Dan’s assistant, and together they defeated Mekon and the evil Treens.

The last Saturday afternoon came.  The boys met as usual at the yard but neither felt like starting the game.  The unspoken truth that this would be their last day together hung over them like a cloud. Tomorrow David would be going with his parents in their car down to Sussex.  Geoffrey had been at his new school all week.  He was already different and distant. They kicked around for a bit without speaking, then David picked up a roof tile from a pile and threw it hard at the wall.  It made a pleasing smash.  Another followed and soon both boys were fully engaged.  ‘Here’s for you Mrs Jackson’. Crash. ‘Here’s for you Green Glass Goblin.’ Smash. ‘Here’s for you Mekon and the Treens’. The boys laughed as their enemies were reduced to rubble in the growing pile of broken tiles.

They didn’t say goodbye, just parted at the end of Geoffrey’s road.  David had to call at the flower shop on the way home.  Miss Heathcote had something for him.  The bell shook on the door as he pushed into the overpowering sweetness of the shop where he had worked on Saturday mornings, delivering flowers for weddings.  A tin of Quality Street chocolates and a card with a ten shilling note awaited him.  ‘Good luck in your new school’.  He waited while Miss Heathcote fussed her goodbyes and left as soon as he could with the tin under his arm and ten shillings in his shorts pocket.

Coming in through the backdoor, David knew someone else was there.  His mother was usually in the kitchen but he could hear her in the lounge, speaking with the voice she used for important visitors.  There was someone else there.  A man’s voice.  David tiptoed to the lounge door, waited, then opened it.  On the sofa, his helmet beside him, sat a policeman. 

The man who owned the yard had reported the damage and the boys had been recognised.  David was in trouble again.  This time it was a serious warning. By a real policeman. The ten shillings was sacrificed to help pay damages for the man’s loss.  Geoffrey was blamed and banned.  The following day, David was taken in the family black Rover to his new boarding school. It felt like punishment for all his past deeds, and he would always be angry with the place.

All the best from a road near you,

Mr Alexander

A boy to be watched

I had not made any connection between the final line in my last blog and the fact that I do really like being watched.  The eight year old I was at the time liked being at the centre of things and maybe that’s what I was doing by scratching the swastika. It’s difficult to say as it was so long ago and 'the past is a foreign country' (L.P. Hartley, The Go-between, 1953). 

However it wasn’t the first time I’d been in trouble, but it was the first time it had become public.  I remember angering my father at home on many occasions to the extent that he would hit me.  I think he was hit as a child and didn’t know any differently.  Maybe he should have done as he was a teacher, and a good one, who rose to become a respected and loved headteacher in the salubrious confines of Highgate Village, not far from Southgate.  But Richard did hit the three of us quite regularly and as children we were a bit frightened of him.  I’ve mentioned we were encouraged to call them Pat and Richard.  I think it’s a potty idea and I wouldn’t recommend it. It made the distance between us even more pronounced.  Richard was a teacher at the school.  At the time of the swastika incident he was on the staff of the school.  The difficulties that made in the staffroom can only be imagined and it wasn’t long after that he took another job elsewhere.

What makes a boy who is brought up religiously and with love and care become the rebel I grew into over the following three or four years?  Richard would have blamed ‘bad influences’. It surely couldn’t have been original sin. I think he believed that my friend Geoffrey Monk lead me in the wrong direction. I don’t think Geoffrey was to blame, even though he was a strong figure in those last two years of my life at Walker Primary.  Next week’s story tells of another incident which stands out in my memory. It involved Geoffrey directly and I think was the final contribution to the moves made by Pat and Richard to distance me from such influences and look for a school that would, in their eyes, give me a better education than was available locally and would give me a chance to make a new start.  They weren’t to know that Christ’s Hospital would, far from making a new start, confirm my outsider status for once and all.  But I’m hopping ahead to the story after next.  Next week, it’s Geoffrey Monk and the Policeman.

Back in the damp twenty-first century present, Cat’s Paw Theatre goes from strength to strength.  The welsh language team has just finished the second week of touring with ‘I think I can wait’.  Despite some inevitable first week teething troubles, I watched it yesterday and I was enormously pleased.  They’ve made it their own.  The welsh culture is very different from the english.  It’s not just a language difference, there’s an entirely different approach to all aspects of life, and this is nowhere more apparent than in a welsh-speaking school.  The welsh team understand that of course and have developed the piece we originated for our culture fully into theirs and the results are there in the evaluation and feedback we are receiving from the teachers and more importantly from the young people themselves.

Back in the English culture (although I admit still geographically in Wales), Andrea presented a one woman show which I directed for Stepping Stones  (www.steppingstonesnorthwales.btck.co.uk), the organisation that offer counselling for adult survivors of childhood sexual abuse.  This wonderful third sector organisation has been operating on a shoestring in Wrexham for thirty years and the afternoon was a celebration of that fact.  We were honoured to be asked to develop a one-off piece of theatre for the occasion and presented to VIPs and well wishers.  Andrea’s performance as a survivor was memorable.  Touching, moving, in parts funny and entirely appropriate for the occasion.  I was immensely proud of the result, and proud to have directed this piece of invisible theatre.  Invisible because the audience is never told it is theatre.  So for many of them it’s real.  An interesting thought which I will leave in the air until another time.

All the best from a road near you,

Mr Alexander

PS The music project is now fully funded thanks to many of you who have contributed.  If you haven’t done so but would still like to there is still time, until the end of November, to make a contribution.  Check it out on

https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/990902434/mr-alexanders-travelling-show

Any extra over the target will add more musicians to the band.

Mr Alexander’s Ragtime Band, of course, it had to be.