8.11.69
Dear Mum, I’m writing this very
late at night, or perhaps it’s actually very early in the morning ˗ but the
trouble is of late that when I arrive home, somebody always suggests that we
have coffee, and either this or else the lack of conversation at work during
the evening tends to cause me to lie in bed for ages awake. So I thought I
might as well stay up awake and do this instead. Thank you for the photo ˗ I
have the funny feeling that I’ve already thanked you, but as I have that about
everything these days I’m always under the impression that I’ve actually
written letters I never have. You look a little plump (and so does Barbara [my younger cousin]) I must say; I’m certainly
glad to see you looking so well and fit. Another request: can you send me one
where you’re smiling? You look a little as though John had said something rude
to you, or something! [John was Barbara’s younger brother.] No, seriously, though thanks for the photo, very much ˗ it mainly
reassures me that I hadn’t forgotten what you look like after all!
I said to Reg that you’d sent it,
and he was most interested because he hadn’t seen a photo of you since you were
married. Good grief! They’re moving house soon ˗ don’t know if they’ve actually
got a place, but the point is that Mavis has been told that the present place
is too much for her (it’s a two-storey semi-detached, and the stairs even kill
me ˗ I like to think I can run up any set of stairs anywhere; not this lot!) and
so they are going to get a smaller bungalow. Which means Nina will have to go
somewhere else, though Reg was a bit vague on where exactly. The funny part
about that is that Nina does do a fair bit of the housework, so she may turn
out to be a bit of a loss; and anyway they always have the place so spick and
span it's positively unlived in; no wonder they kill themselves with work! (By
contrast the flat is pretty messy frequently, though never despairingly so, and
Angela is a great one for house cleaning at weekends, but we survive without
going to great lengths to ensure that everything is always in a certain place.
(That’s an old philosophy of mine anyway, isn’t it?) [I may not have adhered to it as strongly as Reg, who certainly had the motto: a place for everything and everything in its place.]
...The Fight on the Bus,
by M F Crowl
I went upstairs on a rather full
bus one night, followed by a slightly stewed group of East End boys, with two
or three of their girls, and because there wasn’t enough room for them all to
sit down up there (and no one is allowed to stand upstairs) they started
clowning around and sitting on each others’ laps, etc. One even went bowling
headlong down the bus and fell up against the front. Somehow or other they got
arguing with some slightly older boys on the front right. And before we knew
what was happening, the most drunk of these boys (the E. Enders) was punching
someone violently on the head and his mate wasn’t trying to create much peace
either. The other slightly less drunk ones, and particularly one girl, got
worried at this and they tried to get the worst offender off the bus, and this
just created chaos. Fortunately the bus stopped, and as well as several other
people getting off hurriedly, so did all this lot of louts ˗ but apparently one
of them was caught, I presume by some handy copper. End of Incident, though the
bus sat there for ages after that while things were sorted out. the main victim
had a bleeding lip, and blood all over his sportscoat. Ugh! Everyone’s
adrenalin must have gone spinning around during those few moments ˗ my blood
was certainly going a trifle berserk.
Can you do a small thing for me? I’ve
been feeling it’s a waste of time having several rather useful books sitting
around at home doing nothing, and I’m wondering if it would be too expensive to
send them over? If it would be then we’ll forget the whole idea, and be done
with it, but it was mainly a few reference books I mean. For example, Piston’s
book on Orchestration, the three paperbacks comprising Dante’s Divine Comedy (Dorothy Sayers edited [translated, in fact]:
are Hell or Inferno, Purgatory and Heaven); suddenly all the others I thought
of have gone. Tell you what though, if next time you write an enveloped letter,
can you on the back of the newsheets write a list of those music books, poetry
books (just the paperbacks here will do) and books on films that are say later
than 1950? If it doesn’t take up too much of your time, that is; and I’ll tell
you which would be worth sending (cost considering, of course). Novels aren’t
much use bothering with I think ˗ I can always get a cheap copy here if
necessary. Hope this won’t be too much trouble ˗ I can’t new remember whether I
had them classified purely under authors or if the reference stuff was
separate. Anyway, good luck to you! I’d rather like the Beethoven Sonata and
Bach P. and Fugues books too, I think. [Even for me, this seems an extraordinary request. The books would have weighed a ton.]
