What a Bastard

I’ve recently been reading a book about a ‘royal bastard’ – the illegitimate son of a Prince. He has a pretty rubbish time of it, with his origins used to abuse and shame him throughout the novel.

This seems to have awoken a certain amount of reflection on my part, as I’m a bastard myself (though lacking royal blood). Of course, I use this term provocatively. We live in an era where judgments about one’s birth are muted or, indeed, nonexistent entirely.

However, as the son of an unmarried, single mother in the 1970s, it was a source of deep shame and embarrassment to me. It’s not something I like to recall often. Not because anyone was particularly cruel, but because fear of being different drove me to tell some ridiculous lies. I’m now disappointed that I wasn’t stronger and proud of who I am.

I remember I only started to feel the need to lie when my mum and I moved to Leamington Spa from Manchester. I was seven at the time. We lived in a poor neighbourhood in Manchester, where there were several other single mothers and so it wasn’t an issue with other kids in my gang at school.

However, in Leamington Spa, it was all small-town values and nuclear families. I think, even at seven, I knew that a dead father is going to get a better response than one who’s just off the scene. So, as far as any of my new friends were concerned, my dad had died. He met his demise in various interesting ways, I seem to remember, but I think the most common version was a car crash.

The other lie was that my mum’s boyfriend at the time was my uncle. I didn’t realise at the time that this was a terrible cliché, I wish I had tired harder to be original (something like “my mum is in a bizarre tree-worshipping cult and that bearded man is her guru”).

Who knows? Perhaps I saved myself a whole heap of teasing. After all, children are vindictive little shits. One classmate, whose mum had polio, was relentlessly bullied and ridiculed. Because his mum was in a wheelchair! Jesus, the Ku Klux Klan has nothing on kids.

Ultimately, however pragmatic I was, I regret not being true to my mother and my real origins. The story of how I came into the world was never shameful and is, in many ways, more interesting than my lies. But that’s a tale for another post…

7 Fascinating Facts About Me - Yes, ME ME ME

My friend Steve has shamed me into writing something on this sad, neglected, overgrown graveyard of a blog after a long absence. His clarion call is a blog tag challenge to write 7 interesting facts about myself. Ahh, my favourite subject! No problem!

1. I used to read Tarot cards in clubs and bars. My mum had read them for years, so I picked it up by default. I would sit in chill-out rooms and read fortunes for drinks. Strangely, the readings became more accurate the drunker I got. After dabbling in Crowley and Chaos Magic, I lost interest in all things mystical in my late 20s. Perhaps my third eye got blocked?
2. I nearly killed a flatmate with a wardrobe. When I lived in a 5th floor student flat in West Ham, my friend Blaine and I lazily got rid of a wardrobe by chucking it off our balcony. Unfortunately for our other flatmate, Nicky, it landed just as she stepped out of the door at the bottom of the stairs. Fortunately, however, it missed her by about a foot. We didn’t like her much, but had no intention of manslaughter. It was a spectacular MDF explosion when it landed though!
   
3. I have an unfortunate habit of buying crap things on impulse and regretting it. The latest was the X-Rocker, a repulsive vinyl ‘gaming chair’ with build-in speakers. That went on eBay after a week…
4. When I was 6 and living in Manchester, I was mugged by two older kids for some medals given to me by my Nan’s husband Billy. As well as the medals, I was wearing a yellow plastic duck hat when accosted.
5. I got Darth Vader’s autograph from his visit to Rackhams in Leamington Spa. I must have been about 10 at the time and was a Vader fanatic (my attraction to the Dark Side has continued through employment in advertising). You had to buy some Star Wars bedding to get the autograph under normal circumstances. However, I hung around for so long that one of the staff took pity on me and got the Dark Lord to sign me a photograph during one of his breaks in the stockroom.
6. My first bike was a blue Raleigh Chipper.
7. I’ve had two letters published in the sci-fi comic, 2000AD. I was in my thirties on both occasions, so I should know better than to get excited.