1989

Death had never really touched our young lives until Jackki called home from the telephone box in Cayton village that evening, we both still had multiple grandparents to spoil us and I still had my great grandmother, Nanna Dunn. To hear that her Mum had passed away aged only 39 was such an awful shock for Jackki just at the time when she was setting out to take on the world on her own terms. Her strength in the weeks and months that followed was incredible, dealing with her own grief and the descent into a very dark place for her Dad at the same time. There is no doubt that such tragic events brought us closer together emotionally than would otherwise have happened, our relationship provided the good times that were so necessary.

Our letter writing to each other took on a fairly regular format and timetable for the next term with a focus on detailed planning for the term ahead so our weekends could be coordinated properly as well as discussions about making the most of any time we had together and apologising to each other if that didn’t work out for some reason. Some of the weekend highlights included football weekends in Manchester when Oxford United were in town so we could party with the Oxford backroom team and get free match tickets courtesy of my University friend, Jason. On one such night in the club underneath the Britannia Hotel, Manchester, Jackki was approached on the dancefloor by a chap keen to make her an Indian film star, she introduced this chap to her boyfriend who politely advised him it would be better for his health if he F-ed Off. This night was referred to a lot of times in later years whenever Jackki was fed up with work and wishing she had run away to Bollywood.

Winding back a little to the back end of 1988, it would be remis of me not to include a story about the St. Mark’s Rock n Roll night which happened every November and even though we were both away at University we made sure that we could attend. This was an annual fancy dress affair that my parents and those of quite a few of my friends had been attending for some time and since about 1985 our little group of mates had been volunteering to provide a waiter/waitress service. We had a great time, made a good few quid in tips and then spent it all on booze for after the bar had closed and would always drag along girlfriends if they were willing. The fancy dress got quite out of hand and there are too many photos of us all in drag with ridiculous balloon cleavage. Now I can’t remember the full fancy dress theme for 1988 but I think Jackki was Kermit the Frog so there is a good chance I was Miss Piggy, but that doesn’t matter. We all rocked up at Gez’s house in Chelford Drive where his long-distance girlfriend Nikki was scheduled to have arrived from Scotland, being the sharp and observant person I am I clocked that Nikki was not in fancy dress and launched into a suitable level of abuse about no excuses, we’ve all travelled, etc, etc. What everyone else had noticed however, was a not insignificant baby bump on the very pregnant, non-fancy dress, Nikki. Jackki was giving me the full “shut the fuck up” stare for a quite a while before I even noticed.

My wonderful godson, Marc, was the product of that baby bump and arrived in March 1989 and has been a joy to everyone ever since. However at that time, getting pregnant was something we all dreaded and were terrified of, neither Jackki or I knew how to respond on that night or for weeks afterwards, it was clearly exciting and life changing and Gez and Nikki were embracing those changes but we were both nowhere near ready for such things. When Marc came along and we both had our share of cuddles it prompted us to discuss the future, our aspirations certainly included children, but that future was a long way off, of that we were sure.

Baby Marc and his parents provided some fun times to include in our detailed plans by letter for the rest of the University year, including a trip to Banchory for his christening and a weekend in Scarborough at my parents house. Gez and I were left babysitting on strict instruction not to get him out of his cot, so when Marc had a good skrike late in the evening with us two drunks unable to settle him, Gez had to leg it over to the Blacksmiths to fetch Nikki and Jackki while I broke the rules and picked him up. We were dismissed as the useless incompetents that we clearly were but at least the girls had got out together for an hour or so.

I was pretty fed up with University and not really enjoying my course during 2nd year and had planned to take a work experience year away, I had been applying for jobs all over the country with various engineering training schemes. Landing a poorly paid role with the Royal Aerospace Establishment in Bedford gave us the opportunity to plan for a summer away together instead of going home, something Jackki in particular had no appetite for. The idea of having our own place for a few months and living together was a big thing for us and I remember being nervous about telling my gran about our plans, as a teenager we all assume that the older generations have never lived I guess. I can’t better my own description at the time of a conversation with my Grandparents captured in a letter to Jackki “I’ve decided that my Grandad is an even better bloke than I thought. My Gran was talking about Bedford and things like that so I was ready to mention our true plans for the summer, all of a sudden my Grandad piped up with “I don’t know why Jackki doesn’t go to Bedford with you since she’ll earn more money in a job down there than she would up here”. I couldn’t believe it, it was as easy as that. I think he had guessed what we were planning and knew that my Gran wouldn’t be too happy so without me saying anything he was totally behind us. Then as I was leaving, I was alone with my Grandad, he gave me a wink and said “you get down to Bedford with Jackki and make yourselves very happy”, I could have cried it was such a nice thing to say so I have decided he is the best.”

Our summer in a shitty little attic bedsit on Clapham Road in Bedford was a great time, I was enjoying my work with Steve EP, Fred and the team and we spent loads of time together, Jackki got her summer job to raise funds and became an expert on the application of kimble tags, whatever that means. Jackki was also new and enthusiastic about domestic stuff and learned the difference between a bulb and a clove of garlic one day, the smell of that Boeuf Bourguignon with 2 bulbs of garlic was enough to bring tears to your eyes and became another verbal meme trotted out between us for the rest of her days. When invited over to the bosses house for an evening, a few lessons were learned about traffic light drinks sessions, head banging to the Macc Lads and just how bad a Dust Buster is at hoovering up puke, thankfully Steve and Ruby went on to become such wonderful friends of us both.

As the summer was drawing to a close we headed off even further south in my Vauxhall Nova 1.2L for a holiday in Cornwall and Somerset, what a memorable time with great weather and it being quiet everywhere since the school holidays were over. We visited places in Cornwall that I remembered from my childhood and then headed back via Porlock to revisit similar good times from Jackki’s, it was a wonderful merging of happy memories for us both in places we subsequently revisited with our own family in later years. Highlights in my memory relate primarily to the swimming costume Jackki wore for most of the holiday and I kept some of those photos very close for many years afterwards but also include being the only ones in the sauna at Hendra Tourist Park, Jackki’s misadventures crashing an off-road buggy while wearing a mini-skirt and high heels and staying in a B&B in Porlock that had an “honesty bar”, something these kids from Salford found such a bizarre concept that we couldn’t help but comply with.

As the summer came to a close and Jackki headed off back to Liverpool for her 2nd year leaving me in the Bedford bed-sit we reverted to our letter writing relationship with the highlights to follow in the next chapter as we moved into the ’90’s. I’ll finish this post with a direct quote from a letter I wrote on the 19th May 1989 that resonates now and forever “I love you Jackki Smalley and never want to lose you, I hope I can make you very happy for the rest of you’re life since doing that is the only thing which will make my life a really happy one.”

X