A LUDICROUS SUGGESTION

Jeremy

I must have been about 15 when Jeremy made a ludicrous suggestion.

Jeremy Blackford and I went to the same school in Beaconsfield, where we lived. He was always known as Jel.  We must have met when we were about 7 or 8, my memory is hazy there, and though we were friendly, we weren’t exactly friends.  But he was clever and funny –

Teacher: Why are we learning Latin?

Jeremy (after a moment): Because Latin is the basis of all modern languages, Sir.

Teacher: Excellent answer, Blackford, well done….

Jeremy (looking round at the class): Except Chinese, of course…

Hoots of laughter from the rest of us.

Teacher: Oh, Blackford, why do you always have to let yourself down?!

He was also admirably scruffy.  He was one of those boys whose shirt just wouldn’t stay tucked in, whose shoe laces led independent lives of their own, whose satchel threw books pell-mell onto the floor as he rushed to be on time.

One day he sauntered into the changing-room at the start of the day.  Does anyone know what this is? he said, and proceeded to make a noise, a sort of thin, nasal, twanging kind of noise with his tongue.  We thought he’d flipped.  It’s an electric guitar! he explained.  We weren’t interested but, looking back all that way, it’s clear that Jel had discovered a lifelong passion.

Robert as a cowboy

My passion, more predictably, was football, which had replaced my previous passion of  being a cowboy (see above). Twanging noises were still in the future for me.

But a pattern established itself which sort of repeated itself five or six years later (see KATE’S KITCHEN).  During my final year, I failed all my exams – several times, actually, until a minor English public school relented and accepted me because I was “sporty”.  At the same time Jeremy, a year younger, flew through his exams at the first attempt and shot off to a major English public school.

These schools were the making of us.
They were awful.
We hated them.
And they hated us.

Both of us needed something else, some escape. One holidays, a group of us were playing football in the field behind Jeremy’s house and after the game I went back to his for tea. Do you still have that old guitar of yours? he asked.  (I did have a Spanish Guitar.  I still have it, and still use it.) Yes, I said, but I can’t play it. He looked at me seriously before making the ludicrous suggestion…..Shall we form a group?