What made you up sticks, leave the comfort zone and head off in search of a better life over the rainbow (well English Channel)? It’s a question I’m asked a lot.
Straight after leaving school, I found a job in Cameron’s, the local brewery, as a drinks tester. Well I say I found. I more found the notice advertising a situation vacant as a drinks tester at the local brewery on the sixth form notice board, took out the drawing pins which held it to the wall and stuck it in my pocket. Cut out the competition, you know. After a couple of interviews and the head of Quality Control scratching his head and muttering something about “Thought we’d have had more applicants from the students”, I walked out with my first job. Shift work, still living at home and earning a good factory wage (I was management don’tcha know), at 18 I had it made, a beer pump in the office, cash on the hip and home just a hundred yards away. Home cooked meals, washing done and free use of the family car (in fact why did I ever leave?)
After a year of the new job the careers teacher from sixth form kept phoning me and telling me I had to go to university. He and my parents eventually persuaded me to at least go and see him. He asked me what I wanted to do at uni. I explained that I had a good job, career prospects, (free beer) and why should I leave? He gave me the careers book (I think it was called UCCA) and told me to pick a course and where I wanted to do it. Picking up the book and flicking the pages from back to front, I stopped. The page was “Q”, the title was Quantity Surveying and the place was Dundee. Full of confidence I said “I want to do Quantity Surveying in Dundee”. A quick phone call to the course head and I was in. This was June, and I was due to start in September.
All that to say, I went up to Dundee in the September of 1990, went home for the Christmas break and my parents announced “Enjoy it, it’s your last here, we’ve bought a house in France, we move in in February.” I thought that was great, a new adventure. They were probably thinking “Is he thick? Can he not get the message? We sent him North and we moved South – Helllooo”. So I promised to visit at the Easter break. Fact was I was really enjoying university life.
All was going quite well, but as the summer of 1991 approached my mum was hitting one of her big depressions. As you all know, France is not easy on the wallet when you live here and to add to that my dad was hitting the bottle heavily. Stints of work but nothing stable. He was a pipeline Radiographer, that is to say took x-rays of deep sea pipelines to check for weakness. The only work was a long way from the new home and he didn’t want to abandon my mum in this new venture.
During this summer, my mum went back to the UK, so let’s say less than 5 months after coming to France. She wanted a break, both from the enforced poverty and I think from my dad’s enslavement to the bottle. Unfortunate really for the both of them, he was an intelligent man. Eventually that patched up and my mum had taken advice about the illness that is alcoholism while she was back in the UK. She came back with gusto to help and encourage my dad back to health while also dealing with her own problems of depression at the same time.
Hold onto your hats: I came home from uni for Christmas 1991. We had planned to go skiing all together. I arrived at home late in the evening of 20th December and basically we had a chat and all went to bed. Next morning, breakfast, I’ll never forget it. Something happens, you say something and you regret it.
Dad was eating a boiled egg, well trying to. He had already started on the whisky, celebrating Christmas early or whatever. His motor skills were going and, as he spooned some egg into his mouth, he missed and most of the yellow went down his chin. Stupid really when you think, but I looked and said “You’re not my dad anymore.” What I meant was you’re not the one who taught me right from wrong, fair from unfair, what to say what not to say, to wait before others eat, make sure everyone else is served first and good table manners. Oh regret!
A bit later on, after he’d had a snooze and stuff, I said “Listen, do you fancy going down to the local bar for a beer and a game of pool? I’ll drive and you can have a drink.” It was sort of re-bonding. Don’t get me wrong, I loved my dad millions, thought so much of him, but couldn’t handle this infernal spiral. We had a really good father and son time together in the bar about five km away.
As promised, I took the wheel to come home and we had Fairytale of New York on the cassette. I’d glanced at the speedo, 80km/h…and that’s the last I remember until a well meaning French man, trying to comfort me as I asked where my father was, said “Don’t worry about your father, your father is dead.” “But my dad??“ “Don’t worry, he is dead”.
In a British right hand drive car, we had hit another car coming in the opposite direction. My dad was gone instantly and I won’t go into the details. My seat belt snapped with the impact, the car bent and I was ejected into the nearby ditch, smacking my jaw on the steering wheel on the way out. This knocked me unconscious. The steering wheel was through the back of the driver’s chair when we went to see the car later, so I’d been spared by the skin of my teeth. I remember being half unconscious in the back of the ambulance with the other driver and his wife. I also remember being breathalysed and being clear at the scene and the same again at the hospital. The other guy driving was also breathalysed and I’ll go into what happened with that in part two next week.
This is meant to be a why did you end up in France question, but it has turned into more of a blog. I will get to the point in a few more installments if anyone is interested in reading further.