Tuesday, August 7, 2012

1968: Yes, I think to myself*

 Wouldn't it be great to be writing a post about what a particular song reminded me of in 1968?

If I had only been born about 18 years earlier, I'd be filling this blog with my memories from the Swinging Sixties, and rather than Hole In My Shoe by neil it would be the original by Traffic, perhaps reminding me of the time we spotted Twiggy buying sunglasses in Bourne & Hollingsworth or when went on the M1 for the first time. Sigh.

I do have a memory of 1968, however, as it was the year my brother was born. I'd apparently been sent to stay with my Aunt for a couple of days around the due date. I adored my cousins who were a good few years older than me, but of course they were at school all day. So to fill oru time she took me to Winchester with her while she did a bit of shopping, and to her horror I asked a shop assistant if she was fat because she was having a baby like my mummy and sang Winchester Cathedral all the way down the high street at the top of my voice. I don't remember that at all. But I do remember meeting my brother for the first time.

I was taken into this dimly-lit room to see him and on the cot was a present for me. It was Captain Scarlet's car. I was mad on Captain Scarlet, though I found it scary (the gunshots and Mysterons in the opening credits). This was a stroke of genius on my parents' part, as here was a new thing coming into our house that bought me presents. Consequently, I never remember being even vaguely put out by any attention the new arrival had lavished upon him.

My brother was born at home, dad buried the afterbirth in the back garden, a yellow rose bloomed outside mum and dad's bedroom window that day and this song that gets no less lovely with age was number one.

We'll just have to make do with the Seventies onwards.


NB *Boringly, I realise I've told this story before. I need some new material


1 comment:

  1. I was six when this song came out, and our house was vibrant with my big sisters' false eyelashes and Ossie Clark frocks. Spectating tinily was the nearest I got to the Swinging bit of the Sixties, and it was fine by me as I liked having glamorous grownup sisters. This song often seemed to be on in the background, my Mum humming along badly.

    But even then there was something about the line "they'll learn much more than I'll ever know" that made me cry and still does. God I was an oversensitive little mare...

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