Lowlife 121 – A Happy Valley

A Happy Valley

By Dominic Horton

My friend Fran said to me that taking a holiday is essential, even if it is at the expense of paying the bills. This is the way artistic people like Fran carry on in life and rightly so I say. So to that end I am going against the grain and planning a little break, only for two days and the destination is barely outside of my home county of the West Midlands, but nonetheless it qualifies as a bona fida holiday and I am very much looking forward to it. I use the phrase 'going against the grain' as in my adult life holidays have been few and far between due to a variety of reasons including being skint, having no-one to go with and having mental illness difficulties. My main summer holiday in recent years has been a night of camping in the Shire with the likes of Sleepy Tom, Fudgkins, the Abdul and other assorted waifs to enjoy the beer festival at The Bell at Pensax and as my faithful readers know, I do regularly visit my holiday home of the Flagon & Gorses, which always proves to be restorative despite me never returning homeward with a sun tan or a stick of rock.

The late Alex Munro.

I did have regular holidays as a child, including an annual visit to Llandudno with my elder brother The Albino under the stewardship of my Grandad Tom and Nanny Edna. The coach, run by Evergreens, used to set out from around the corner from my grandparents' house on Shell Corner and proceed forthwith to our destination in North Wales, stopping just the once on the long journey, at a café near Chester. It makes you wonder how we managed in the days before there were toilets on coaches but looking back people were not as big on hydration in the 1970's as they are now so it was not as much of an issue. A cup of tea with breakfast would see you through to another one at lunch time, or elevenses if you were lucky. Boys drank pop or milk but men only drank tea and beer, never water, and even coffee was a rarity mainly because it was generally disgusting. Grandad and Nan drank Camp coffee, which wasn't granulated but in liquid form – I rest my case. Camp coffee was even a bit racist as its label depicted a British army officer in India being served coffee by his Sikh orderly (but not as racist as Hitler Ice Cream, which was controversially unearthed in India [ironically] this week by The Daily Mail.)

Back then there were no flashy electronic devices such as Ipads, DS's or DVD players to keep children entertained so the Albino and I used to mainly spend the coach journey by feeling sick because of all the cigarette smoke generated by the adults. It was always a relief to get to the half way house café to get a breathe of fresh air before the renewed onslaught of nicotine on the second half of the journey. By the time we reached Llandudno my lungs felt like I'd spend hours in a smoking towering inferno but unfortunately Steve McQueen failed to rescue me.

The Albino, Nanny Edna & the Author at St Helier guest

house, Llandudno, late 1970's.

We always stayed at the same guest house, St Helier, which was run by friendly Liverpudlians Betty and Eddie. The other guests at Betty and Eddie's were always familiar to us as we used to go the same week every year, so we knew everyone and in the dining room the guests would annually chart the growth and progress of the Albino and I. One guest in particular, old Mr Bray, sticks in my mind. Bray, a shortish stout man of a kindly disposition, was a war hero and he had injured his neck in conflict so it was permanently crooked at an angle, so it often took him a great deal of maneuvering to turn around to speak to other diners behind him.

Despite the weather being hot (it was always sunny and warm when we went to Llandudno) Mr Bray used to wear a shirt with a detachable collar over a vest, a tie and a three piece suit and highly polished brogues. When Mr Bray walked down the beach side promenade with his wife he would additionally have a rain coat over his arm and a trilby on his head. When Bray ate his hot soup at the evening meal his fleshy, thick neck used to bulge out over his starched, tight collar and it used to make me sweat just watching him. When the main meal was served Mrs Bray could be seen surreptitiously wrapping off cuts of chicken or beef in a serviette and slyly putting the package into her handbag – apparently the Brays used to use the meat for the following day's luncheon sandwiches, as the guest house only provided breakfast and evening meals.

Camp Coffee

The Albino and I used to share a family room with Nan and Grandad, with them sleeping in a double bed and us two boys occupying a bunk bed, which seemed exotic to us. There was a wash basin in the room but the shared bathroom was down the hallway as en suite rooms were not known in working class circles in those days. If I didn't get to sleep before Grandad Tom then I would be in all sorts of bother as he was a dreadful snorer (or a good one more like) and his bellowing fog horn noises would keep me up all night. How Nanny Edna put up with Grandad's cacophonous snoring gawd only knows.

Regardless of how well we had slept the Albino and I were ushered out of bed early in the morning as we had our routines to go through before we settled down to breakfast in the dining room. Grandad Tom would wash in the basin and with the aid of a fully equipped and maintained leather-bound shaving kit he would meticulously guide his razor over his whiskers. We used to then leave Nan to it, to get ready, and we walked down the town to get the papers for Grandad and comics for us children and we would sit in the sunshine on a promenade bench reading our respective publications. As the Albino and I got older we would want to read the newspapers ourselves to see if we could find any football news in the sports pages but we would be lucky to find a treasured snippet of transfer news as it was close season and unlike today there was no saturation coverage of football.

A comprehensive breakfast of cereals, toast and marmalade and an English breakfast set us up for the day and off we all went to the Great Orme, Happy Valley or the beach. One time when on the beach I had to dart away from a pursuing crab for fear of feeling the wrath of its claws and in the process I fell and cut my knee on a rock. Nan wrapped my knee in her handkerchief and kissed me better. I still have the scar to this day, though it has become faint over time.

Hitler ice cream, by request of Toby In-Tents.

The Happy Valley is a garden and lawns in a sheltered hollow on the East side of the Great Orme, a large rocky out crop. The Happy Valley was a pleasant venue for holiday makers to relax but I remember it being a bit of a frustrating place as the lawns were sloped so it was difficult to play football. There was an open air theatre and an old Scottish music hall comedian and singer named Alex Munro seemed to have a monopoly there and the sounds of his shows could be heard resonating out over Happy Valley at intervals all day long. Thrillingly cable cars travelled from Happy Valley up to the top of the Great Orme and it was beyond exciting getting to travel in them, the highlight of the year, let alone the holiday. A café at the top of the Orme housed old fruit machines and amusements.

The Author & Grandad Tom at Conway Castle.

In the evening we repaired to The Golden Goose amusement arcade, which was one of the highlights of the day. Grandad would give The Albino and I a set amount of money to fritter away, which we did with glee, occasionally winning on the one arm bandits but losing more often than not. One year The Goose introduced a two person boxing amusement with small figures of Muhammad Ali and Joe Bugner and the players controlled the figures in knocking lumps out of each other, which was great fun.

I think of Llandudno periodically and sometimes consider returning there with my dear son Kenteke to visit the old holiday haunts of my childhood. In fact until only a few years ago Betty still ran St Helier guest house, well into her dotage. But Llandudno will have moved on, as have I as a person, so some happy places from one's childhood are probably best left well alone to remain fondly resting in the memory.

© Dominic Horton, May 2015.

* Lowlife is dedicated to the memory of the late Jonathan Rendall

Lowlife 120 – Slidin' & Glidin'

Slidin' & Glidin'

By Dominic Horton

I was very sad to hear of the passing of the blues legend BB King on Thursday, hot on the heels of the death of the Labour party following the general election the week before. BB King was my first love in the world of the blues and so he has a special place in my heart. More specifically it was King's album King of the Blues Guitar that got me into the blues originally. At the time, when I was 14 or 15 years old, Halesowen library used to have a collection of vinyl records that you could hire out (for ten new pence a pop, if I recall correctly) and so I used to try different types of music and artists and I borrowed King of the Blues Guitar as part of this controlled experiment. When I dropped the needle on the first track, Slidin' & Glidin', I instantly knew that it was for me. The album was a compilation of instrumental tracks so at that stage I was yet to have the pleasure of hearing BB's rich and characterful voice but I played the album over and over and was keen to get back to the library to borrow more blues albums. Next I hired a Muddy Waters record, I forget which though I remember I Can't Call Her Sugar was the first track and it was a recording from the 1950's, so I was introduced to the harder edged Chigago blues, which is of course altogether different from BB's velveteen guitar. That was it, I was off and running as a lover of the blues and I haven't looked back since.

The late, great BB King, the Chairman of the Board.

I was intoxicated by Muddy Waters' slide guitar playing and the accompanying sound of Little Walter's harmonica so I saved up and bought those instruments myself and tried to replicate the sound. I didn't have a great deal of success but I must have driven the members of my household mad trying. I sounded less like Muddy Waters and Little Walter and more like Muddy Harmonica and Little Talent.

It is strange how when you revisit books or films that you enjoyed earlier in your life that your experience of them, and how you interpret the work, can change over time: I first read On the Road by Jack Kerouac when I was eighteen years old and at the time I found it to be a joyful whirlwind of electric energy but when I re-read the book a few years ago I found it to be very dark and brooding. The book, of course, had not changed but I had. But music doesn't seem to be burdened with this change of perception and after hearing of BB's demise I dug out the tape that I made of King of the Blues Guitar and it instantaneously sounded every bit the same and as good as it did when I first heard it when I was a youth.

The cassette itself had weathered well and the sound quality is still more than acceptable after all these years despite it being a cheap tape in the first place, so you can keep your ipods and MP3 players, I'm happier having something more tangible in my hands. It was exciting rooting through boxes in my cupboards and unearthing the tape, putting it into the stereo and pressing the play button and hearing the delights of Lucille, BB's guitar, cascading out of the speakers – you simply can't have that experience with an ipod download. Nor can you replicate the thrill of dropping the needle on a much anticipated vinyl record.

Mojo Buford, by request of Toby In-Tents

Years ago, before people had access to the internet, I was desperate to find a record, Blues with a Touch of Soul, by Mighty Joe Young after hearing a track from it on Paul Jones's Rhythm and Blues show on BBC Radio 2 but I couldn't seem to get it anywhere. So I employed the services of a record search agent and many weeks later, when I had all but forgotten about the matter, they contacted me to say they had tracked down a copy of the album in the U.S. It cost me a pretty penny but you can imagine my elation and unbridled excitement when the postman delivered the record. I hastily unpackaged the disc and before even reading the liner notes I put the record on the turntable and readied to play it. But before I settled the stylus down I hesitated as I was suddenly plagued with an unwelcome thought – what if the record is sh*t? Fortunately the album turned out to be as magnificent as I'd hoped it to be and it remains a firm favourite of mine to this day.

Mighty Joe Young.

After King of the Blues Guitar I listened to a number of other BB King albums and started to read about the man and his life so it was with great excitement that I found out that a documentary about BB was to be shown on the television and I could barely contain myself waiting to watch it. But frustratingly on the night of the broadcast my step-father wanted to watch another programme so I was scuppered, there was no video or catch up TV or anything like that and we only had one television set in the house, so I had no means of watching a recording of the programme. We take it for granted these days that we can see television programmes at our leisure by a variety of methods but back then you either watched a show when it was broadcast or you missed out altogether. Things changed later that year when I was bought a black and white portable television to watch the Mexico World Cup, which meant that I could hole myself up in my room, as teenagers tend to do.

I saw BB King in concert just the once, at Birmingham Symphony Hall, and the world class acoustics lent themselves well to King's classy playing and band. But I never got to see Muddy Waters in concert as he died in 1983, when I was just 12 years old, but I did get to see one of his harmonica players, Mojo Buford, at the Bear Tavern Blues Club in Bearwood in the early 1990's. While Tom Holliday and I were waiting for Mojo to start the gig Tom made favourable comments towards a tall, leggy, long haired blonde woman who was standing in front of us with her back to us, accompanied by her boyfriend. It transpired that the “boyfriend” turned out to be none other than the internationally renown rock star Robert Plant (of Led Zeppelin fame) and the “woman” turned out to be a fella. Once Tom found out this information all of a sudden his comments about the person turned less favourable.

Mud Morganfield. 

Also a few years ago I saw Muddy Waters' son, Mud Morganfield, at a gig at the Jam House in Birmingham. When the support act were playing I looked over my right shoulder and to my delight there was a man watching the band who was the spit of Muddy Waters so I immediately knew that he must be Mud Morganfield; I enthusiastically shook his hand and welcomed him to Birmingham and said to him that I hope that he enjoys the show. Mud said nothing but just smiled and nodded his head. The support band wound up and it was time for the main act, so the emcee took the stage and roared into the microphone, “And now from the South side of Chicago, Illinois, USA, direct from the Windy City, give a warm welcome to the stage the man himself MR MUD MORGANFIELD!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!” Whilst clapping vigorously I looked over my right shoulder again to see Mud standing there, waiting for him to rush to the stage. But he stood perfectly still. Then from my over my left shoulder another fella proceeded towards to the stage, high-fiving with members of the audience as he went – it turned out that the man who I had earlier shook hands with was not Mud Morganfield at all but a regular punter there to watch the show, just like me.

It goes without saying that Hugh Queensbury and Dustin Scoffman, who accompanied me to the gig, were highly amused but not for the first time in my life I was embarrassed to say the least. You could say that the incident gave me a bad case of the blues.

© Dominic Horton, May 2015.

Lowlife is dedicated to the memory of the late Jonathan Rendall

Email: lordhofr@gmail.com

Lowlife 119 – Things Can Only Get Worse

Things Can Only Get Worse

By Dominic Horton

So like many events that are built up by the media, such as the Floyd Mayweather Vs Manny Pacquiao 'Fight of the Century' bout, the general election turned out to be the dampest of squibs and not, as predicted, one of the closest elections in years with a hung parliament bringing intrigue, frenetic negotiations between the parties and a soap opera for the media to feast on. On Thursday evening I was all set to watch the BBC's election coverage from the comfort of my bed at my Codger Mansions homestead and I was keenly anticipating a long night of twists and turns all carefully stewarded by the unflappable institution that is Richard Dimbleby, culminating in a breathtaking photo finish. But then the exit poll was revealed and like an overly excited teenager having his first sexual encounter the election had prematurely ejaculated.

Ed Miliband looking a bit dejected.

It was clear that the Tories would be back in power come Friday, even if they had to do a deal with the likes of the DUP. So as it turned out I was asleep by 2300 hours and although I hoped that the exit polls had got their predictions horribly wrong I knew that the game was up and that Labour had failed to take power. In reality even if it had of been the most exciting election in years I doubt whether I would have made it much past midnight before nodding off, such is my inability to endure beyond that hour these days.

It was all a far cry from the election of 1997 when El Pistolero and I sat up through the night, tinnies in hand, watching the Tory seats fall one by one like dominoes, with Labour winning a landslide victory, taking a mammoth 418 seats, to finally oust John Major's Thatcherite Conservative government which had been in power for 18 long years. We cheered as if Aston Villa had just scored a winning goal when the likes of Michael Portillo, Malcolm Rifkind, Norman Lamont and Edwina Currie humiliatingly lost their seats and when Giles Brandreth also fell the levity of the evening hit a peak. It is unlikely in my lifetime that the 1997 election, like the 1982 World Cup, will be bettered. Things can only get worse.

I wish the Returning Officers would not reveal the outcome of the constituency ballots to the candidates before announcing the results to the world at large, as you can often tell who has won the vote by a revealing suppressed smile of the face of the winner or a look of thunder on the boat race of a loser. Keeping the results under wraps until the official announcement might lead to more emotional responses from the candidates who have won seats, especially in close calls, and it would liven up the proceedings no end if an elated winner shouted, “get in there you f*cking beauty!!!!” But this would most likely not happen as there is far too much decorum among the candidates standing for seats in parliament. I would much rather see an abashed loser, who is getting dogs abuse from the crowd, throw his dummies out of the pram before exclaiming, “why don't you f*ck off you w*nkers - I'm off down the boozer!”

The infamous Paddy Pantsdown headline

 from The Sun

But it could be argued that there is no shame for a party member to lose her/ his seat in a close run ballot. The Shadow Chancellor Ed Balls, the former Right Honourable Member for Morley & Outwood, was deposed by the Tory candidate Andrea Jenkyns by a mere 422 votes, but at least 18,354 souls in the constituency did have faith in him.  The real humiliation in the election is for hapless candidates such as Nathan Handley, an Independent in David Cameron's constituency of Witney, who commanded only 12 votes. Handley was even shamefully outvoted by Bobby Smith of the Give me Back Elmo Party (37 votes) and Vivien Saunders of the Reduce VAT in Sport Party (56 votes.)

As a minimum I am sure Handley would have expected his friends and family to have voted for him and one imagines that they all pledged their undying allegiance to his cause. Assuming Handley voted for himself and that he has more than 11 others in his social circle he will be left wondering which snakes in the grass promised him their votes but actually put their crosses in the box of someone else. On his next trip to his local boozer, like a seasoned poker player Handley will be gazing keenly into the eyes of his acquaintances for any little sign of guilt or duplicity. Not knowing which of his cronies are traitors will mean all trust between them and Handley will be eroded leading to breakdowns in his relationships. Hanley could well be left friendless, ruing the day he decided to waste £500 paying his deposit to stand for Member of Parliament for Witney.

Hanley's meagre campaign budget probably did not extend to paying for the traditional “Vote for XXX” signs that political parties affix to lamposts. I got to wondering how effective such lampost signs are as surely not even UKIP supporters would not be persuaded to vote for a candidate solely on having sight of such a simple sign. That said one undecided voter who was interviewed on the BBC stated that she tweeted the two main candidates and voted for the one who tweeted her back first. This is known as the Twitter for twits Mavis Riley method.

Mhairi Black MP, by request of Toby In-Tents.

When I popped to vote on Thursday morning I took my dear son Kenteke with me as his school was being used as a polling station and was closed for the day. Kenteke asked me a series of questions to try to get to the bottom of what this election business is all about and I explained, with some difficulty on my part, the electoral system as best I could and eventually he seemed to understand; gawd help we if ever we move to a system of proportional representation. As is the want of a 10 year old boy, Kenteke's biggest concern on Thursday was wanting a game of football with his new Champions League ball (which turned out to be rather good, I have to say). But when I woke him on Friday morning the first thing he did was to ask me the result of the election and instead of tuning into the Cartoon Channel on TV whilst eating his breakfast he watched the BBC's election coverage instead, which by then had taken on the feel of post-game analysis on Match of the Day, but instead of Lineker, Shearer and Savage it was Dimbleby, Andrew Marr and Jo Coburn picking the bones out of the matter.

Dimbleby, Marr and Coburn all agreed that the biggest winners of the night (other than the Tories of course) were the Scottish National Party who gained a bumper 50 seats north of the border, catapulting their total number to 56. The new SNP MPs included 20 year old Mhairi Black - who ousted the shadow foreign secretary Douglas Alexander from his Paisley and Renfrewshire South seat – to become the youngest Member of Parliament since 13 year old Christopher Monck in 1667. Monck was probably only successful as everyone else had died of the plague.

Giles Brandreth. 

One can hardly blame the members of the Scottish National Party from wanting to split from England, a country which is so messed up and confused that the flying of the national St George's Cross flag is often seen as primarily an act of xenophobia and not one of patriotism. (Discuss.) The Liberal Democrats were one of the biggest losers with 49 of their seats being culled, leaving just 8 in total, but their former leader Paddy Ashdown was convinced that the exit poll was wrong stating to Andrew Neill on the BBC that he would “eat his hat” if it was accurate. As the results rolled in Paddy Ashdown once more became Paddy Pantsdown.

As Friday wore on there seemed little point in following the election coverage on the BBC as the result was depressing enough without having to suffer the prolonged media aftermath. So it was back to the escapism and reassuring tones of the eternally breezy Alan Brazil on Talk Sport. Like the general election sport can leave you dejected but at least if your team loses you don't have to wait five years for them to put it right. 

© Dominic Horton, May 2015.

Lowlife is dedicated to the memory of the late Jonathan Rendall

Email: lordhofr@gmail.com

Lowlife 118 - The Iron Man

The Iron Man

By Dominic Horton

In last week's edition of this column I wrote about my spells of reading to a critically ill close friend of mine, Carl Taylor (or Tater as I have always known him.) I couldn't ask Carl what he wanted me to read to him as he was in an induced coma, so I perused my bookshelves trying to find a suitable book; I wanted something fairly light and easily digestible so I decided to go for a childrens' book but one that could equally be enjoyed by an adult. I could easily have chosen one of Roald Dahl's stories, Wind in the Willows, The Adventures of Tom Sawyer or a host of other books but I plumped for The Iron Man by Ted Hughes. It only struck me later how fitting the title of the book is in relation to Carl, a physically imposing, mentally headstrong, solid, utterly dependable character. In hindsight I don't think that it was an accident that I picked out that particular book.  Regrettably I didn't get the chance to finish reading the book to Carl. Unlike The Iron Man there was no happy ending for my dear friend as he tragically passed away last Thursday after his critical condition quickly deteriorated.

Tater

After being admitted to Russells Hall hospital on Saturday 18^th April Carl was in a critical but stable condition and that remained largely unchanged until Thursday last week. When Carl was moved from Russells Hall to the Queen Elizabeth II Hospital in Birmingham on the Friday after his hospitalisation it was clear that the illness to his brain, that struck him out of the blue, was a rare one and was outside of the expertise of the staff of the former hospital. As the QE hospital is a centre of neurological excellence in the country I thought at that stage that it will only be a matter of time before the experts there diagnose the illness, get to the bottom of what caused it and start a course of treatment that would lead to Carl being restored to health, even if such treatment took a while to complete. Sadly, through no fault of the hospital staff, things did not work out as I had anticipated.

After the neurological consultant assessed Carl he quickly diagnosed that he had status epilepticus, which is a very rare condition where the patient has continuous bouts of fitting. Although the consultant reached a diagnosis his knowledge on the condition seemed to be limited as it is such an unusual one, to such an extent that he had only previously encountered the illness once before in his career. That being the case further tests on Carl were needed and the consultant had to research the matter further. The main problem seemed to be that the medical staff were no further forward into knowing why such an otherwise healthy man contracted the illness. Still, there was a plan of sorts and all hoped that the test results would provide answers and the consultant's research would prove fruitful.

Early on Thursday morning Carl's wife Sarah let me know that he had taken a turn for the worse. When you are contacted at an early hour in these circumstances it is not normally going to be good news. Any deterioration in Carl's critical condition was always going to be extremely worrying. At the hospital Sarah explained the severity of the situation as Carl's organs had begun to fail. Although the doctors would try things to help Carl's condition during the rest of the day if there was no improvement they recommended that treatment be withdrawn the following day. Needless to say, Sarah and all of Carl's family and friends that were present were utterly devastated with the dreadful explanation and it seemed barely credible that things had escalated so quickly from Carl being in full health to such a dire predicament.

Greenhill FC, 2005: Back row: Newty, A. Speake, A Wooldridge, J Barlow,
D Smith, Tater, Me, K Wainwright, L Baker, A Spencer. Front row:
Tony Parkes, C Winstanley, Jim Mattin (c), Matt Adams, M Siddall (seated),
B Smart, The Big Un (Mark Whitehouse). 

When a close friend is extremely poorly and in hospital it is often tricky to know when to visit and when to respect the family's privacy and to leave them be. Throughout Carl's hospitalisation Sarah had completely dispelled this awkward dilemma by consistently inviting me, and Carl's other close friends, to attend the hospital when we wanted to and I was truly thankful for such a warm and open invitation. But on hearing the dreadful prognosis on Thursday morning it seemed to be the right decision to leave Carl's family alone for a while to come to terms with the atrocious news and at that point there didn't seem any imminent threat of the worst happening.

So Tony and I decided to go to lunch and pop back to the hospital in a couple of hours or so. We ended up in one of our old stomping grounds, the Fairfield pub, a Banks's (Marston's) house. As we were just about to order our drinks and food my mobile telephone rang and ominously the screen told me that that caller was Sarah. I barely needed to answer the call to know what the news was going to be. It turned out to be Lesley, a close and incredibly supportive friend of Sarah, who through her tears confirmed the worst, that shockingly Carl had passed away.

The precise moment of Lesley call could be seen as one last timely intervention of advice from Carl: “Doe drink any of that Banks's rubbish, if you want a decent pint you might as well get your ars* down the Waggon & Horses.” We immediately returned to the hospital, dumbstruck and in disbelief.

Enville Athletic FC, early 90's: Back row: N Bird, Me, A Gore, M Heathcock,
Tater, C Howard, A Litchfield, S Hancox, S Smith, Glenn Taylor. Front row:
D Robson, M Dutton, Warwick Adams, P Clinton, Mark Rutter, Newty,
P Tomlinson. 

I won't write that Carl lost his fight for life because he never had the chance to compete in such a fight as the severity of his illness meant that it was entirely out of his hands. If Carl had of been involved in a straight and fair fight for his life then there is absolutely no shadow of doubt whatsoever in my mind that he would have ended as the resounding victor such was his strength of character and mind and dogged determination. More than anyone that I know Carl was a straightforward, honest, unflinchingly steadfast and unfailingly reliable person who I would have trusted with my life. He was an iron man. I always saw Carl as unbreakable, a towering figure, both physically but in terms of his personality as well which makes it almost impossible to comprehend that he is no longer here. If I were to choose one person to be in my corner or to be in the trenches with me then it would be Carl, without question. When Carl was there, it felt like everything would be just fine, he was a steadying, reassuring influence who gave me a sense of security and peace of mind. As a dear and invaluable friend to me, Carl was always a cornerstone of my existence and without him it feels like the world will collapse and crumble into nothingness.

For those of you who didn't have the pleasure of meeting Carl the previous paragraph might give you the impression that he was an overly serious man but nothing could be further from the truth as he was always smiling and we never failed to make each other laugh. Occasionally something silly would tickle our funny bones and we would set each other off chortling uncontrollably and just when one of us would regain his composure the other one would set him off giggling again. One time Carl and I were sitting on bar stools in The Mosquito Bar in Malaga, me drinking Scotch, him vodka (Carl hated whisky) after a busy night of drinking and making merry with the rest of our stag party, and we were trying, but failing, to make understandable conversation. I said to Carl, “this is no good Tater, when I'm drunk I cannot hear and when you're drunk you cannot speak.” And that was that, we were off, crying with prolonged laughter, almost falling off our bar stools.

The Big Un and Tater enjoying a vodka jelly. 

The story of how I met Carl to a large degree sums him up. I joined Enville Athletic Football Club as fresh faced eighteen year old some twenty five odd years ago and at the first training session I didn't know the other players from Adam and I was a bit nervous. Carl said hello to me (or “alright mate, how am ya?” to be more precise) and that was that, I got talking to Carl and Newty and my nerves were dispelled and both have remained close friends ever since. Carl's outgoing, warm and friendly nature was the seed from which our friendship blossomed.

Before Tony and I left the hospital to go for lunch at the Fairfield on Thursday we briefly got to see Carl and although I didn't realise it at the time it turned out to be the last time I would see him. Knowing the gravity of Carl's condition, lying there unconscious with his life being maintained by numerous machines, my legs turned to jelly and they remained that way for the rest of the day. I knew that I may well not get the chance to ever read the last few pages of The Iron Man to Carl, so I told him how the book ended: the iron man won his battle with the space-bat-angel and pacified and befriended the terrifying monster and the world became wonderfully peaceful. Carl now is also peaceful but the world is an immeasurably poorer and emptier place without my dear friend to illuminate and enrich it.

© Dominic Horton, May 2015.

Lowlife is dedicated to the memory of the late Jonathan Rendall

Email: lordhofr@gmail.com