Thought for today:
"While looking through my Facebook albums yesterday, I came across an old photograph of me and a girl named Rose who I met at Butlins when I was 17 years old. I can still vividly remember that week of romantic exploration and the life-changing consequences for my best friend, Geoffrey.
First love is a magical thing that the memory often plays tricks with but never loses, however old one gets. More often than not, when a boy is under 12 years old, his 'first love' is more than likely to be nothing more than infatuation. During one's early teens it can be put down to curiosity and experimentation, and from 17 years onward, it depends whether or not one is a 'dreamer' or a 'player.' The dreamer will believe his feelings to be that of true love, which invariably turns out to be an illusion, while for the player it represents no more than an opportunity to be grabbed and a moment of sheer lust!
When I was 17 years old, it was 1960 and like so many other young ones of my time, I'd never had it so good. The world was my oyster. I worked hard in a local textile mill between Monday and Friday and I played hard on my weekends, especially during my two week's annual holidays from work. These two weeks away from home often proved one's major talking point for the remainder of the year. For the first time in my life, I earned enough money to pay my mum £10 per week board and keep, and still be left with sufficient to buy myself some decent clothes and footwear. As a general rule, we'd spend every penny we had every weekend and borrow off mum again every Monday until the next pay day.
The time eventually came for me to take my first holiday outside the presence of my parents. It wasn't that I was shy with mum when it came to talking about girls and the like; more that I didn't want her butting into that area of my life now that my body had grown big enough to do something about it. This physical maturity naturally made me more self-conscious. My best friend, Geoffrey Griffiths, suggested that we go off on a lad's holiday. We had saved up some money over the previous months to put down a deposit for a week's stay at Butlins' Holiday Camp in Skegness.
At that time, if one went on holiday without one's parents, the destination was either Blackpool or one of 'Butlins Holiday Camps.' If one was simply looking for the opportunity to have a good time, meet a few girls and have a bit of innocent fun without your parents buzzing around in the background, Blackpool Tower ballroom, Blackpool Fun Beach or Blackpool Central Pier was the place to be. If, however, a young lad went in search of serious romance, looking for a greater prize than one was ever likely to get in Blackpool, then 'Butlins Holiday Camp' held out much better prospects. Having one's own cabin and key with parents not being there to see what you were up to, plus the very slim likelihood of bumping into one's neighbours from the estate where you lived or the mill where you worked, provided a young man with all the privacy he could ever want.
On the third day there I met 18-year-old Rose. The only thing I can remember about her background was that she lived in the Midlands and worked as a Comptometer Operator, which at the time I'd never heard of. Her job sounded posh to me and initially, I thought it to be very important. It was some years later I learned that she operated a glorified calculating keyboard for adding, subtraction and multiplication.
Anyway, during those final, four marvelous days of our holiday at Butlins, Rose and I were never apart. Geoffrey had also met a girl with whom he seemed to hit it off and the upshot was that for the second half of the week, Rose and I shared a cabin and so did Geoffrey and his girl called Eileen. Geoffrey was 18 months older than I was and he no doubt had different expectations from his holiday than I did.
Let me say now for you of curious mind, apart from sleeping together partially clothed in our most private of regions, kisses, cuddles and some heavy petting was all that Rose and I got up to. We had a lovely four days, and in some ways, it was far too good to exchange addresses or ever expect it to be repeated. Rose intended to train to be a teacher and would have her time occupied in college for the next three years and I wanted to go to either Canada or America after my 21st birthday. When I reached 21 years of age, I would receive some compensation from an accident I had at the age of 11 years after being run over by a wagon. After ten years of interest, it would amount to a tidy sum. I estimated that even after I'd given my parents part of it, I would be left with over £2000, which amounted to two years' wages for me at the time. This was the time when a pint of beer would cost you 8p, a loaf of bread 5p, and brand new Mini car could be purchased for £500 and a small terrace house for less than £1000.
I was sad when I said goodbye to Rose at the camp on our day of departure. We kissed and each knew we wouldn't see each other again. It had been the briefest of holiday romances with no expectations or expressed commitments by either of us.
Geoffrey and Eileen, however, had seen much more of each other during their week at the holiday camp than it could be said that Rose and I had. As fate decreed, they were destined to see far too much of each other during the years ahead. Geoffrey wanted to keep in touch with Eileen and so they exchanged addresses. Having Geoffrey's address proved very handy for Eileen, especially when two to three months later, Geoffrey's parents received a letter saying that she was pregnant with his child. The strange thing was that the letter wasn't from Eileen, but her angry father!
In those days, abortion was against the law and even had it been legal, it would almost never be seriously considered by anyone! By Eileen's sixth month of pregnancy, she and Geoffrey walked down the marriage aisle. Neither set of parents could be said to have been overly pleased about the union, and whereas I don't know how Eileen felt, I know Geoffrey wasn't at all pleased to be the groom at a shotgun marriage. However, like all the young men of his time, there was only one thing to do in such circumstances and that was to follow one's parent's advice. The time had come for Geoffrey to do the right thing after he'd done the wrong thing by the poor girl. He'd made his bed and as far as both sets of parents were concerned, the only responsible and proper thing to do was to lie in it!'
I'm sad to say that Geoffrey and Eileen's marriage didn't last beyond five years of their wedding day. On year four of their marriage, Eileen got herself a job at 'The Batley Variety Club' as a bunny and six months later, she moved out of the matrimonial abode, left Geoffrey holding their five-year-old son and moved in with the Assistant Manager of the Batley club. Twelve years later, Geoffrey died of lung cancer.
As for Rose, I don't know how her life fared. I don't know whether or not it has been kind to her or has been one filled with permanent regret. I often wonder did she ever became a teacher, marry, have children, divorce or run off with the milk man etc. I don't know whether her memories are happy or bitter sweet. Like myself, I hope that she was fortunate enough to have kept her good looks and didn't turn into an overweight, toothless frog after finding her Prince, kissing him and letting him go. I wonder if she ever thinks about those four days and nights we spent together at 'Butlins Holiday Camp,' in Skegness during that summer holidays of 1960?" William Forde: September 15th, 2017.
https://youtu.be/1zUeAaBGVTk
