Low life | 22 November 2008

I have three friends whom I’ve kept up with since we sat together, aged five, in Mrs Asplin’s class at the local county primary school. After Mrs Asplin, we were taught by Mrs Dobson, then Mrs Asplin again, then Mr Seager, then Mrs Dobson again, then Mr Middleton and then Mr Farrell. These teachers were all kind except Mr Seager, who was Welsh and shouted at us and made us write out hymns. After that we were swallowed up by a huge, new and somewhat terrifying comprehensive school and in the second year I moved away from the area. 

These friends have been easy to keep up with, however, because whereas I’ve moved about the country a fair bit, they’ve stayed put. One we’ve always known as Dot, one as Phy, and the other we call Man, in a parody of the hippy greeting. I’ve always been Jel. For several years Phy and Man were in a rock band called Heironymous Boch and I moved back briefly, having no job or commitments, and Dot and I were the band’s incompetent roadies.