Scribblings

Grant, Lee, & Jeremy all visited and we went out for a walk to Knowlesbeck along the canal and back; Lee had his new Pentax ME Super camera he got for Xmas. They all left around teatime.

If Grant cocks his A-levels up again next summer, there’s a chance that he’ll just stick his neck out and move down to Watermouth. I said he could stay in my room no problem until he gets fixed up, but whether I’ll be so blasé about it if the situation actually arises is another matter. He’s writing poetry again, and thinks it’s better than his previous stuff, and I found myself wishing I could keep the mood he puts me in and take it with me back down to University.

I'm dissatisfied with this diary; I want more, want it to be more; it’s no medium of any permanence and I really ought to write apart from my scribblings here.

Test

Into Easterby again, second day in a row, and I intend going again tomorrow. I bought Huxley’s The Doors of Perception.

Before going to bed, Andrew, Dad and I listened to the exciting climax of the Test match in Melbourne on the radio. Australia’s last pair were in, needing 36 to tie and gain the Ashes. It looked like they were going to win when, three runs away from the target, Miller took a catch and England won.

Dad has been very ratchety the past few days, signs of the old bitterness creeping through. Today in particular there are flashes of his old, preretirement self, the self I thought he’d discarded. He delivered the usual vicious sermon about declining morals, permissiveness and Channel 4’s “pornography” (we can’t even get it on our TV!). He's so bitter and it's all so unnecessary, but then I suppose unemployment does get him down from time to time.

He's written fifteen hundred pages of his autobiography in just over seven weeks!

Errands

I went into Easterby: I had a lot to do what with buying train tickets, getting Dad’s birthday present (Andrew and I got him a Thesaurus), and so on.

Pete Godfrey rang me in the evening from London; his call cheered me up. He sounds to have had a pretty miserable Christmas and was kicked out of his house by his Mum.

Resolution

We came back early today for the match. The atmosphere between Mum and I was soured by an unnecessary argument caused by my tactless comments but also Mum’s tendency to fly off the handle over nothing at all, but always, apparently, at me!

So I went to the game in a foul mood, feeling full of anger and frustration; the former eased eventually but the latter was only aggravated by a boring, irritating, 0-2 defeat. Athletic were useless.

I felt better in the evening. Mum apologised for “blowing her top.”

I have just over a week left at home. I’m looking forward to getting back to Watermouth, back into the thick of it again. But as always, I’ll be sad at leaving home and Easterby’s countryside behind. Next term has got to be more satisfying for me; I’ve got to go out more, read more, go to bed at regular times, get up at least before ten every morning, be more honest with myself, etc., etc., (although I’m not exactly sure what I mean by that last comment). Work hard, spend more time in the library. I can’t have spent above half a day there last term.

These resolutions are probably futile, but at least here, on record, I declare my desire to be ‘good'!

Uninspiring

Robert and I got up early to set off for Cannonbrook and the Yorkshire League first division clash between Dearnelow and Hatherseats Bridge. The game was pretty uninspiring although there was a massive crowd. Bright sun, bitterly cold and very windy. Final score: 1-1.

I spent the rest of the day ploughing through The American Colonies reading eighty-or-so pages and listening to Athletic lose four-nil at Astlow.