Invariably at some point in the long school holiday I was packed off to stay with an Aunt in Edinburgh. Not a favourite Aunt I have to say. She had too many 'dos' and don'ts' and an acid tongue to enforce her ideas of strong discipline. She was also at this point, childless, so there were no cousins for me to terrorise. If only my elder brother had been sent as well, we could have had some great fights.
But with hindsight I can appreciate that this was part of the strategy to give my mother a rest by separating her two energetic and competitive boys. I had often heard myself described by my mother as a 'steering' boy. I now know that this Scottish expression means the opposite, more or less, of placid. I never heard her describe me as difficult and indeed, roaming the countryside with my mates, I was no trouble to anyone. Caged in a flat in Edinburgh was a different story.
With little to engage me all day except learning to be good, I longed for the evening when my uncle would come home from work. Most evenings we would watch cricket in The Parks, go for walks through the old parts of the city which were a bit creepy or he would let me watch as he dressed fish hooks for his fly fishing while he talked to me. I think he was imparting bits of history but he could make it seem like an adventure story; then all too soon I was being driven off to bed by my Aunt and come morning another long day stretched ahead.
One concession I earned was permission to negotiate the many flights of stairs to the street door. Here on pain of death not to step over the threshold I was allowed to stand just inside to watch the street traffic; in those days a fascinating mix of horse drawn waggons, trams and cars.
When I say I earned this concession I think it was more by default as I had taken to practising goalkeeping dives by racing across the room and diving headlong on to a large settee. I seem to remember hearing 'Oh God,' and other expressions like 'give me patience' as my Aunt worked in the kitchen. So by whatever means, I had achieved a daytime pursuit and eventually a friendly face other than my uncle's.
Tom was the coalman, sturdy and satisfyingly dirty. His horse and float would stop by the door and he would call 'coal' in a voice that carried three storeys to my aunt. A window would be opened and an order called. 'Two bags coalman' and Tom would set off stooped under a hundredweight of coal. 'Fetch another bag son,' he would say. 'Can't,' I would reply. 'Not allowed past the door.'
Tom, always cheerful, whistled a lot and often stopped to chat with me. He talked about his steady old horse, his children, his mates, about places they had to deliver to. One day he told me about a coalman who had to deliver to a cellar with a delivery chute. He and his mate had spent time in a pub just previously. As the coalman was about to empty his bag his mate gave him a playful push which sent him and his coal into the murky, coal dust polluted cellar.
'You think I'm black?' asked Tom. He seemed to expect an answer so I said, 'a little perhaps.'
'Nothing to what he was,' Tom guffawed heartily. 'You can tell your Auntie I told you a dirty story.'
'I did. She was not amused.'
© Ian Campbell Thomson, 2003