Did something right then

We were down at Boscombe Vintage Market the other day. It was freezing in the Royal Arcade so we all met up in Café Nero for a welcome cup of hot chocolate. My, but it sounds salubrious…ROYAL arcade no less; Café Nero. It belies the fact that Boscombe is, I believe, officially the second poorest area in Europe. Metal shutters on virtually every building…it reeks of poverty and drugs.


My girls, who were brought up here, don’t perceive it that way though. For example, they don’t see the spillage-covered tables of Café Nero that are piled high with other people’s leftovers. They don’t know that I had to ask for a key to use the loo. They only see the place that used to house Jones’ shoe shop as they reminisce across the dirty crockery of the past.


Do you remember the rocking horse?
I wonder what ever happened to that
We always had to have the same shoes
You could have red, blue or brown
Those ones with the three little holes on the front
I used to look longingly at the black patent ones on the next shelf
(I used to have the same ones when I was a child I recall)
Be fair though. Mum always made sure she spent the money on proper shoes for us.


There wasn’t much money I remind them
No. But do you remember when we went to buy me a new dress in Laura Ashley?
What were we doing in Laura Ashley I don’t say
We were going to buy a cheap dress but I saw that lovely one with all the screwed up stitches on the front
Smocking?
Yes smocking. You said it was too expensive but I started to cry so you bought it for me.

Good grief. That doesn’t sound like me. (It gets better)

Yes. And because you bought Leonie one, you bought me one in a different colour
But we had to keep them for best. Just for parties and stuff
They were lovely those dresses

I don’t remember any of this. We must have gone without something in order to finance such expense. Those two. They have no idea how touched I am that they have kept and shared this memory.

On the way back to the car, we pass the fish and chip shop.

Look. It’s the same man in the chip shop says Leonie.

God. How awful to have been stuck in this place for over twenty years. What happened to his life? These are more unexpressed thoughts

He was so nice to us she says
Perhaps you could go and say hello and get a free bag of chips I remark half-jokingly
Do you think he’ll remember the pictures we used to draw for him asks my 31 year old daughter?

God knows. I’d forgotten all about them along with the Laura Ashley dresses

I thought we lived in a grotty place all those years ago. I thought I hadn’t done very well when it came to providing them with a decent place to live in. They escaped before I managed to. Maybe it was me they were running from.