I loved going on holiday
As I head towards 50 I want to say some thank yous
Often when I sit my dentist’s chair I distract the experience by recalling every holiday I have been on. I start with 1973 maybe 1974 when we went as a family to the Isle Of Man. I have only a few memories of that trip, seeing my first peacock near a Lighthouse we were visiting and being mesmerised by the old fashion lift in the hotel. I think it was 1975 when we spent a week or two with extended family in the country while my ma and da went to Spain ( I like to remind myself they were only 33, 34 then).
I remembering driving my first car in the field adjacent to the bungalow in which I was staying. Well, I thought I was driving but I was only steering it while sitting on a relative’s lap.
In 1976 we went with two other families to Butlins in Ayr, Scotland. I gave my first performance at a Talent show. That tells me that I had not become conscious of critical voices which somehow crept in within a few years.
In 1977 my parents separated so any plans for a holiday were abandoned.
I think we had recovered by 1978 and joined another ‘Single Parent Family’ on a caravan holiday in Kilkeel, County Down. I kept buying comic magazines from the shop on the site.
Was it 1979 or 1980 that the Boys’ Brigade (BB) started to provide me with an annual holiday? It was to Pwllheli in North Wales. The annual camp was part of the BB culture. We would take a field and set up camp. There would be tent inspections each morning and inter tent sports competitions in the afternoon which I did not particularly enjoy. But I did enjoy the adventure of travelling to a destination I did not know without parents.
A camp followed each year to Tullymore Forest, Newcastle, County Down, the Isle of Man and then the final big trip to Hyeres in the South of France. Of course travel to all these destinations was by coach and boat when crossing water.
Hyeres was something else for many reasons probably most notably the naked bodies. I can still see our tour guide taking off her T-shirt and being topless. It obviously made a lasting impression on my 12-year-old self.
It was the same year my BB was closed due to controversial ‘goings-on’. In short, one of the leaders had encountered Charismatic Renewal and decided to share it was us. Speaking in tongues and casting out demons was not in the programme and when some of our parents noticed apprehension in some of us it was brought to the attention of the minister. I wasn’t apprehensive at all. I had an interest in the supernatural and paranormal so I rushed by any ‘fearing angels’.
It looked like this trip to France would not happen but it did. It was the last camp as my BB company had now folded.
I was lost for a time without the BB and finally drifted from church. I had joined the Rugby team at school and found that I shared humour with Ron. He seemed twice my height but he had a welcoming nature. Things in youth just seem to happen much more easily than as adults and of a summer evening I would take myself off to another estate and just hang out with Ron and others from school. The local community police got to know us as we were always in the parks. That summer my holiday was an RUC Community Relations Camp in Crawfordsburn.
School then took over the holidays and in 1984 we were making our way by coach to Crans Montana, Switzerland. Not the most ideal location as it is a ski resort. Was I surprised to find no snow in the summer?
Ron was involved with the Army Cadets and it wasn’t long before I got involved. It seemed I joined things to get a holiday and that year 1985 we had a cadet camp at Redford Barracks near Edinburgh. If I ever thought of going into the Army that experience put me off.
That summer I recall us watching a TV set in the Barracks canteen which showed the riots that had erupted in our home town. I determined the next year I would be going nowhere but staying at home.
Thank you to everyone who made those holidays possible.
best day,
g
