School is school for some people but for M each one held a unique fascination and appeal as well as other less desirable emotions. The next school was only a mile or two from his Primary school but this was “Big school” in every sense, it was the first school that held what he understood as proper lessons where you were expected to work and do homework; sport was properly organised into games lessons and he boarded and thus would be away from home for the first time. This was to prove an experience that would, in many ways, shape his life as he found, unlike his brother who constantly ran away, that he quiet enjoyed the time away from home with his friends – although if he was honest I suspect he was safe in the knowledge that he would go home at times and his mother and father were always there should he need them!
It was in many ways a traditional boy’s school and yet was quiet modern too and this combination suited M down to the ground; it seemed to him the best of both worlds for him to develop as there was some freedom to enable him to flourish and yet the security of discipline to rein in anything too extreme. He loved the smell of the wood panelled walls, the fact that it was not too large and that he could be himself without the restrictions of a sibling’s reputation or indeed presence; something that all younger offspring usually take advantage of and enjoy. The teachers were, by and large, good and he seemed to flourish under their care. He enjoyed the rituals of the marbles matches, that he longed to, but rarely did, win; but most of all he loved football and was in the team above his age group, mainly through endeavour rather than skill. The first stirring that he might be good at something had taken root and it was here that they would begin to blossom. He found that he loved the rough and tumble of team sport and the accolade of doing well at individual sports. So he played football, usually in a mid-field attacking role, he competed in the Athletics, sprints and jumps and began a love / hate relationship with cricket.
Work still posed a problem for M, he believed he tried, but how much effort besides attending could be called into question; in reality he lacked concentration and got quickly bored and as his mind wandered the thoughts that replaced academic thoughts were not always pure or honest! He had begun at first school to get into minor scuffs and this would continue throughout his school career and here was no exception! He began to barter his possessions and kick against authority, another trend that would colour his life. One of the things that the boys had to do was learn to dance, which seemed fair enough to him, but not with other boys! So shortly after beginning these lessons he found himself bending over and receiving the slipper for being disrespectfully rude to the dance teacher which really consisted of no more than having a laugh and fooling about, but as was his want, a little too loudly, and therefore being picked on and sent out! He never mastered the Fred Astaire’s after that set-back!
The school was situated on a hill and commanded lovely views over the surrounding area, an area that was covered in heather and through which he went each week on the Sunday walk, a pleasant experience most of the time as it gave a chance to let off steam and have a good natter with his friends. He remembers also going out on these moors to do nature study, another subject like dance that promised so much but delivered little, as it was confined, much to his dismay, to the local fauna.
Again, change was on the horizon as he reached his ninth birthday and after two relatively happy years, he was about to change school again and go to secondary school in Liverpool.
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