Angels of the North (1)

Ann, Barbara, Anthea, Dorothy, Christine, Rosemary, Margaret, Trish, Irene, Belinda. And the dark-haired beauty at the Redworth bus stop.

This is not a Salut! North version of that harmlessly silly song about having "a little bit of Monica in my life/a little bit of Erica by my side......". It is just the list of girls who occupied places of varying affection in my heart when I was single.

Even if you add a couple of missing names, it is not a particularly long list by the standards of today or, for that matter, the not quite so liberated 1960s. It becomes shorter still if you filter out one or two that scarcely qualify for inclusion as girlfriends.

My friend Len had much greater success. We'd prowl the rec path on spring and summer evenings, giving the eye to - and hoping to get it back from - any pretty girls that came our way. Actually, it was Len doing most giving of the eye. With perfectly good reason, he would tell me that when it came to chatting up, I had neither boldness nor finesse.

He was also much better looking. This, I readily acknowledge, was not difficult, though I did go through a brief but irrational phase, encouraged by some older girls on a factory coach trip to a pop concert in Newcastle, of believing I looked a little like Paul McCartney.

But Len had pulling power in abundance, and this was to be the source of one of the sharpest disappointments in my campaign to find a first girlfriend.

For several weeks, maybe months, when I was about 15, I would go straight from school each afternoon to a particular council house on the estate in Shildon where I once lived. This was not for old time's sake, which 15-year-olds tend to care little about, but to talk to Ann, whose name may or may not have had a final e but who certainly had the charm and appearance to turn the heads of lads of my age in the town. Those were good times for a teenager, if female, to look like Hayley Mills, and this - in my eyes at any rate - she did.

I no longer remember what we managed to talk about each day. But conversation came easily, mesmerised though I was by this adorable girl sitting in front of me. And since we got on so well, surely I would eventually get round to asking her out? I did not.

Do not imagine for a second that this obvious next step did not occur to me a hundred times or more. But I never summoned the courage to pose the question, so powerful was the fear of rejection that dictated my fumbling boyhood search for romance.

For some time, I consoled myself with the thought that at least she was not, or did not seem to be, dating anyone else.

Then one evening, on my way to or from the Black Bull youth club dance, I saw her out walking. Out walking, hand in hand, with Len. It was not the only setback I would suffer while my love life remained non-existent, or indeed after it had got off to a shaky start. But it felt that evening as if the world had come to an end.

Things started looking up a little when I left school and started a course at Bishop Auckland Technical College. Without knowing quite how, I found myself asking out the prettiest girl in our immediate crowd, and being accepted. If I cannot remember her name, this may be because it lasted all of two weeks until she thought better of it.

Then there was Anthea, a rather prim, prefect type of girl from one of the villages outside Bishop. This time I was the one to call time, after perhaps a couple of cinema outings.

Dancing was a good way to meet girls, and there was the occasional "Tech Dance" at the town hall, if my memory on this is correct. Len was good at dancing, too. And, needless to say, I was not. But then, without the need to show off any fancy steps or even to dig deep for an original chat-up line, my luck seemed to change in the most dramatic fashion.

Blind, or blindish, dates were not uncommon in those days. Len now had a steady girlfriend, Sue, who was to become his wife, and she once arranged one, bringing a friend to make up a foursome at - where else? - the cinema, this time in Darlington. The poor girl was so tall that she towered over me. Someone to look up to maybe, but not someone to court.

But one day, back at the Tech, some of the lads pointed across the crowded canteen towards the most gorgeous girl in college, a classically pretty blonde. She fancied me, they assured me, and would be up for a date. I must have considered the options for all of a quarter of a second.

So the next night found me waiting outside the Essoldo, still unable to believe my good fortune but nevertheless feeling exceptionally pleased with myself. And I waited, and waited. When the B-feature - there were B-features in those days - must have been about to start, I was on the point of giving up, accepting I'd been stood up and catching the No 1 bus home.

Then I saw her. A girl was also waiting, though this was a very plump and decidedly plain girl. A very plump and decidedly plain girl whose eyes had been pointed by the same "pals" in the direction of the most handsome male in college and told he was desperate to go out with her but was too shy to ask.

The films were watched in polite, awkward silence, and there wasn't to be the slightest tactile aspect to the encounter. We were both feeling, to say the least, cheated. And I was nowhere closer to finding my own Angel of the North, let alone losing my virginity.

* Read about the girl at the Redworth bus stop at Angels of The North(2)

Comments

[Irene]

I had boyfriends who lasted about one month and then I decided they suffocated me and I called it quits. One of them, though, became my boyfriend repeatedly and he let me have my ornery way with him and always allowed me to change my mind. He is my husband now and I couldn't have a better one. His love was true and loyal, whereas mine was fickle and untrustworthy, but no longer. I am not that horrible girl anymore who drove the boys crazy and I am now a most loyal wife and a very pleasant matron.

[Bill Taylor]

You're not the Irene that Colin mentions in his list of inamoratas (real and virtual), are you? If so, give us your side of his story, please.
I'm a little worried about where Colin might be taking us. He's being going on for a while over at Salut! about all things Virgin and now we get a mention here of his virginity, at the time still intact.
I fear we may be on the verge of some ungainly revelation of the kind that in Victorian times frightened the horses.

[Irene]

No, I am afraid I am not Colin's Irene, although I'm sure it would have been a pleasure to have been, although he sounds a little shy when smitten. Maybe he should have been a bit more assertive and grabbed the bull by the horns more. Then his lost virginity might not have been lost as late in life as it did and he would have been a wiser man for it.

[Bill Taylor]

Quite when Colin bade farewell to chastity is unknown to me and bulls and horns are temptations that I intend to resist. But the Irene I remember could hardly have hoped for a more ardent admirer -- a combination of shyness and assertiveness that she must have found quite beguiling. Whether or not it led to the loss of anything, on either party's part, is a matter for conjecture. At least until our hero sees fit to enlighten us.
I wonder who occupies the Auckland Chronicle office these days?

[keith]

Bill's post contains what we in the trade would ordinarily call a non sequitur. He follows a point about the amorous adventures of our hero with a question about the occupancy of the Auckland Chronicle office. Are the two linked?

[Bill Taylor]

It's a question Colin might prefer to address. Or not.

[Irene]

It seems that Colin prefers not to address any question so far. Is there any way of prompting him into action? I could pretend to be one of his lost loves, but which one would I be? Which one really left her mark on Colin?

Hi Colin, I was not quite old enough to have left any lasting mark on you in the not quite liberated 60's, though I did come of age in the 70's and you may have been around then. Where you ever in the States during that time and having drinks in a quiet shady bar in Newport Beach, California?

[keith]

I suppose that while we are waiting for Colin to overcome his coyness and reveal all about the Auckland Chronicle office, we could ask Irene about that shady bar in Newport Beach

[Bill Taylor]

As far as lost loves are concerned, it may be best to let sleeping Colins lie.
But Irene -- did you ever come across an Australian named Jim in Newport Beach? A plausible type but, back then anyway, probably shadier than your bar.

[tricks to fall asleep]

I'm not sure exactly why but this blog is loading extremely slow for me. Is anyone else having this issue or is it a problem on my end? I'll check back later and see if the problem still exists.

[Colin Randall]

I have no idea why I failed to replv to the impertinent questions above. Too late now