ऑफ़ Mice

Princes street was a much more satisfactory living space than the bedsit in Alton ever was. Apart from anything else, i did not spend every evening alone hoping that it didn't rain, and every night worrying that I would oversleep.

The job too was more rewarding, though in those days the money was still pretty awful.

I arrived at the High school for my first term, the day before the kids arrived. This was a tradition that was retained throughout my career. THis time I knew a number of members of staff and some of the kids already as I had been to the school on a teaching practice two years before, so it felt like coming home. I was expecting to become part of the main school but found that my "lab" was to be an old Nissen Hut, dating from the last war, and that is was situated as far from the main buildings as possible.
The old green painted metal building had been kitted out as a basic laboratory with old desks and chairs that no-one else wanted. I had a small budget for improving equipment and was left more or less to my own devices - yet again. So my second year in the job was spent in near isolation.

Ok I went and joined the others at tea breaks and lunch, as long as it wasn't raining, but by and large I had my own little empire and should anyone important decide to visit, it was easy to see them coming.

I started to keep animals there, Locusts in cages, Mice and even cockroaches. That was fine until one monday morning I came in and found the mouse cages open and bits of mice all over the place. Rats had got in and eaten most of the livestock. The rest had escaped and would thereafter be seen scuttling over the benches or over the floor from time to time.

I never felt the same about the place after that. I loathe rats.

During that time, I established a gardening club at lunchtimes, a drama group, and began taking kids on walking holidays, staying in Youth Hostels. All of this stemming from my youth club days and remembering how such things had changed my life. It just felt so natural to give something back. Goodness knows how I found the time, but I, and others too, did find the time to make school a little more than a tedious curriculum.

That year we got married and moved out of Princes street into a caravan in a colleagues garden. Therein lies another tale.