Purple loons

The ads seem to have picked up on one word - Bollard. Co-incidentally, that was the name of the student magazine when I was at college all those years ago. This "literary" publication allowed all those with pretension to publish their prose and poetry for anyone who wished to and was able to read. I recall that having recently read Tolkein's The Lord of the Rings for the first time, writing a series of what I thought were satyrical tales of the way in which the Union was operating. Much to my surprise they actually published them and somewhere i still have copies of Bollard containing my only published work.

A college education is worth it. I lay no claim to having been exposed to high standards of academia; in fact I am rather grateful for that as I may well have failed, but to be with like minded individuals in a situation where there was really nothing to be too concerned about, was pretty wonderful. In terms of Mazlo's heirarchy, all our prime needs were taken care of, leaving us time to play, to experiment and to generally grow up in a rarified bubble of the real world.

One of the problems of youth is the tendency to think that you are pretty much the first generation to know it all. Another is the feeling of invulnerability. Escaping from home enabled me to become a part of the 60's generation, for the first time in my life, able to express myself as i wanted to and for the first time to be able to think for myself. I allowed my hair to grow, and although I had little money, I dressed as i wanted, however inappropriate that may have been. I recall a fashionable item called Loons. These were very tight fitting cotton trousers, hipster fitting with huge bell bottoms and they came is a variety of very bright colours. They were also very cheap and so I managed to buy a pair in bright purple. They were my pride and joy and they must have lasted all of six weeks until the fly burst and that was a sort of expression that I was never into.

We thought we were untouchable and when one of out friends was set upon by a gang of local skinheads whilst waking home, a little corner of our world collapsed. The anger that it generated was enormous and there was much talk of reprisals and gang warfare, but being trainee teachers, there were more opinions than people and in the end everything died down again, but things were never quite the same.

It seems odd now writing about a past that is becoming fainter as the days pass. It is so much easier to look backwards than forwards and I know that it isn't necessarily a good thing. The world has moved on and sometimes it is hard to keep up.