Trams - Illuminated Train Tram

 

I’m currently enjoying a birthday break in Dumfries & Galloway, where so far, the snow has missed us out. The temperature is below freezing.  Blue skies, sunshine and hardly a breeze, but that may change in a day or two, according to the weather forecast, even in this micro climate pocket. It’s cosy in our favourite lodge. This is my happy place. While I’m relaxing I’m reminiscing about my childhood and my first encounter with trams.

That second relocation to Blackpool would have taken place in April, 1965. I was nine and a half.  My father got his wish, a pub on Blackpool promenade. Uprooted again, but I soon settled in to our home and my new school. All my pub homes were interesting, even quirky, looking back, but this one was the best. It might be to do with my father’s fulfilled ambition, but there was a calmness and happiness through the family that I was aware of. I hadn’t lived anywhere that offered such fascination through the front windows of our accommodation. South Pier, the beach, the sea in all its moody glory, the promenade that filled with people as spring turned to summer and summer ended with the Illuminations. Bay windows meant our view had a long stretch in both directions. Donkeys on the beach – I would hear their bells as they arrived and departed. Of course, those thundering trams trundling the length of the prom from Starr Gate to Fleetwood and they were loud. At least, loud is how I remember them and they seemed to be more noisy in the winter months when they had the promenade to themselves. During the Illuminations, there was, for me, the added joy of watching the illuminated trams go by, The Rocket, The Ship, The Boat and The Western Train which we always called the Puffer Train Tram, the one my sister looked out for.

Eventually I got to have a ride on one of the clanging monstrosities.  I think our housekeeper, Auntie Kathy, took us – that’s my sister and me – the first time. Other times we went with our mum and even Nanna was persuaded to come along on one of her visits.

As an adult, I have appreciated our Blackpool and Fylde coast line more than I ever did in childhood. When the new, smooth and quieter trams came on track I enjoyed taking the trip from Starr Gate to Fleetwood and back, just to look at the sea. The trams have been part of Blackpool since 1885, which makes them older than the Tower. They are an essential part of public transport for Blackpool and Fleetwood as well as a popular tourist attraction.

Moving pubs meant moving town, leaving behind the familiar comforts and friends to start again somewhere. It wasn’t always welcome but, looking back, I think I coped with the disruption. I have fond memories of people and places that were part of my childhood.

Back to the here and now, weather permitting, we’ll go out for lunch tomorrow to one of our favourite venues. If the weather is against us, we’ll stay cosy and make use of our food supply.

My Haiku poem,

Ride along the front
A new, smooth electric tram,
Starr Gate to Fleetwood.

How quiet they are!
Almost silent on the tracks
Where others thunder’d,

Rattled and trundled,
Those balloons of cream and green
Belonged to Blackpool.

Me, a nine year old,
Found so much fascination
Through our front windows.

And it got better,
Much to my delight, some trams,
Illuminated!

The ship, the rocket,
And the very best of all –
The Western train tram.

The new trams are good,
Accessible and comfy,
Have a seaside treat.

Choose a sunny day.
It’s an amazing journey
The best North West coast.

PMW 2024

Thanks for reading, Pam x

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This Writing Game - Where Does It Start?

I’ve always had ‘this writing thing’, ever since I could hold a pencil and form letters, which was long before I started school. My mother taught me the alphabet in upper and lower case, how to write the letters and the different sounds they made, called 'phonics' now.  I was lucky to have my mother at home to do this sort of thing with me, and, although I was almost constantly the new girl at various schools due to frequently moving pubs with my father’s work, I had a good education. There was a lot of emphasis on producing good handwriting in my primary schools. An entire lesson could be spent practising until each letter was perfect and sat correctly placed along the lines in the writing book. I took pride in this, so much pride that my personal signature flourishes were frowned upon and deemed completely unnecessary. Individuality was not encouraged.

Books were a thing, too. My mother was an avid reader and she read my books to me. I was determined to read for myself and proved to be a quick learner when I started school. I’m from the ‘Janet and John’ era of the late ‘50s. I don’t think the ‘h’ in John ever gave me or my classmates a problem. We accepted what we were told, John says John. I remember being ready for my next reading book then having to wait longer because I kept mistaking ‘clothes’ for ‘cloths’. The things I still carry round in my head sixty-odd years after the event! No wonder I’m a bit bonkers. Anyway, I was moved up and continued going from strength to strength.

I was aged seven and in my last year of infant school when I was introduced to Enid Blyton’s Secret Seven and The Rilloby Fair Mystery by some books that were given to me. I reached the end of the book and would go straight back to the beginning and read it again. I couldn’t get enough of Enid Blyton but her books were discouraged by schools. Both parents bought me books regularly. I must have been so indulged, but I was always reading and the more I read, the more I wanted to write. The seed was sown. It took a long time to grow.

I lost my main mentor when my mother passed away. Things can be ‘meant to be’, though, and upon leaving secondary school I was encouraged by my English teacher to keep writing, so I did. Life takes unexpected turns and leads us down unfamiliar paths, mistakes are made, lessons are learned and we move on. That makes it sound simple and straightforward when, as we all know, it very much isn’t.  Personal ambition was never far away. The writing game, it’s just there, we have to do it, even if it is something for ourselves, like a journal, it’s compelling. I hope someone reading this understands and agrees with me. I’m sure I’m not alone.

Creative writing continues to be my passion. I might get round to finishing ‘that novel’ or it might stay as it is, half of it on a shelf, the rest in my laptop. I loved writing it. I loved seeing a published short story in print. If that’s as good as it gets, I’m happy. It happened.

My poem, a tongue-in-cheek look at the future of education.  I’m glad that my grandchildren are learning handwriting and basic skills that I can relate to.

An Alternative Education

The 3 Rs soon to be redundant
Computer-led kids will be abundant
With all information mega-quick
It only takes a scroll down and click
No need for any conversation
Included in their education.

Last year’s reception class have all gone
And taken a leap up to Year One
To drag sticky fingers on iPad screens
And work out what technology means.
Will this be their basic foundation
Instead of formal education?

Numeracy, or let’s call it Maths
Has rules to follow specific paths
Beginning with learning how to count
Then adding up and sharing out.
One click away from calculation
Takes away their education.

The infants are learning to use a pen
It’s not a skill they’ll need again
For a future spent staring on-line,
Social activity in decline
With hardly any interaction,
So they won’t need our education.

When did this digital preference start?
Oh why no poetry learnt by heart?
‘Spell check’ becomes their favourite teacher
With ‘Grammar check’ an added feature.
The only future expectation,
A self-taught on-line education.

PMW 2015

Thanks for reading, Pam x

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Appetence - We'll Get What We Need

“You can’t always get what you want, but if you try sometime, you’ll find you get what you need…”
from the Jagger & Richards composition, You Can’t Always Get What You Want.

My late father used to say something like that, long before the Rolling Stones immortalised the words of wisdom in their song. He had lots of sayings and witticisms about things that belonged to his generation and his upbringing. He was an original Rusholme Ruffian, very grounded and proud of his roots. He became an engineer and lived in Northenden at the time of meeting my mother and marrying into a family of licencees. He soon joined in. His first pub was in Manchester city centre. He was ambitious enough to want a pub on Blackpool Promenade and made it his goal. Six years later he’d done it and stayed for the rest of his working life. He had focus, desire and appetence. He’d certainly found his niche with his change of career. I’m proud to display his Licensed Trade Diploma on my wall, with photos of most of his pubs.

In my twenties, I wanted lots of children. It was a real yearning to have a large, close family. Obviously, it wasn’t meant to be and how I would have possibly found time to fulfil my ambition to write something meaningful, I can’t imagine. My two arrived in my mid to late thirties. I worked in a school with the under 8s.There was little time to write anything more than a birthday card. Things have improved, slightly.

For a few years, it’s been my wish to relocate to Dumfries and Galloway when we retire. I have to work more years than I wanted because I won’t get a state pension when I expected to. Yes, I’m one of those WASPI women, affected by the government moving the pensionable age criteria at short notice. I’ve just come home from a couple of weeks indulging my longing for Scotland, a holiday on the Isle of Barra then time in D&G. I hope it keeps me going until later in the year.

My family is growing. A fourth grandchild is on the way. I’m a very hands-on Nanna, so in a roundabout way I’m getting something I always wanted.

I thank my dad for genetically passing on his patience and tenacity, for always encouraging my writing and for showing me the difference between what we want and what we need.

The Rolling Stones have been doing a UK tour while I’ve been away. It would have been great to see them. Instead, I’ll play their music and look forward to catching up with a friend who went to one of their London concerts.

The photo is of our holiday cottage in Barra.

The poem is one of mine from long ago, but it means the same.

 

The Lowlands

 

Take me back to the coast of Ballentrae,

And a breath-taking view of Ailsa Craig

Half hidden by mist on a rainy day,

Grey shape against dull sky, outline so vague.

It’s restful at Robert Burns place of birth

And Autumn quiet on the Ayrshire beach.

A cloudy sunset calms the Solway Firth

And all of the Lowlands is in my reach.

I close my eyes and think of Galloway,

Afternoon tea at a street side café

A chilly breeze coming over the bay

At the end of another perfect day. 

I will return to this place of my dreams,

My love of the forest and rolling hills

Where all is real and just as it seems,

In peace and tranquillity, my soul stills.

 

PMW 2013

 

 
Thanks for reading, Pam x 

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Ambition

 by Cerridwen Lee

 Life is too short to ponder on things that may or may not have happened in different circumstances. It's certainly too short to analyse and speculate on a situation from every single angle. Sometimes we have to close our eyes and just feel what is happening in the present, because that's what humans do best and it makes us feel exactly that; human. Emotion rules; often this is the case particularly within the poet, and it’s exhausting. Within this world that worships flesh, there isn’t much of a choice as to whether we are a part of the game. We play no important part in this game of consequence. We all want to be heard, but no-one wants to listen. We are specks of dust in the universe. Yet, even so, what drives us to continue? What makes us continue to read the rules, in order to go against them?

I apologise for that depressing paragraph and its dark thoughts but it does lead me to this week’s theme. Ambition is something I believe to be incredibly important to the human being, yet something we hardly think about, because it is so innate. We are human, no matter how small, and we dream. We are all dreamers. Dreamers who sit back gazing blankly at a blurry chattering coloured screen, or at the silver and sapphire ocean weaving in and out of the shore, or at a crowd of bustling people on a city street, longing to be elsewhere doing other things. It starts with the dream, and it is fired by ambition. I believe that for writers and poets ambition is particularly crucial. We are both inspired and inspiring, and without our work what would this world be?

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Lives.

Yesterday was Remembrance Sunday. As anyone who has ever worked in a shop will know, it can be awkward. A customer never fails to arrive at the counter bang on 11, every year.

This time, with that in mind, I had gathered a copy of the Sunday Times 'Culture' magazine, bodged up a sign and gone out front with my poppy on 5 minutes early, just so people got the message. Whilst waiting for the radio to switch over to the Cenotaph, I began to read their piece on Edward Thomas, one of the (perhaps) lesser known of the war poets. The article mentioned his developing love of nature and the outdoors, his love of description and his insistence that poetry should be constructed only from words people actually use. These days, many poets will swear by those approaches, the latter two especially.
Printed within the article was a copy of Thomas's poem Adlestrop. You can read it here: Adlestrop: Poetry Foundation website

I digress though. As a football fan, I have been party to a number of 'silences' this weekend and, so as not to waste them, I found myself thinking down various different avenues. It struck home that many of the men I was stood up for were younger than me when they died. It struck me that many of them had families to leave behind, jobs never to go back to and lives never to actually live. What really struck home though was the TV coverage of the faces.

I saw something in the eyes of the veterans, a sort of blooming around them, much like a poppy. This may happen to all old people, I don't know, and please don't take that out of context and consider it a judgement. To look into them suggests many nights of tears shed, many years of tears held in and a grief I would never wish to understand.

After spending all day (as most of us do every year) remembering those lost and the freedoms I have as a result of their sacrifices, I felt I should persist with my ongoing quest to write a decent war poem. I try it every year and haven't quite managed one yet but, with this week's blog theme being 'Ambitions', here is the result.

Cenotaph

The chat chat chattering of tired machine guns,
echoes in the teeth of the silent man beside.
The cold November mornings stop for no one - 
the ticking clock to remember lost lives. 

Amid the bugler's call my focus wandered
past each stoic cheek and tight-buttoned coat,
long swollen eyes of veterans tell of what went on there.
Poppies grown from tears. Lives touched like asymptotes. 

All these years since those Great Wars have ended
Our nation we're told - divided, long undone -
unites, the graves of soldiers freshly tended.
By this prism, we ensure the light lives on. 


Thanks for reading,
S.

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