Galloping Gilbert.

On the odd occasion that I mow my front lawn I usually receive a visit from Gilbert over the road, a steady chap of some years, seventy-two to be exact. He stands at my gate extolling the virtues of the rotary mower over the hover mower and chides me for not doing stripes when really any way will do for me as long as its over with. “You young fellows are all the same”, no discipline, I usually ignore him and get on with it, although I have to admit to rather liking being called a young fellow.

Most times he will make an effort to help despite his age, raking up grass and filling a black bag or two. Which of course entitles him to a cup of very sweet tea, eight spoons of sugar, he never drinks coffee and considers it the main reason for young peoples lack of respect these days. “Coffee should have gone back to America with the yanks after the war” he would say.

I haven’t seen him for a while, but this weekend I was out front valeting the car and he paid me a visit, I expected the usual advice on how to do things, but he just stood there watching, hands in pockets not saying very much at all. “Fancy a cup of tea” he said, I nodded, put my cleaning gear into the boot and turned to walk over to Gilberts house, but he was of down the path, through my front door and was shovelling sugar into a cup I realised my mistake and followed him.

We settled down with our drinks in silence, all that could be heard was the rattle of teacups, this was not like Gilbert, he always had something to say. I asked him if he was ok, fine he said, fine, yes couldn’t be better, couldn’t be better, silence again. Then from nowhere, “You’re a bit of a lad, aren’t you” I nearly choked on my coffee, “What do you mean a bit of a lad?” I said. Gilbert looked at me, “I need some advice, its personal, of a sexual nature so to speak, I have to make a choice and I’m not sure what to do”.

I couldn’t believe it; the giver of all knowledge was asking me for advice, “Fire away, I’m all ears” I said. He told me that three times a week he is picked up by mini van along with several other older people and taken to a local hall where they are given a meal and drinks, and spend the afternoon dancing or playing bingo. He is the only man on the bus, the rest are women, according to him he has his pick of the ladies and all of them flirt with him. I asked him if this wasn’t just wishful thinking on his part, to which he replied “In the world of the blind the one eyed man is king”.

“So what’s the problem I asked him”, “The problem is that the only one I fancy is the only one who doesn’t flirt with me, she is a real lady and still a great looker. She doesn’t have much to do with the others, you know keeps herself to herself, sort of thing, the other ladies think she is a bit of a snot, but I think its just that she has breeding”. I nodded, “So where does the choice come in” I asked him. “Well there is another lady who I know I could get physical with because she just came out with it and asked me if I fancied a bit of hanky panky.

For the second time I nearly choked on my coffee. He carried on “So you see it’s a bit of a dilemma, do I have a go at the dead cert, and god knows its been a while since I had a go at anything, or do I hold out for the one I fancy and perhaps miss my chance?”

I thought for a while, “It’s a question of value, you have to weigh the value of both options Gilbert”, “I’m not sure what you mean” he said. “Does the chance however remote of you having a friendship with the lady of good breeding, have more value than a meaningless sexual encounter with the dead cert” I asked him. He looked a little vexed, “It might be meaningless to you mate but it’s got to be twenty years since I last had my conkers, chances like this don’t come along every day at my age”.

“At every stage of our lives we make decisions that can effect our future, and your at one now” I said.
He looked thoughtful, “The one I really like hardly talks to me, I might be wasting my time, she doesn’t flirt with me like the others, she might not even like me”. I poured another cup of tea for him, and as he began spooning sugar into it at an alarming rate I gave him the best advice I could.

“Some people just don’t flirt, its not their way, a lot of times people flirt just to boost their own confidence, she may well feel left out because the others flirt, perhaps the fact that you flirt makes her feel uneasy. Whatever the reason it’s not the way to go with this lady. You could have a good time with the dead cert for however long it lasts, but it could also be a big let down, friendship lasts longer than sex, and romance has always beaten lust in the long run”.

He gulped the last of his tea down, thanked me for the chat and said “I think I’ll have a go at the dead cert” before he walked through the door he turned, winked at me and said “Just kidding, I’m not even sure everything works these days”.

Reunited and it feels so good (NOT)

It’s that time of year again, the run up to Saint Valentines day when traditionally my ex wife will bombard me with phone calls and the inevitable “I was just passing so I thought I would call in” visit.

She lives thirty miles away from me so she would hardly be just passing; it works for her, however it doesn’t work for me. So I usually make myself scarce around this time. I get into the office earlier and leave later than usual so that there is less chance of me having to suffer her completely foundless reliving of the happy times we spent together and her endless whinging about how it all went wrong.

It went wrong dear because you couldn’t keep out of clubs and slot machine emporiums, nor could you keep your hands of various crossbow wielding, baseball bat toating lunatics. That last statement was a little dramatic but none the less true. Her choice in men friends came back to haunt her when one of them (The baseball bat toater) took exception to her leaving him for a chap with a more refined taste in fashion accessories than he had. He displayed his anger by beating her with the bat and as a result she spent some time in hospital. He spent some time in gaol and whilst he was there she took the opportunity to move to where she lives now……thirty miles away from me.

When it was obvious she had gone for good, I gutted the house, which had been furnished to her taste, brown chintzy furniture, flowery curtains and millions of ornaments. I threw the lot out redecorated and in went the chrome and subtle colours, minimalistic you might say with just a dash of dirty old man.

I have lighting for every conceivable situation and a TV the size of a garden shed. I like the way I live now, I answer to no one, I do as I please when I please, and its quiet. Well-meaning friends sometimes ask me if I get lonely and the answer is always a resounding no.

So the few weeks before Valentines day are a busy time for me, dodging the ex wife is no easy task, she seems convinced that a reunion is on the cards. Nothing could be further from the truth but no matter how direct I am about that with her she just ignores what she doesn’t want to hear, and every year buys me an anniversary card (We were married on the 14th). Its sad and I am truly sorry that it won’t work out the way she wants it to, but I’m just a kid and there is so much I haven’t done yet like….erm, there must be something I haven’t done!

My Aunt Fish

I once read somewhere that the brain has no capacity to remember pain, I would argue with that, so would every woman who has given birth I expect. I can’t remember if the writer was talking about mental or physical pain, he can’t have suffered either to come to that conclusion. Physical pain is brief for the most part, and what we remember of that is the event. Mental pain is a different animal; it feeds on fear and lurks in the dark corners of your mind until called again. Not much scares me these days, I’m too old to be scared, I have come to learn that what will be, will be, pain physical or otherwise is an old adversary. But I can still remember and recognise both, and I saw it a day or two ago.

My company works with disaffected and underprivileged young people. Yes we still have them in 2007. It’s a last chance given by the courts to drag them back from the brink of serious crime and educate them to a level that will allow them to see that they have worth, and are capable of better things than so far they have achieved. One of these youngsters stood in my office several days ago distraught and in tears asking a colleague to be allowed to go home. He had been bullied and not for the first time, It was of course dealt with, but I saw in his eyes the fear and self hate that I experienced when as an eight year old I made the mistake of telling the girl next door that I loved her.

She was a very pretty girl with blonde hair and bright blue eyes, and wherever she went she would skip happily. I adored her from afar, until the day I dared to tell of my affection for her, I did this in the classical way. I wrote her a poem, I’m sure it must have been a very bad poem, but it was heartfelt and genuine. I know I picked a bad time, I should have waited until we were alone, but I was impatient. It was middle summer and the street was full of kids playing in the sunshine. I was sat on my doorstep watching the girls involved in some kind of jumping about game, and when the object of my desire broke away from her friends to get her breath back, I seized the opportunity. I ran over to her shoved the piece of paper with the poem on it into her hand, kissed her quickly on the cheek, then I scuttled back to my doorstep.

My nemesis at that time was a big lad called Peter who lived at the top of the street, seeing this and also being somewhat enamoured of the blonde hair'd blue eyed girl came to investigate. I like to think that had he not been there, she would have dismissed the whole thing as just the actions of a silly boy. But egged on by her other suitor she began to taunt me and the scrap of paper with my heart written on it was passed around from kid to kid. She laughed, they all laughed and my heart shrank to the size of a peanut. I couldn’t understand how someone so beautiful could be so cruel; I walked away willing myself not to run, but as I turned the corner of the street the tears came and for the first time in my life I felt the dull ache of rejection.

I sat in someone’s back doorway for a long time going over in my mind what had happened and why. Long enough anyway for my Mother to have become worried and out looking for me. As it was my Aunt Fish who found me and seeing my distress took me to her house for tea and a jam sandwich, as I ate I told my story. She listened whilst she sewed shami leathers together on her treadle machine, when I had finished she came and sat beside me and putting her arm around me she said this.

There is someone for everybody in the world, you already have a girl David, she is out in the big world somewhere, you just haven’t met her yet, she is probably right now playing with her friends or having tea with her family. She goes to school just like you, she has birthdays just like you, and there are times when she is happy and times when she is sad, but she is as real as the jam on your face. I wondered how she could know all this and asked who this girl was. I don’t know she said, But how will I know who she is I asked her. When the time comes you will know. But what about now I said still miserable. She smiled, make a face up in your mind, and she can look however you want her to look, give her a name, and it can be your secret. Whenever you feel sad, or you’re in trouble you can imagine her and it will help to have a friend with you. Then when your all grown up and you meet you can tell her that you have known her all your life.

I felt a little better as I left her house, but I think that was down to the jam sandwich rather than her well meant advice. However that night as I lay in the darkness I put together in my mind the face of an angel, it was fuzzy and indistinct, but it had beauty. Over the years the face has changed from being that of a girl to being that of a woman, but it has always remained the same beautiful face, and often in bad times I have recalled my imaginary girl and been comforted by her presence.

When I saw that young man in my office, desperately unhappy and in tears I recognised the pain in his face, there perhaps for a different reason, but without doubt the dull ache of rejection. I wanted to talk to him, I wanted to tell him that everything will be all right, to give him some snippet of hope like my Aunt Fish had given me. But I couldn’t, our remit is to listen not give advice, anyway kids are different these days, and I’m not sure he would have appreciated a friendly arm on his shoulder, political correctness forbids it anyway, and I think that a pity.

The name of my imaginary girl? It’s a secret.

Exfoliate My Brain

Exfoliate My Brain

Perfect summer.

We probably all have happy times that in slow moments or quiet nights we can reflect on, most are just pictures in your mind from slices of time that have no real order. They lie in a jumbled heap along with all the other memories good and bad that we accumulate as we walk through life. But there are some that have the power to enable us to live again the feelings, and emotions that stamped them so indelibly in our minds.

For me it was my perfect summer, I was fourteen years old and full of expectation for the future that then seemed light years in front of me and promised everything. Some of my expectations were realised, some not, but my only regret is that we can’t go back. I remember our little gang sitting on the bridge that spanned Gore brook late into the night watching the sky turn slowly from gold to blue. Chatting about everything and nothing, and I can still smell the new mown grass carried on a warm breeze from the park, I remember how our voices echoed on that bridge and seemed to give them more importance.

The days were lazy, and the nights long and full of youthful adventure, it was a time to joke and show off to fresh faced girls who laughed just because it felt good. It was then I found and lost my first real girlfriend. It was then as the summer wore toward winter that I had my first experience with a woman older than I. Who careful of my youth took me on a journey with great care and gentleness. And then when our journey was over displayed the same care and gentleness when it was time to say goodbye.

It was a time when the relationship between my Father and I changed, that summer he looked at me in a different way, he taught me all that I know about life and people, all that has passed has just been a verification of his words. That summer seemed to last for ever, and I can’t remember its end, I suppose it never will as long as it remains a happy time in my mind, and I can go back to it in slow moments or quiet nights. That perfect summer all those years ago.

I think about you every day.
I still hear you laugh.
I still see your smile.
And every day I miss you.

Pitch black and pissing down.

My first made to measure suit was a fifteenth birthday present from my parents. I can remember proudly telling anyone who would listen that I had to go for yet another fitting bemoaning the fact that it was an inconvenient interference in my busy schedule, as though being fitted for a suit was a commonplace event for me. There were several fittings as it happened, during one of these the chap with the tape measure asked me what size pants hem did I want. He suggested fourteen-inch, I was horrified and told him that twelve-inch was what I wanted. He looked at me oddly, “But Sir Twelve inch bottoms will look! “ that’s as far as he got. “I want twelve inch bottoms,” I said. “Very well Sir, twelve inches it is”.

I was thinking twelve inches from the front crease to the back crease with the pants laid flat, but of course he meant circumference. Oh silly me, I have since learnt to take advice from people who know their job, but at that time I was young, free, stupid and living in the sixties, a time of free love and newly acquired independence.

The suit was promised for the Friday, and it was delivered just before teatime by a spotty lad with alapecia. I snatched it from him without so much as a thank you and flew upstairs to get ready for a party that my friend Pete Hall and I were going to that night.

I tried the jacket on, it looked superb, I remember thinking this could have been made for me, and then I remembered that it had. When I tried the pants on I had a little difficulty getting my feet through the holes in the legs. When I eventually did, what I saw in the mirror filled me with dismay, because the hems were so narrow it meant that there was less material further up the leg, I looked like Max Wall, I felt like Max Wall, I was Max Wall.

Too late now, I had a party to go to and I was in no mood for taking prisoners. I found that if I stood a certain way it didn’t look so bad. But I obviously couldn’t stand in that position all night, so I made the best of it by only moving from one side of the room to another when a group did, then it wasn’t so noticeable. That’s about all I can remember from the party, but then I wouldn’t remember much, I did get rather drunk. We both did, Pete more than I, which is probably why he suggested a visit to a couple of girls we had met on holiday some weeks before.

The girls lived in St Helens, which as far as we knew was on the way to Liverpool. The quickest way to get there in those days was strait up the East Lancs road, it’s a bit of a journey in a car but as neither of us had one we decided to walk. We left the party around midnight and began our trek which took us first through Manchester city centre and then into Salford where we passed the river Medlock at its widest and on to the East Lancs road. It’s a pretty long road by any standards and is for the most part a duel carriageway with not much on either side of it but fields. In those days it was unlit except for roundabouts and the odd set of traffic lights.

Hours passed, tempers frayed and on we walked. Cold, tired but a little more sober than when we started out, it didn’t seem such a good idea to be out in the middle of nowhere miles from home. Then it started to rain, sheets of stinging rain soaked us through and my badly engineered pants became even harder to walk in. Pete suggested phoning the police to tell them we were lost, I suggested that as there wasn’t a phone box anywhere, and if there was we couldn’t tell them where we were because we were lost, he should keep his trap shut. Funnily enough he did, not like Pete at all.

We walked on in silence shivering, until we bumped into something very large on the grass verge. We couldn’t make out what it was in the darkness, but it was some kind of very large vehicle covered in a tarpaulin sheet, and it was warm, actually very warm. To us this was an oasis in the desert; we quickly crawled under the sheet and made ourselves comfortable. We were out of the rain and beginning to warm up, Pete fell asleep sat down, his back against the side of the vehicle, his knees pulled up under his chin. Face down, stretched out to warm as much of myself as I could, I too fell asleep.

We were awakened by the sound of laughter and blinding sunlight, several very amused road workers watched us desperately trying to prise ourselves of their road tarring machine, which was difficult because we had become stuck in the warm tar that covered the whole vehicle. Pete was lucky, he only lost the seat of his pants, which meant his arse was on display to the whole world. I however having lain down full length tore of my jacket lapels, a pocket and the front of my shirt along with my tie. Most of my face and hair was covered in oily black tar, and my designer trousers now looked like ladies tights. The workmen were still laughing as we hobbled off up the road; the only thing missing was feathers. It turned out we were nearer St Helens than Manchester so we continued our journey hoping for salvation from the girls when we reached our journey end.

Unfortunately this was not to be, we tried for several hours to find the address we had been given but had no luck. We had no choice but to start the long trek back to Manchester, again down the East Lancs road, which I can tell you we were thoroughly sick of by now. Pete had taken off his jacket and tied it round his waist to cover his arse, so he didn’t look out of the ordinary at all, apart from having black hands, which he kept in his pockets. I on the other hand resembled a partially burnt Worzel Gummidge.

People stared at me and pointed as we walked passed them, some even shouted derogatory remarks, which being the stalwart that I am, I ignored, until the relatively unscathed Pete started to join in with, which made me mad, but I got my own back. As a group of cool looking girls passed us I quickly whipped up Pete's coat exposing his arse, the girls thought this hugely funny and believe it or not began talking to us, and asking why we looked like we did. We told them the story; they must have been impressed because we were invited back to their house to try to tidy ourselves up.

They were sisters, our age, very attractive and very kind and if I could remember their names I would publicly thank them. But I can only remember Karen, the tallest of the girls with blonde hair and a great smile, whom I eventually took out a couple of times. Sadly she left me for a bloke with better dress sense, but I think it was our strange meeting which taught me that you don’t have to look like Mel Gibson to get girls. You just have to have to have the balls to approach them, but more importantly make them laugh.

In any event it was obvious that apart from cleaning my hands and face nothing much could be done for my suit, which like the Titanic had gone down on its maiden voyage. The girls lived with their Father who when he came home from work took one look at me and pissed his sides laughing, but after hearing our story generously offered to spare us anymore public ridicule by giving us a lift home.

Pete was dropped off first then it was my turn to face my Parents, they had spent most of the night worried about me and they were just short of phoning the police when I walked through the door. I stood in front of them in half a suit, my chest with its one hair shirtless, my hair matted with tar and annoyingly stuck out in all directions and my ludicrously tailored pants now and forever a part of my legs. They gawped at me with open mouths, they struggled to say something, but the words stuck in their throats, so with the best smile I could muster I said, “I’ve been to a party”

Be afraid, be very afraid.

I am impressed by the government’s new plan to raise the school leaving age to eighteen. Keeping young people in the education system for another two or three years when they don’t want to be there anyway is a great idea, especially as it will conveniently doctor the unemployment figures. Ok so school leavers don’t get that much state benefit, but consider how much more cash will be needed to implement this ludicrous idea, balanced against the severely undermined resources teachers have to deal with as it is, It can only get worse.

Mr Brown has said that the extended education they will receive will give them a better chance to obtain training for a new job, or improve the likelihood of being indentured and getting an apprenticeship. But to whom, and where, surely there has to be work before that can happen. Since the nineteen sixties successive governments have decimated industry in this country, by allowing cheep imports that British companies couldn’t hope to compete with and thus going out of business. It happened with Japanese steel, shipbuilding, motorbikes, cars, electrical goods white and brown. Then Thatcher set about breaking the unions and selling everything she could get her hands on to fund an inept government, and its happening now with clothing that costs two pence to make and is then sold for a fortune to idiots like you and me.

I’m not going near the subject of the common market, which is the biggest scam since Amelda Marcos discovered that she could buy an extra pair of shoes simply by taking food out of people’s mouths. The maths is easy, no jobs, no apprenticeship, keep them in school, devastate an already beleaguered education system. I don’t often make predictions, but as bad as Thatcher was, she is just a baby compared to Mr Brown, and if he succeeds Blair and has his way, we are in for a bleak time.

Diamond Anne

I used to use Yahoo chat a lot, but not any more, not since they banned the user rooms from being used by the obviously easily influenced British public, sometimes I wonder what the rank and file would do without the government keeping sentinel on our morals.

Anyone who has chatted in these rooms will know that for the most part they are full of lunatics pretending to be someone else. Nearly every chap I happened to chat with was a spy or an airline pilot. Of course there were women wool pullers as well, but for the most part it was the men who tried to deceive. Sorting through the dross reaped its rewards in that amongst the individuals that lived a life by proxy there was to be found the odd diamond.

One such diamond is my friend Anne, a very attractive lady with wild blonde hair, perfect teeth, a figure to drool over and a great personality. Add to all this the fact that she is a nurse and, well………I am a man after all, gimme a break. Still however much drooling I might do the fact remains that she is a very nice person who has a good soul and above all is honest.

She reads this blog every day I think and enjoys my meanderings and silly trips down memory lane, which I thank her for, and in return I will teach you how to fly.

Annie Gread

Annie Gread was a coalman, or rather a coalwoman, a rare sight when I was a lad. In those days houses burnt coal in an open fire, the hearth used to be my favourite place to sit during the long winter months, and of course it was the warmest place in the house. There was an old brass box at the side of the fireplace and I used to lean on that and watch our five-inch TV set. Well the screen was five-inch but the actual TV took up half the room and you needed a degree in Physics to work the thing. It had more knobs and dials than the space shuttle and I don’t think a night went by without having to reposition the Ariel, which drove my Father round the bend.

The coal was always delivered on a Friday. Annie who was a big woman and had arms like Popeye and smoked a pipe too, she would knock on the front door with her secret coalman's knock. Then she would hoist a hundredweight bag of coal onto her back from the lorry and carry it around to the rear of the house, where it would be dumped very noisily through the hole in the shed wall. She used to wear a big square of leather full of metal studs on her back, and an old coal sack like a hood on her head to stop the coal dust from going down her neck. It was a hard job even for a man, but she used to throw those bags of coal around like most women throw ex husbands.

I would wait by the lorry for her to return with the empty sack. She always asked me what song I had learned that week, and if I sang it for her she would give me a penny chocolate bar. It must have been a strange sight this huge woman as black as the hobs of hell wagging her finger in time with the wailing’s of a small boy. She used to call me bonny, I thought it was because she couldn’t remember my name, but my Mother told me it was because of my eyes.

She stayed single for a long time, well she wasn’t what you would call model material, but in middle age she met and married a chap and was I believe very happy for a year until he was crushed by a lorry at work and killed. They had no children so Annie was alone again; I lost track of her after this.

Some years later I was visiting an aunt who was in a retirement home; she pointed out her friend Annie to me, a fragile old lady who was sat in a chair staring into space. “She tells everyone she used to be a coalman,” My Aunt winked. “ But the poor little thing can just about hold her knitting, I think she is confused” It was time for my Aunts nap, so leaving her to nod off I approached the little old lady and asked her if she would like to chat. “Its up to you” she said “I don’t care one way or the other, makes no difference to me if I do or I don’t” I asked her about her days working as a coalman and if she had worked in Gorton, specifically Roseberry Street. She said she had and what was it to me. I asked her if she remembered me, “I’m David” I said, “I lived at number twenty four and I used to sing for you, for a penny chocolate bar”

She pulled back squinting at me, then her shoulders fell and she lowered her head, when she looked at me again her eyes were full of tears, “Are you Bonny, little Bonny” I told her I was although not so little now. “You used to sing for me you did” She kept saying it over and over and for a moment I thought I had upset her. “I told my Harold about you, I told him how you used to sing for me” I didn’t ask who Harold was not wishing to upset her any more than I already had, But a big smile spread across her face and she started to chuckle. “You’re a big feller now, a lot bigger than I remember you” I laughed “and you’re a lot smaller” I said, wishing I hadn’t.
We talked for a while, and then she asked me if I remembered her favourite song, the song she asked me to sing for her if I hadn’t learned a new one, that way I always got my chocolate. I couldn’t remember, but she did. Scarlet ribbons, It’s a song guaranteed to bring tears to your eyes, although it didn’t mean much to me as a kid, I used to sing it to my Daughter when she was a tot, to get her to sleep.

“Sing it for me now” She said, “Oh no I couldn’t, I don’t think I can remember it” I protested. If you have ever been in the position of having to let down a child or an old person when they really want something, then you will probably understand why I found myself in the day room of a retirement home holding an old ladies hand and singing a lullaby.
As I sang she cried, and held my hand in a vice like grip, Up to the second verse I had kept my composure, but when the six or seven other old people in the room joined in singing it was too much. Tears rolled down my face but I kept on singing. When I had finished she smiled, picked up her bag and rummaged around in it until she found what she wanted, a menthol eucalyptus sweet, she offered it to me saying “I haven’t got any chocolate, will this do Bonny”

That was it, I made my excuses and left, as I walked through the day room door I heard her say to the others “I told you I was a bleeding coalman didn’t I”

Bits

Christmas reminded me that somewhere in Manchester art gallery there is a bit of me, Its probably in the vaults now or the archive or whatever they do with unwanted paintings when they have finished with them. By bit I mean my hands, an artist whose name I can’t recall had been visiting schools to find a suitable model for his painting of an angel ascending to heaven.

I wasn’t to be the angel, just the hands. In fact he said, “you have the hands of an angel dear boy, but that head! Will never get of the ground” I wasn’t bothered by this remark, after all posing with a book in my hands for this bohemian got me out of lessons for two days. In any case my hands finished up in the painting, and I did on several occasions go to the art gallery to admire his work. I thought the best bit was the hands, but then I would.

So a bit of me if not all of me will ascend to heaven if only in a painting, it got me thinking that we all leave bits of ourselves all over the place, be it a painting, a drawing, a photograph or actual real bits.
We are all scattered around the world in one way or another, for instance, I left some nail clippings in Canada, a tooth in Turkey, some of my hair in Greece, some of my scalp and a bit of my arse in Africa.
The biggest bit my Gall bladder I left not that far away from me in North Manchester general hospital and I was well rid of it I can tell you.

These bits be they inanimate representations or tangible artefacts contain, as some North American Indians believe a part of our soul. Japanese soldiers before going of to war leave behind some nail clippings and hair for the family to bury should they not return. Have a think about it, if your like me your not complete, you are slowly falling apart and leaving human debre all over the world.