D~Chapter three

The trouble with narrators is, you can trust them as far as you can
fart.

It's always a great source of amusement to me that my mother - yes,
narrators have mothers too - has no truck with fictional films or
books, forever favouring a "true story". I've tried to explain to her
that your average biography contains more cowshit than a brace of dairy
farms, but she'll have none of it. Stories are, after all,
mini-perspectives.

Now Jim, he wants to be a writer. Nothing strange about that. But take
a look at this autobiographical anecdote he wrote in the first person
for a website:

The whole family - border collie included - and virtually every
material possession we owned was miraculously stuffed into our green
Mini, which Dad was pointing in the general direction of a holiday in
Anglesey on some no-mark B-road at about 40mph.

Inevitably, I started to complain about a hunger of
starving-African-child proportions. My mum, an organisational genius,
would certainly have made plentiful sandwiches. But either they had run
out, or movement sufficient to find them was rendered impossible by
overpacking.

Ever vigilant, Dad spotted a greasy roadside snack-van, pulled up and
purchased a jumbo hotdog.

Even more inevitably, I took one bite and said, "I don't want any
more."

He was livid. It had cost a quid (a lot in those days). Seething, and
already filled with Mum's copious cheese baps, Dad force-fed himself
the unwanted product of al fresco catering.

He bottled up his anger and resentment about this incident. It simmered
and gnawed away it inside for while.

One thing I'll say for him, he never took it out on me.

He got to exorcise his demon. On the same road, on the way to the same
destination, a full TWELVE MONTHS LATER, he caught sight of the very
same hotdog-seller. He wound down his window and, still controlling the
car, stuck his head out, raising it above roof level, yelling . .
.

"YA WELSHHH ROBBERRRRRRRR!"

I'd say there is an interesting voice here, humorous, flowing and
snappy. But did it really happen like this? Answer: on the whole, yes.
Jim's only real memories of the incidents, though, were refusing the
hotdog and dad yelling abuse a year later. The rest are garbled
memories from myriad family holidays cobbled together.

He has told this tale in many pubs and at many parties. It's nicely
honed. The border collie (Ben - such an original name for a dog) didn't
join the family until much later. He probably knows this. It's details
that sell your story. The cost of the hotdog is an approximation, and
the speed of the car a wild stab in the dark. More tellingly, the story
gives the impression of a happy childhood, and a charming if quirky
family life. In fact, his dad was always secretly gay, and rotten to
his mum until the day he came out. His very early childhood was
miserable as sin, but he doesn't remember too much about it.
Perceptions.

So if you can't trust Jim's perceptions, you certainly can't trust
mine. In the last chapter I lied about diazepam (he never took it) and
Paramount Comedy (he doesn't watch it - nice juxtaposition though). But
I'm still the best man for the job. So stick with me. There's a
pay-off.