Welcome Home Snowbaby

I was born at home on the day of the great snowstorm, March 14th
1964.

I was a late guest to this table of life.

However, it must be said, and with a lot of conviction, not as late as
the monstrous Glaswegian mid-wife who eventfully and eventually
delivered me on that crystal night.

It's family folklore.

What was she like?

The mid-wife?

Well.

By all reports.

She was a theatrical tour de force of Widow Twanky proportions that
entered ten minutes before kick off time ranting furiously of a flat
tyre and un-gritted paths. She flapped and whistled through the heavily
panicked two up, two down terraced house in Basildon and was attired in
the full Hattie Jacques garb. She wore far too much make up and had the
attitude of a pent up racehorse on amphetamines.

Her name was Maggi.

My Nan despised her at once and gave her the nickname of 'Mental
Maggie'

'She did not even wipe her feet the rude cow.'

This crazed creation enhanced her growing reputation even further by
ordering my Dad away from his crumpled 'Sporting Life' and demanding
that he make her freezing hands some soup.

'A bairn born to warmly hands is a bonny bairn.'

'A midwife named Maggi is a mental Haggy' responded Nan

I was born at 8.25pm with a slapped arse to Mulligatawny hands.

Maggi wasn't finished yet; she informed the now edgy and exhausted
household that she might be here for a while longer because of the
blizzard and her precarious broken bicycle. She blamed her tiredness on
my indignant reluctance to come out and play with the world.

This was an out and out lie.

Ask me Dad and he will back me up.

The truth is when she finally left it was close to midnight and she was
slightly squiffy from Metaxa brandy that she continually helped herself
to.

Christ knows how she got her hands on it. It's still a mystery.

Nan said that she had nothing to do with it.

This brandy came from the legendry special draw that was only opened on
special occasions such as Christmas or when West Ham United won, which
incidentally was getting more and more frequent as the season
progressed that year. My Dad, a big, burly assertive man always tells
me that he had planned to offer Maggi a little nip as she was preparing
to leave but said that Maggi had got her soupy hands on the bottle
seconds after I popped out and the whole matter got out of
control.

He still states to this day that this was the only time in his life
that he had been bullied and that this woman actually frightened
him.

Maggi majestically slipped on some ice outside the front door as she
left, her front tyre between her woollen legs.

Nan screeched with laughter.

It has been told constantly this story, a slice of family fairy cake
that has been iced more and more down the years.

Last year it had been updated to the point where the mid-wife was on
the verge of seducing Dad while Mum, Nan, my brother Frank and I slept
soundly through a land of white.

It was the night of the storms.

I do not know what to believe.

It definitely did snow though. That is in the history books.

*

On March 14th 1964 it snowed, snowed heavy, especially in the town of
Basildon. The heaviest for thirty years my mum said. It snowed the
following week as well. People were cut off, could not get to work and
schools were closed. A party atmosphere ensued. Neighbours became
neighbourly; they helped each other out, they cleared snow from
footpaths, gave the elderly surplus food and blankets. It was almost
like the war my mum said, almost like the old East End.

The thaw came with brilliant sunshine, turning the sky a periwinkle
blue. Pipes burst turning paths and roads into chocolate slush within
hours. It was followed by rain that lasted on and off for a
month.

*

I am not superstitious man by any means. I have my Dads healthy
cynicism, but there has to be something in this.

I have always had a strong need for snow you see. An addiction
possibly. All through my life it's held me in awe. I always want it in
winter, sometimes in summer. As a boy I would wait for it when it was
forecast, I'd forever stare out of the window in my pyjamas throughout
long nights. When it started I would be entranced, I would not sleep. I
would wake the whole house up time and time again. The thing is, no one
would be annoyed in my family, they found it endearing. They would call
me the Snowbaby.

They still do.

I remember my first white Christmas; it's scrawled in my mind like the
faulty' Etch a Sketch' that I received that morning.

It was 1971.

It caught me by surprise the snow that year. It was not on the cards
and I was delightfully furious when my brother Frank got there before
me.

'Wake up Snowbaby, you'll never guess what's happened.'

I did not know what to do. Half of me was at the window, the other half
in a ripping unwrapping frenzy.

I was torn.

The only present that I remember from that year was a complete West Ham
United football kit. I did not get boots just plimsolls but I did not
mind, it was snowing. My brother frank got a Chelsea kit, he got boots
though, he was older and that's fair.

That's how irrational this kind of weather made me back then.

We went outside in our kits, I had my shirt firmly tucked into my
shorts like Bobby Moore and Frank had his hanging out as a tribute to
Peter Osgood. It was freezing and falling around us in perfection. We
decided to have a one-a-side match. We fell all over the place in the
deep fresh snow, we shivered and our shirts froze. It was
glorious.

Frank thrashed me of course. He had boots.

We then made a huge rolling snowball the size of a Space-Hopper that we
left in the middle of the road. I don't know how that all ended up
because our Mum called us in for dinner. I remember though that there
were no other children playing out that Christmas Day.

By Boxing Day the snow had gone and I had terrible flu that lasted
until New Year.

I was always ill during my childhood.

From the age of five to fourteen I suffered from what I can only call
pus syndrome. I had boils on my bum and sty's on my eye continually. I
was always tired and in and out of the health centre with some plague
or other.

I once had a lump on my knee that swelled to the size of a melon. I was
rushed into hospital and stayed there for a week. Doctors gave me all
sorts of tests, tablets and swabs, but they found nothing wrong with
me. One doctor with a clown smile tried to humour me.

"We'll have to cut it off."

I screamed for two days.

My Dad punched him I think.

They never found out what it was and the swelling subsided.

Another time I had to go the hospital to have a blood test because of a
septic eye.

I hate needles. I hated them then and I hate them now.

Before I went in to have the injection I sat in what was a normal busy
waiting room with my Dad. When I returned after the test the room was
silent and full of white faces.

You could have heard a needle drop.

I was a big screamer.

Dad had to hold me down in the doctor's chair you see, he was wearing a
heavy duffle coat at the time and sweated so much with the effort that
he still swears to this day that he lost half a stone in weight.

It was a winter's day I remember, snow had just melted.

Maybe that had something to do with it.

*

My teenage and early adult years were textbook. I still had a
fascination with the weather but the obsession had faded
somewhat.

It all changed when I was 27.

The girl that I was living with at the time wanted us to have children.
I was pretty keen myself.

Nothing happened. I went to the hospital.

Same waiting room, same doctor

I cannot and never could have children ever.

The girlfriend vanished and I started snow chasing again.

I coped, got on with life. Got better jobs, a better girlfriend who
understood. I travailed the world.

I still do.

I have a wonderful life.

*

I have not hunted snow for years but am doing so tonight.

I'm listening out for the weather bulletins on the radio.

It's consuming me. I can't concentrate on anything else.

Why is this?

An old friend of mine whom I discussed this with this earlier tonight
said that I might be waiting and hoping for change.

She may have a point.

Because right now things are bad.

My beloved Dad is ill.

The world is at war.

My dreams are fading.

I'm standing at the window, watching the clouds form.

It's got to happen.

Soon!

Welcome home Snowbaby.