by
Frank Hatton

I may, or may not have mentioned, that wife's sister's husband died some two years back, and since that time, she and my wife have grown even closer together. They live around a hundred miles apart, but, they telephone each other at least three or four times every day. Every month, and sometimes less, they each get withdrawal symptoms, and have to visit, and this month, it has been the turn of my wife's sister to come to us for a week. Now to me, this has several advantages, not the least of which is the fact that they never ever run out of things to talk about. They will talk to each other all day, every day, for the whole time they are together, and the amazing thing is, that when it comes time for the sister to go home, the first thing she does on getting back, is to telephone my wife, and off they go again, talking for another half hour or more. I constantly have a sense of awe on the unending subjects of conversation they find to communicate on...... It could be the colour of the curtains, the best way to cook fish, which woman is having an affair with who's husband, how to train a budgerigar to swear, what type of underpants the local clergyman wears, and how over familiar the local doctor gets, when performing an examination of ones private parts...... Ostensibly, the most mundane topics I have ever heard,...... but, they seem to find a fascination which beggars belief, in each and every issue. Now there are probably some men somewhere, who can also indulge in this type of conversational perpetual motion, but, I for one have never met one. The type of bloke I meet up with can hold a discussion for maybe five minutes or so, and then, the time to say farewell gets to be more and more urgent,.... and this suits me just fine. Because to my simple mind, normal types of conversation just do not have the ability to hold my interest for long. Obviously, there are exceptions to this attitude... like when one is discussing the merits of various football teams, or how well a particular car will perform against another type, but, in the main, there are strict limitations to the length of time two fella's will chat to each other. It truly is strange, that the ability of the average female to talk, is so far superior to the average male. Now, I'll tell you another peculiar thing about talking! Part of my responsibilities when I was in business, (I am now retired), was to lecture and train the staff on certain aspects of the operation, and, quite often, I would run a week long training course, starting on Monday, and running through five days, until the Friday...... I never needed any notes, and just by working with overhead projector slides, I could talk all day long, and usually, hold the interest of the audience without problem. However, if anyone should ever ask me to stand up and give an after dinner speech, even though I may have had plenty of time to prepare for it....... I get as nervous as a kitten, and the act of actually making the speech is to me, far worse than having a tooth out without anaesthetic.

Those of you who read this column regularly, will know that I often turn to the contents of my daily newspaper, in an endeavour to find items which I feel would be of interest to you...... I kid you not, but, of late, it seems that the entire subject matter is taken up by either the war in the Balkans, or folk shooting each other, plus the usual helping of wife beating and cruelty to children. None of which is suitable material to offer a poor soul who is looking for some form of levity to help cancel out the trials and tribulations of everyday living.

Although,.....aside from the doom and despair on offer, I found in a book I am reading by Bill Bryson, an account of a train journey, with the design of the railway carriage being of the old fashioned type, with the individuals squashed into a compartment, in which they sat facing each other across the width of the carriage, with the atmosphere akin to a waiting room where you are waiting for a doctor who never arrives. Nobody speaks to each other, but, movement of any kind is immediately viewed with avid interest by the rest of the occupants. So, if you want to take out a bar of chocolate to munch on, the rest of the folk will look very intently to see what you are up to, and a feeling of guilt comes upon you for being so selfish as to eat without attempting to feed the rest of your travelling companions. It is unfortunately, also normal in situations such as these, for the feeling of uncontrollable flatulence to occur,.... and then comes the decision making problem, one either suffers the long agonising efforts to restrain the urge, or risks the release of the intestinal gases, whereby you are then plunged into the nightmare of everybody in the compartment glaring accusingly around at everyone else, in an attempt to convince everybody that they are they innocent party. There are many other examples of Murphy's Law which come into operation in these sort of circumstances, among the more common of which is to find your underpants have tied themselves into knot known as a sheepshank, and have firmly wedged the centre of the knot precisely where it will hurt you most. While you are trying your best to ease yourself into a more comfortable position, you find that somehow or other, you have acquired what feels like a large peanut in the upper reaches of your left nostril, and the urge to stick your finger so far up your nose to relieve the discomfort, is such that the folk opposite would think that you were trying to scratch the inside of your forehead. Fortunately, this type of railway carriage is very rarely used nowadays, so this type of torture is uncommon.

Moving onwards, I would now ask you to consider what you would understand by the word 'Neighbour'? My dictionary lists the meaning as, 'one who lives close to you'. Over the years, many words tend to change their meanings, and to me, this is a typical example....... , my childhood years were in the 30's, and we lived in London street which was characteristic of that period. The houses were what were called 'terraced houses', and were joined together down the whole length of the street. Each house was four stories high, and home to four families, with each family occupying a rented floor, or story of the house. Now, while I would agree that, our calling each of the families living in our terraced house, 'neighbour', was within the true definition of the dictionary description, in that they lived 'close to us', it was there that the meaning changed. Because each of those terraced houses, was in essence one large family!!! Nobody ever locked a door in the house, in fact the only key each family had, was the key to the front door leading to the street. All of other doors were left unlocked, and it was quite normal for the other folk in the house to wander to your living room, kitchen door, etc., knock briefly, and walk in to talk to you. If you had an emergency, and needed someone to look after your children, or, even collect them from school, these 'neighbours' would be there to help you. If you were short of food, someone would somehow find you and your children a meal. So, what I am saying, is, that each of these terraced houses, was a self contained unit, and folk were there to help, sustain, and relieve each other, whenever required. OK, so now my wife and I live in a detached bungalow, in a very nice area, and we have 'neighbours', in that they, 'live close to us', but, if ever we were in trouble, I would seriously hesitate to ask for help from any of them.

Sure, they are nice people, but, the point I am making, is that they are not the same type of 'neighbour' that I remember from my childhood. Folk nowadays are quite prepared to be 'sociable', but, there are sort of 'acceptable', and 'unacceptable' limits to which you can stretch that sociability. I feel sure that the type of neighbourliness which existed years ago, would be regarded as an 'imposition' by the folk who 'live close by you' in this day and age.

'til next time,
Frank Hatton

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