Choir, Church, Sunday Lunch and rampaging through the woods
‘I took a table at breakfast as HC had just managed to write out Church Hymns. The choir dragged and made no attempt at expression. [Illegible] sounded a like. Amen went tres Bon. Letters. Played Table Tennis. lunch. Went outside and mucked about with DCs. Did some masks in art room. Supper. Talked to DCs told could watch ‘Colditz’, quickly changed and watched TV. Talked with B about sex or something or other.’l
At meal times the junior and middle tables had a school prefect, known as a DC or Dormitory Captain at the top of the table ostensibly to keep order. I don’t recall how we were chosen or chose to take a table. I assume HC are initials for a boy or teacher. Mrs T must have made the selection of hymns and as the Head Chorister, I had to relay this to the vicar and the choir. Church was down the road and out at one of the lodges. Prefects wore suits. We were 13. The rest of the school was in shorts and blazers. I can’t recall ever having long trousers.
Letters were a formal task undertaken in a classroom under the supervision of a teacher who may or may not have read our efforts. Parents and grandparents got letters. As did a bunch of girls I’d met on an IAPS School Cruise.
Was there just one table tennis table or more than one? I don’t know how I worked. Was it ‘first come first served?’ We also had a billiards table. Table tennis was a one-on-one. Two on two or a group going ‘round the table’. There was a knock-out completion organised by a teacher once a year or each term.
After Sunday Lunch ‘Tuck’ was distributed. The usual technique was for the teacher to call out a birthday day like ‘3’ and all those with a birthday on the 3rd went up. This was never challenged but I had the impression that my brother, born on the 3rd always went up in the first five while I, with a birthday on the 27th usually came in the last five. As the ‘Tuck’ ranged from the highly desirable’ Mars Bar to the never-wanted Penguin Biscuit I ended up more often than not with a Penguin. All the sweets in the middle were eligible for being swapped: Rolos, Polos and the like.
My brother had gone up to Sedberg in September 1973. We’d had three years at Mowden as Vernon Ma (Major) and Vernon Mi (Minor). My older cousin had been there when I had arrived which had made me Vernon Min (Minimus) which some older boys changed to Vermin and used whenever I was spotted. On rare occasions where there were four siblings or cousins that the school then oldest became ‘Max’.
Permission was required to put in the TV. The teachers were most particular about what we viewed. I have little recollection of watching much, ever, other than the Moon Landings and my Dad appearing in a Money Programme panel. We were too busy watching TV.
Dormitory nights once lights were out could mean a ghost story from the DC or if unable to sleep rambling conversations with the boy in the bunk below or the bed next to your own. Our sex education was non-existent. Our bodies were a mystery and for many years an erection was something to hang a towel over as a challenge – how long could you keep it there? I wonder if in later years this may have been at all conducive to staying power. A dictionary and an encyclopaedia (neither had illustrations!) in the school library with well-thumbed pages furnished with a modicum of insight.
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