Childhood in an English children's home

Dear Joe,

I have been reading your web site for a number of months and have really enjoyed reading work by an intelligent American. Forgive me if I sound patronising, but from my side of the Atlantic it often feels like all Americans are Bush. I leave the door wide open for you to attack my very own poodle leader Tony Blair!

I am writing to you because I wanted to tell you about my childhood almost a half-century ago in the late fifties and early sixties. I had the great good fortune to be brought up in a small children's home in Hertfordshire, England. The first three years of my life were, apparently, coloured by deep poverty and neglect and when my father was finally imprisoned for grand larceny (lovely quaint offence, don't you think?) in Wormwood Scrubs at Her Majesty's pleasure, and my mother showing not the slightest interest in having me join her and my other illegitimate siblings, the decision was taken by the London County Council to take me into its "care".

The social workers decided that it was very important for them to move me out of London and also out of my father's violent reach, or perhaps it was because they thought a little girl shouldn't be left with a lone father. I was to go to Boxwood, a rather lovely red brick former shooting lodge owned by Mr & Mrs White.

When I arrived in 1958, I remember being given a bag of sweets by my accompanying social worker, "to share with your new friends". I was so happy because I don't think I had previously ever been given a whole bag of sweets in my life. Mrs White was known as "Ma" and she completely ignored me, as "my new friends" descended not so much on me as on my bag of sweets! Ma walked away and left me to it. I don't think my "friends" had ever had a whole bag of sweets either, since I believe I only managed to save one sweet from the bag.

That memory is probably my earliest memory, but I know from that moment until I was 14 I never knew fear again. Ma and Pa always ignored new children. They believed that kids are usually scared of unknown situations, so they would wait until each child trusted them and the child would approach the adult.

Ma and Pa were socialists. He was a lawyer with his own practice and she was an art teacher who had taught at Bertrand Russell, the greatest 20th century philospher's school. They both were far sighted progressives and, of course, the friends they cultivated were also progressives.

So, what did that mean for me and my childhood? Well, that was a fine story. I was brought up with my foster brothers and sisters. They were black, white, Asian or whatever, but I really didn't know that because no distinction was ever made. They were simply Stevie, Nicky, Alan, Babs, Sandy or whoever. I didn't know a distinction was made until I was much older. By that time, the pure injustice of discrimination of any sort aroused in me such anger at its sheer stupidity and violence that I would forever stand against it.

We lived a mile from the nearest village and we became collectively known as "the Boxwooders". In my "family" there were always 11 or 12 of us and, as in any other family, we would have fights and disagreements. Pa insisted that we be free to do as we wished with the sole proviso that we did not hurt or upset anyone else. We were expected to respect and value every member of the family and the community.

Pa's philosophy was that each child who came to him was a traumatised child and each child needed time, support and kindness to be able to relearn a different way of life. Joe, we really did have some children who had been treated dreadfully. In 1962 we had a pair of boys who had been so starved by their parents that they had distended bellies like those of third world starving children. We had one boy who I later learned was so traumatised in his first nine months that a psychiatrist said he would never recover, but he did.

So life went on seasonally, always gentle, always kind. In winter I remember, sitting around the fire in my pyjamas or on Pa or Ma's lap. Christmas was great. We would shine the ruby red apples and hang them on the tree. In the lead up to Christmas Eve we would make straw stars to hang and paper chains to decorate the house. On Christmas Eve we would get dressed in our very best clothes, which in fact were usually patched, and with hardly suppressed excitement make our way to the sitting room, (you had to be on your best behaviour to sit in there) and then we would listen to Kings College Cambridge. We hated that because we had to listen to all the readings and sermons coming over the air waves and we weren't even religious! But Pa said if we were going to celebrate Christmas we might at least know something about it!

After the readings, the sermons and the hymns were over, we would all gather around the fire and sing Christmas carols. Pa would tell us to sing louder since Father Christmas was an old man and probably wouldn't hear us. I loved singing We Three Kings of Orient Are because I had a great singing voice so I always got to sing the solo bit. Anyway, every year Pa would have to go out and find Santa because he always got lost and rather strangely Santa would turn up a few minutes later with a big sackful of presents for us. It was so exciting we could hardly breathe. We weren't allowed to open our presents because Ma said it wouldn't be fair to do so while Pa was still out in the cold looking for Santa! Poor Pa, he never did get to see Santa.

Spring would follow with Easter egg hunts and then summer would arrive with the best. Joe, over here we have Areas of Outstanding Natural Beauty and these areas are protected from the demon Property Developers. There's a place called the Gower Peninsula in South Wales and it is just such a protected area. We would arrive there in August and run and play in the sea and the surf. Ma and Pa would always make us go on long, long hikes up and down the cliffs. We would walk for miles have a packed lunch and walk all the way back. Ma later told me that with 12 kids on those long summer days, she had to find some way to get rid of excess energy!

We rarely went into the town which was seven miles away. If we needed anything we would cycle to the village, although every Saturday morning we would cycle to town to go swimming at the local pool. Each and every one of us was fit and healthy as every day we would have to run to school and back. We rarely got a lift to school and then only if it was raining. If it was raining on the way home, well we could change our clothes when we got back.

We weren't allowed to watch television unless it was something really good and worth while. Perhaps a David Attenborough natural history programme, or the news or current affairs programme. Pa did sometimes make mistakes. I remember him taking us to see The Rise and Fall of the Roman Empire! He muttered something about it being "not what I expected" as we all fell for the trite rubbish with Sophia Lauren and Stephen Boyd.

Anyway, enough of this. I suppose the reason I wrote is to say that there is another way. I had the most wonderful childhood, there was no anger and no violence. I'll give you an example of childhood discipline as exercised by Ma and Pa. When I was 12 I went to town with an older sister. She met some friends of hers and somehow they dared me. They said I wasn't brave enough to steal some sweets from a shop. I was, I said. Prove it, they said. I did. I wasn't a good thief. The lady standing beside me said "you shouldn't be doing that", "I know" I replied but still went ahead and stole them. Of course, I was caught.

Pa was informed and I was told to go home. That was the longest 7 miles I ever walked. When I got home Pa wasn't there and I had to wait from 2 o'clock in the afternoon until 7 that evening. To say I was stewing was a vast understatement. At times, I pretended that perhaps he didn't know or perhaps he'd forgotten. Still, at 7 someone told me Pa wanted to see me. I trailed into the breakfast room and he asked me to explain what had happened. I couldn't of course, so I mumbled an apology. I looked up at him and I had never seen him look so hurt. He told me how disappointed he felt with me, how sorry he was that I could not be trusted to go to town. I was devastated and I never stole again. Even to this day that still rankles, even though the next day he told me that we would make a fresh start.

I hope my little story will show that we can live another life. You are so very right when you howl against the corporatocracy. Our children have been brought up to believe that they can have everything they want and that will give them happiness. The problem is that enough is never enough. They want more and more and more and they are never happy. While I was teaching in a prison I asked the men there what would make them happy. The chorus reply was, if I had a house, and a car and a job. I asked them why that would make them happy. They replied that they would own something. It would make them feel worthy of respect. And that is what society has come to. We are each of us fighting our neighbours and our friends. It's like a senseless competition where you are valued only for the amount you possess and not for who you are.

We allow ourselves to be led into an illusionary, fantasy world, ever chasing happiness in the guise of greed. However, we can change. We can opt out and I believe more and more people are doing just that. I don't want to be part of that anymore. I want to go back to real contentment, like growing my own food, living my life as frugally as I can. I am currently trying to persuade my husband to sell our house, in this nightmare "boom town" I live in and move somewhere where the corporations and their nasty televisions can't infect me anymore.

I say to you, Joe, keep your anger if you need to, but also love yourself for the strong, free, proud man that you are. That's something worth respecting and I do.

Thanks for "listening" to me and keep up your honourable work.

With Best Regards,

Pat

Milton Keynes, England

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Dearest Pat:

I am so choked with emotion I cannot reply.

God bless your wonderful soul.

Joe