Chapter two
Broken Home.
1938-1941
We are losing the battle so we start heading back to the shore and get back just in time, with a sense of relief.
Then one day I get a splinter in my foot. Mum wants to stick this needle into me, to get it out. I won't let her, so Dad sits on top of me while Mum tries to dig it out with the needle. I start screaming at the top of my voice, “ They're murdering me,” but they carry on anyway. I haven't been too good with needles since then. (Later I learn to block pain with self hypnosis.)
Just after this I develop pleurisy. Mum's treatment is a form of torture. She puts a large, very hot plaster on my chest which burns like hell. There is more torture when she rips it off again. Her treatment for stone bruises is no better. Boiling hot mashed potato, on a bandage, wrapped onto my foot. There is always pain. Then one day, Brian tries to hang himself. Mum finds him under the house and gets him down.
We have a father, who doesn't remember our names or our birthdays, so he never buys us any presents, but Mum does. The next year, I start school at Birken head Primary. (S1) On the first day, I get into trouble for kissing a girl at the back of the classroom. You're not allowed to do that, apparently. Then the teacher tells me to draw pictures on the blackboard but I tell her that I want to have a pee. You're not suppose to say that either. I'm told to say, “Please teacher, may I be excused?” And the answer is, “No. You can wait until the bell rings, at play time.”
This is punishment for not asking properly and for saying pee, but my bladder hasn't learnt to operate by a bell. So I urinate against the blackboard. Apparently you are not allowed to do that either. Then at lunch time, they have another bell system, where at the first bell, everyone must sit down and eat their lunch. Then at the second bell, they can get up and run around. Well I'm not born knowing all this either, I need to be told, but nobody tells me.
I'm looking for my brother Gordon, who has my lunch. I see him coming across the playground, so I start walking over to meet him. The headmas