In Spite of Everything
by Charles Lacey
Chapter 1
Paul
A note about currency and prices
The 'old' British currency, abolished in 1970, was based upon the pound. A twentieth of a pound was a shilling, and a twelfth of a shilling was a penny, represented by the letter d (from the Latin denarius).. There were halfpenny (pronounced hayp'ny) and farthing (worth ¼ of a penny) coins. A half-crown was worth 2s 6d (usually written 2/6d and pronounced 'two-and-sixpence'.
In the mid-1930s, the time when this story begins, a large loaf of bread cost 4½d (fourpence ha'penny), a pound of beef 1/2d (one-and-tuppence) and an imperial pint of beer 6d. Petrol cost 1/6d per imperial gallon. A skilled worker's wages would have been around £3 per week. A modest house, outside of London, would have cost between £300 and £600.
The rate of exchange between British and American currencies was then around four and a half dollars to the pound. British currency was still pegged to the value of gold.
I lay in my bed, as I did every morning, listening for the Church clock to tell me the time. As soon as it struck six, I would have to be up, wash and dress, and then be about my chores. Our days were governed by the Church clock, though it was the only thing about the Parish Church of which we took any notice. Every other part of our lives was governed by the Rehoboam Chapel. I opened my eyes and saw what was the first thing I saw each day, the embroidered text hung at the foot of my bed:
Be sober, be vigilant,
for your adversary the Devil
as a roaring lion goeth about,
seeking whom he may devour.
Other texts hung on the walls of the kitchen and the little-used parlour at the front of the house. My parents were good Christians; they neither smoked nor drank; we went to Chapel twice every Sunday and sometimes on other special days as well. Our Minister, the Reverend Albert Hodges, was a fairly frequent visitor to the house. We had family prayers with a Bible reading morning and evening, and a Grace before every meal. What we ate and drank, how and when we worked, what we did for recreation, all of these were regulated by the Word of God, as interpreted by Mr Hodges and my mother.
My father was a gentle, kindly soul. He made wooden furniture and something of the qualities of the materials he used seemed to have rubbed off on him. He was sturdy, warm-hearted and, when necessary, pliable. He needed the last quality in large measure, for his wife, my mother, was a stern, hard-featured woman, convinced of both her own rectitude and the wickedness of others. Her knowledge of the Evangelical Faith, and especially the gloomier parts of the Bible, was encyclopaedic. I was her only child. Whether she had been unable to bear further offspring or had chosen not to, I never knew. But although my parents slept in the same room, they had separate single beds, and I strongly suspect that once the marriage had been consummated and I had been conceived, she refused any further bodily union with my father. She was like that.
I had learned very young to obey, immediately and without question, any order my mother saw fit to give; to disobey resulted in immediate punishment. So each morning I had a list of chores to be done before leaving for School. There would be wood to cut and brought in to feed the boiler; chickens to let out and feed, water to be pumped from the well to the tank under the roof, my bed to be made and the floor swept. Family prayers were held at eight o'clock, after which I left for school on the 'bus which left at eight thirty.
Mornings did sometimes present me with a problem. I was a growing boy, and inevitably, once I reached my early teens, experienced morning erections. As far as my mother was concerned, genital organs were intended by the Lord for two purposes, both of them unmentionable. One was for the elimination of bodily waste, the other for the procreation of children. Aside from these two functions, they were to be ignored. Unfortunately mine were insisting upon attention. Most mornings I would wake as stiff as a stave, a state of affairs which normally persisted until I had relieved myself. I well remember on two occasions when I was in the bath – and five inches of tepid water were permitted; more, or warmer, water would have been far too enjoyable – touching my penis, and receiving a stinging slap and a tart instruction to 'leave yourself alone'. Thinking about it, I strongly suspect that my mother supervised my bathing until I was twelve or so, and began to show signs of puberty, in order to prevent my engaging in any activities which she would have regarded as improper.
From my childhood, my life was mapped out for me. I should grow up, leave school and either go to college or get a job, unless I joined my father in his workshop. The question of further education had already been discussed with the Reverend Hodges; my unfortunate father was not required to have any say in the matter. A conventional university was out of the question; I might meet with all manner of evil influences there and mix with people who smoked or drank – perhaps even some who were (here the voices became hushed) immoral. And in due course, once I was 'settled in the world', I should marry a girl, who must be a strong Bible Christian, and preferably one from the Rehoboam Chapel we attended. As it happened, there was a girl, Susan, a year or so younger than I, whose parents were friendly with mine, and I could see match-making starting already.
The problem was, I really wasn't interested in girls. Susan was actually very nice, in addition to being a 'nice girl' (i.e. one who would expect to arrive at marriage still a virgin, as most girls did in those days, though I hear it is very different now), and I liked her, despite the fact that she was utterly conventional; her ideal life consisted of a 'nice house', a respectable husband and two or three children. But the thought of going to bed with her; well, it wasn't unpleasant, just totally uninteresting. If I am really honest, though, the person I would very much have liked to go to bed with was Adam Skillicorn. Adam was my father's workshop assistant. He would have been in his mid-twenties, fair haired, with a small moustache and blue eyes. But there was something about his figure that I found very attractive, especially the way in which his trousers fitted around his hips, and the way his bottom moved when he walked. When I lay in bed at night I used to think about him, and dream about rescuing him from drowning or some other peril. And the dream always ended the same way: he would put his arms around me, say, "thank you, Paul," and kiss my forehead.
The one thing my parents couldn't do anything about was school. I went to the primary school in the village. That was approved of, as the Headmaster was a member of our Chapel, as was one of the other two teachers. And I have to admit that the teaching, as far as it went, was competent, sufficient for me to pass the Eleven Plus and thus to get a place at the Grammar School at Ashbury, about five miles from the village. I had a short walk each morning to catch the 'bus, and then I was back each evening a little before five, though I usually had at least an hour's homework to do.
As far as it went, this school was not bad. I worked hard – in most subjects, at any rate – and gained good marks on the whole, without achieving anything spectacular. The thing I disliked most was football. I was never any good at it, and could never see the point in chasing around a field, getting dirty and usually cold as well. After each football session, of course, we had to shower, and this was torment. I hated being naked in front of the other boys, though my nervousness ensured that I never got an erection. This did happen occasionally to one or two of the others, which resulted in much name-calling. I was puzzled about what was meant by "Homo" and "Pansy", but had the sense to realize that if I had asked the only result would have been laughter at my expense. The dictionary at home was not helpful, neither was the encyclopaedia in the school library.
I didn't really have any particular friends among the other boys. I was a country lad, far more at home among fields and woodland than in the town, and my interests – insofar as I had any – reflected that. One or two of the lads were a bit harum-scarum, but it was a small town where everyone knew everyone, and in those days children were on the whole much better behaved than they are now.
What I did enjoy, though, was swimming. The school didn't have its own pool, so we used the municipal baths once a week. There were individual changing cubicles, so I didn't have to strip off in front of the other boys, and the sturdy muscles I had developed from all the chores at home, as well as helping Dad in the workshop, meant that I could put on a pretty fair turn of speed.
On Saturdays I was expected to help my father finish off such jobs as he had in hand and tidy his workshop for the weekend. I didn't mind this: Dad and I got on very well in an undemonstrative sort of way, and I liked the scent of wood shavings and sawdust. These were saved, of course; the sawdust went to the butcher's shop for a penny a bag and the shavings were used for lighting fires. Dad was a very quiet man, so we didn't talk much, but he was still good company. But he did answer my questions about what was meant by Pansy and Homo… poor man, he was horribly embarrassed, but he did a father's duty and explained, adding, of course, that the people who went in for these strange practices were at risk of hell fire. But I wonder if he mentioned this chat to Mr Hodges, because a couple of Sundays later we were treated to a sermon about Unnatural Practices and the dire punishments which awaited those who indulged in them. If anything, this made an already obscure subject still more obscure, since he avoided any kind of description of what these Unnatural Practices were.
And so things continued, until I caught Whooping Cough at the age of fourteen. I was confined to bed and the doctor was called. I had some gruesome medicine to take every three hours, administered by my mother but without sugar or other means of making it taste less unpleasant, but was otherwise left more or less to my own devices. My bed was moved close to the window, on the grounds that Fresh Air would be good for me – thank goodness, it was warm and sunny weather – and I was allowed to sit up and read. My bedroom was at the end of one wing of the house, and its window was the only one facing towards the back of Dad's workshop. I heard Dad's van start up and drive away, and then a movement caught my eye; it was Adam, who came into view behind the workshop. He unbuttoned his trousers and took out his penis, urinating copiously. I watched, interested, but hidden behind the curtain. To my surprise, my own penis started to stiffen.
But Adam had not finished. He wrung out the last drops, but then kept his penis in his hand, stroking it up and down. I observed this, fascinated, as it became longer and stiffer, and my hand strayed down and tried the same thing on myself. Just then, there was some small noise – it might have been my mother closing the back door - and Adam hastily put away his equipment and returned to the workshop. But I found the sensation pleasant, and continued, sliding the foreskin backwards and forwards along the head. Since the feeling this gave me was so good, I continued. The inevitable happened; I experienced my first orgasm and a drop of moisture appeared at the tip. For a moment I was anxious: had I done myself some harm? But I consoled myself with the thought that Adam had done this, perhaps more than once, and he seemed to be in the best of health. At any rate, I made it an almost nightly practice. When I began to ejaculate, which was fairly soon afterwards, I made it my practice to catch the result in a sock. Since one of my many domestic duties was to put my socks and underwear into the wash-tub on a Monday morning, I don't think Mother ever noticed. And in my mind I never connected the practice with the "self-abuse" about which we were given such ominous warnings.
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