Extract from: Driving Big Davie
I know exactly where I was. I was sitting in a private room in a private hospital, trying to wank into a cup. This probably needs some explaining. Not everyone knows who Joe Strummer is. Or was. Joe was rock'n'roll. He was The Clash. For my generation, he was the man. He sang 'White Riot' and 'Garageland' and 'London Call- ing' and 'Know Your Rights'. He ran the tightest, wildest, most exciting beat combo in history . He made music important. He changed lives in a way that Spandau Ballet or The Hollies never could. He was my Elvis, my Beatles, and he never got fat, or bland, or shot.
The world is indeed cruel. I know that more than most people. And I take refuge from that cruelty in the music of my youth. Joe was dead and he was only fifty years old, yet Elton John was still alive. Chris de Burgh was still breathing while Joe, the man who Fought the Law and stood for everything that was good and lush about rock'n'roll was pushing up daisies. Cliff Richard was still giving power to all his friends, for Christ's sake.
But Joe was dead.
It had already been a miserable few years for the punk generation. Johnny Thunders had succumbed in a seedy New Orleans hotel, Ian Dury had lost a battle with cancer. Two of The Ramones had snuffed it, and the other two were touring as The Remains. But Joe -it wasn't even a rock'n'roll death. He had taken his dog out for a walk in the countryside, then dropped dead from a heart attack. It was frightening.
Still, wanking into a cup. The hospital was in Belfast West, that part of the city once known as West Belfast, until a £3m EC-funded tourism think-tank came up with a re-branding idea which was destined to fool all of the people none of the time. So we now had Belfast West, Belfast South, Belfast East and the Shankill Road, because they knew better than to mess with those boys.
I know a bit about tourism now, because it's kind of what I do. What I'm reduced to doing. Sad. I was about six months into my pipe and slippers years, with the exception of the pipe. I was happily reunited with my wife, I lived in a nice house in a nice suburb close enough to enjoy Belfast's many and varied shopping facilities but far enough away that we wouldn't be overly put out if things went all to hell, which they still did from time to time. I was for many years a journalist of some repute, mostly ill, reporting mainly on the troubles - usually my own -but for the past six months I had endured journalism of the last resort, commonly known as public relations. Now I was working in a small operation set up by the Government to promote tourism in Ireland.
They didn't even call it Northern Ireland any more.
The flag that hung lamely above Stormont was white. The project I worked for was called Why Don't You Come Home for a Pint? It was aimed at the tens of thousands of students who'd exiled themselves from their homeland during the course of thirty years of violence, and was supposed to entice them home with the promise of high-paying jobs, low cost of living, a grand social life and a guarantee that nail bombs were a thing of the past.
Which they are. They're so 1970s. Whenever anyone phoned to enquire about grants or mortgages or business opportunities, I had to say,
'Hi, this is Dan Starkey, why don't you come home for a pint?'
Really. I had a script. I had to say it or I'd get a warning from the supervisor. You were allowed three warnings, then you got knee-capped. Old habits die hard.
But still, wanking into a cup.
You see, Patricia and I have had our ups and downs. And as the old nursery rhyme goes, when we were up we were up, but when we were down we were really fucking down. We had battled through separations, affairs, murder and mayhem, like any marriage really. Except there had also been Stevie, our boy, our boy with the red hair who'd starved to death in a bunker and been buried in a little white coffin. That had destroyed us and for a long.time we'd gone our separate ways, knowing all the while that we still loved each other and that one day we'd get back together but neither of us prepared to make the first move.
And then it had happened, and needless to say drink was involved, and a party, and my old mate Mouse inviting us both without letting on and then deliberately seating us at different ends of the table during dinner so that we couldn't slap each other round the head. Then he played old songs by The Rezillos and The Mekons and Rudi which everyone else looked aghast at but had me up dancing like an eejit and Patricia up there with me doing a silent boogie and trying not to look at me but eventually not able to stop herself from smiling because Mouse put on 'You're a Disease, Babe' and we were pissed and pushing forty and dancing to The Outcasts, which we wouldn't even have done as teenagers because they were always the most unfashionable punk band in Belfast -but there, after midnight, pissed on red wine, with everyone else at the party begging for relief or Neil Diamond, we danced happily and punched the air every time Greg Cowan hit the chorus.
We giggled and danced and eventually kissed and that was that. We went home together and we stayed together; we loved each other -with added ground rules. An end to the fecklessness, which translated as a proper job; I hadn't been in a bar in months; occasionally we had dinner-parties; I have been known to toss a salad. And they say punk's not dead. We were happy.
And yet.
There was always the grey area, the invisible border we were not able to cross. Little Stevie…
Copyright © 2003 Colin Bateman
