The Debris of Debauchery

The car pulled into the rutted, pitted car park. A café that had seen better days showed a lop-sided sign spelling out “Open”. This seemed more of a triumph of hope over reality. If the building had been an animal, it would have been put out of its misery years ago. The driver’s side door of the battered Morris 1300 creaked open. The driver, a young man in his twenties, sat on the edge of the car seat, preparing for the momentous task of standing up. The other three doors opened revealing a trio of ghastly laundry piles, a portrait of man’s inhumanity to man, a debris of youthful folly.  The passenger immediately behind the driver, screwed up his eyes against the bright sunlight. From the other side of the car came groans, followed by the unmistakeable sound of vomiting.  The scene froze for a couple of minutes as nobody had the wherewithal with which to move. Eventually one stood up, stretched and yawned. His clothes had seen better days, yesterday would have been a better day. The shirt was buttoned artistically, Picasso would have been proud, it hung out the back of his muddied jeans  A casual stranger would have noted a white trainer on his right foot and a black dress shoe on his left, the laces were useless adornments. The driver now held the car door, a life raft for a drowning man. He gripped tightly and bowed his head as if in prayer. Finally he stretched his legs.

“Let’s do it”.

They started to move towards the café. Closer inspection revealed lack of sleep, eyes that were red. The manager of the hotel had commented as they paid their bills in the morning.

 “You don’t get eyes like that by reading the “Melody Maker”.

Nobody smiled but one of them had deposited a load of assorted curry and beer, which he didn’t think he had eaten, into a pot plant on the way out. He had been staring at it in amazement when his mates grabbed him by the arm and rushed him through the swing doors.

“So that’s what I ate last night,” He scratched his head.

They found the café deserted but for one waiter and the obvious presence of a cook. All of them craved grease. They looked at the menu, hoping for the “Full English”, fried bread, bacon, sausages, eggs, mushrooms, tomatoes, toast and beans. Instead they found that they could have bacon and toast, sausage and toast, egg on toast, beans on toast but no combination thereof. Red eyes and green shirt spoke,

“I would like bacon, sausage, fried egg, beans on fried bread with a cuppa tea.”

The waiter with pen poised over her notepad shook her head and explained that such a combination was not on the menu at which she pointed with her biro and ‘seen it all before’ disdain. Nonplussed the faces looked at each other until initiative was shown and one of their number ordered four items which combined would make the ‘Full English”. The rest followed suit so that there were going to be at least 16 plates to serve four people. The driver pulled over an empty table to accommodate the extra. The waitress didn’t blink but went away to report to the cook. The table was silent. The vomiter had rested his head on his arms and closed his eyes. The others sat back in their chairs, dozed, folded their arms and waited. The scene was reminiscent of a photograph of a Mafia hit. Eventually the plates started to arrive and all of them tipped their orders onto one plate each and stacked up the excess on the spare table. One of them ran his tongue over his lips, frowned and said,

“Anybody seen my teeth?”

The vomiter scratched his head, reached into the pockets of his jacket and found a set of dentures, which he tossed nonchalantly across the table where they landed in a cuppa tea.

 Nobody spoke as they ate.

It had been a boys’ weekend in London. If asked why the four had been there, what they had been celebrating, none of them would have been able to give an answer. “London. See the sights. Couple of pints. Bit of daft carry on.” Shrug of the shoulders, palms upturned, look of pained obviousness. They had booked two rooms in a cheap hotel, been out to a pub and club, found themselves in a shrine for the rowing fraternity, all Henley on Thames, Oxford and Cambridge eights. All striped blazers, ties, snobby accents, people with a good conceit of themselves, chinless wonders born to rule, walking evidence of why nations fail. Plums in mouths, motte and bailey nobles unable to boil an egg or say something sensible. But they knew very well how to talk down to people; how to cast a spell of superiority over an occasion; houses of straw. But the four knew that if the brains of these lords and ladies of the land were dynamite they would not have been able to blow off the tops of their heads.  That was the craic, spending an hour or two in subtle mockery of their ‘betters’. Always a bit of a lark to go to a place where a presence would have been notably  better as an absence. Paul had told a crowded throng that he had rowed at Cambridge, held his audience with tales of his prowess but never explained that he had merely stolen a rowing boat and simply rowed the 20 or so yards to the other side of the River Cam, hardly a coxed eight at a regatta. It was a tall tale which had grown taller with every swig of beer.

So that is what had led them to this dishevelled drive northwards and to this café. The driver was now energised the grease and coffee had worked their magic.

“I feel as fit as a butcher’s dog,” he announced brightly. His passengers were not so sure.

But as they proceeded further away from the city, they all had a rebirth. Soon they were laughing and telling stories and chuckling about the night before. Innocent antics which had done harm to livers and brain cells but to nobody or nothing else.

Their trip had been purposeless, they had no goals. All they wanted was time away, time together, a letting down of hair, a setting aside of responsibility. For all that it had been a physically unhealthy weekend, it had raised their spirits, been a balm to their souls. For certain they would be tired at work the following morning, but they would all be there and the smiles and the shared experiences would continue and give their energy a boost as the week went on. The stories would become enlarged, minnows becoming salmon; the exaggerations would become myths; the myths would become legends. And that pointless weekend away, two goalless days of fun and frolics would all have been worth it and be with them into middle age and beyond.

“You know you have a hangover when you wake up and go to brush something off your shoulder and realise it’s the floor. Then the dog licks your face and you think, “Hang on a minute I don’t have a dog.”      Rod Green

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Nobody in their right mind at my time of life yearns to go back to those days of long weekends away with friends in some city of iconic, touristy status where nothing iconic and touristy is going to be experienced. I spent four and a half years teaching in West London and yet I saw more of London in 4 and a half days there last Fall than I ever saw in my salad years. Highgate Cemetery, Westminster Abbey, St. Paul’s Cathedral, 3 West End plays, the British Library, Foyle’s bookshop, Hyde Park, Buckingham Palace were all visited. In the 1970s when I taught in the London Borough of Hounslow, there was the ‘Admiral Nelson’ on a Saturday night, the ‘Queens Head’ across the road from school on a Friday night as well as sundry rugby clubs where I played, and the magnificent, abundant Indian restaurants of Southall. We were different folks back then and so were our strokes. Here am I roaming around the foreign country of my past and if we are honest, Dear Reader, we all revisit such a place in our own minds. Youth is wasted on the young. Thanks for reading.

• “The debris of debauchery” is a quotation from my friend, Dermot Strong.