Friday 21 July

Miss Smith’s after-school class turned out to be basically all about Sex Education. I stayed for 10 minutes but I do not think Miss Smith is as well-informed about this interesting Science subject as the author of my James Bond book. I would have stayed longer, because Miss Smith is not at all like a teacher but very interesting and kind, and she would probably appear very attractive to an older man like Simon, but there were some girls there and it became a little embarrassing so I suddenly remembered that I have not done any piano practice today.

I met Antony arriving just as I was leaving the school gates. He didn’t look ill at all, just furtive, and he did not speak to me. He probably feels very awkward now that it is widely known that he has been sacked from the Cathedral choir and I am beginning to feel a little sorry for him. He is very pompous and full of himself, but he is after all another Christian Soul in distress. All the same, I didn’t speak to him either.

Wednesday 19 July

Mum has joined a Women’s group that meets in the Library on Tuesday evenings. I am pleased that she has a new interest to take her mind off things, and I am sure that she will enjoy learning more about for example cooking and the healing power of crystals.

Tuesday 18 July

Finished my James Bond book, apart from the last chapter which I merely skimmed in order to arrive at the dénouement (or ending), which I thought a little weak. I suppose it is not the plot that matters in a James Bond book, but the descriptive detail, although I am rather surprised that 007 can engage in so much descriptive detail on his diet of nicotine and alcohol. I will ask Mr Grudge for his opinion as a man of Literature, and also there is something that I will probably wish to raise with Miss Smith in her extramuriel class on Friday.

Garnham v grateful for the James Bond book, but now says he has no further information about Antony’s precipitate departure. I believe that this is called Acquiring Property By Deception, and it is probably a criminal offence. It is likely, however, that I would lose Garnham’s friendship if I took legal action against him and he was banged up in chokey for the rest of his natural, and anyway I’ve read the book practically.

But now I must work on my Scales and Arpeggios to prepare myself for my return to the Church Organ on Sunday.

Monday 17 July

Antony’s Mum sent a sick-note today. Antony is suffering from stress, and Garnham says it is because he has been sacked from the Cathedral choir. Garnham says he will tell me more if he can have my James Bond book when I have finished it.

Sunday 16 July 12:15pm

Mum and Mrs Ramsbotham had a long talk after the service this morning and they are friends again. Mrs Ramsbotham told Mum that she should be on the PCC provided she didn’t wear that hat, but Mum declined on the grounds that she has favoured Direct Action ever since Dad scuttled off with That Woman, and she is thinking of becoming an Annerchist having had her eyes opened by Feodor Dostoevski.

Statistics from this morning’s service: Hymns 7. Lessons 2. Sermons 1. Clergy 1. Congregation 17. Choir 0. Organists 0. Collection £1.47 and two IOUs totalling a further £1.39.

The Vicar, I mean Ken, preached about human frailty and why our churches are nearly always empty, even though loyal people play guitars at the remaining few, and how difficult it is sometimes to see the Gingerbread beneath the Guilt, but Mum said she could tell his heart wasn’t in it, though it didn’t matter because everyone else was fast asleep.

I feel very sorry for Ken, but I am a bit worried about the collection plate, out of which my enhanced Stipend is to be paid.

Sunday 16 July 10:00am

I did not write a lot in my diary yesterday. Instead I busied myself with completing the Task ready for my return to my Organ duties this morning. I have finished reading the Old Testament without finding any more instruments than the ones I have already mentioned, and the list is now complete, with one addition from the Canticles which is by way of being a witty joke between me and Ken, as man to man.

Mum went shopping yesterday and bought me a book as a present! I tried to conceal my disappointment when I unwrapped it and found it was Crime and Punishment, by Dostoyevsky. I am sure she meant well, but obviously it is those Hormones playing up again.

And I completely forgot to mention that Miss Smith has invited me to join a special class that she takes after school hours on Fridays for More Mature Pupils. I promised to go next week, for it is a great privilege rarely afforded to an Arts & Humanities person such as myself.

I do wish Mr Grudge was as conscientious in his duties as Miss Smith obviously is. I think Miss Smith must be an extremely good teacher, and I am beginning to regret not taking at least one Science subject to provide a necessary Balance in my education. Human Biology, which is Miss Smith’s special subject, sounds very interesting indeed, and when Rachel and I are united in Holy Matrimony I will need to know some basic facts about the Human Reproductive System, the details of which I am unfamiliar with at present although I know that it must function efficiently otherwise I would not be here now. Renaissance Counterpoint and the Conceits of John Donne and the Crystal Poets of the 16^thC are one thing, but they do not in themselves guarantee a choirstallsful of golden-haired trebles.

Saturday 15 July

The bandages on my scalded wrists are a nuisance when I am trying to write, but Mum explained at the clinic that it was an unfortunate accident, and the lady from Social Services seemed satisfied as well, after we had had a little chat on our own. She seemed very pleasant, although a trifle inquisitive.

Mum cooked me a big breakfast afterwards although it was nearly lunch time. It was perfect, apart from the fried bread, which was a little limp and greasy, and the difficulty I had using a knife and fork.

Mum can be so kind and attentive. I cannot understand why Dad felt it necessary to run off with the lady from Aldi.

I will have to stop writing now because it is time for Mum to change my dressings.

Friday 14 July

I am not surprised that Mum was so upset yesterday. There is trouble at Church! Someone from the Civic Society said in the paper – but I have the paper here, so I can copy it down:

Dear Sir (or Madam)

I write on behalf of our local Civic Society to protest in the strongest possible terms about a recent act of Vandalism in our historic Parish Church. Of the early 15thC choirstalls no less an authority than Nicholas Pevsner wrote: “Magnificent tracery, and unusual curlicues, scrolls and gyres: a fine, possibly unique, example and astonishing for its period. A priceless treasure in a building otherwise devoid of architectural or artistic merit.” Yet it is these very choirstalls that have been ruthlessly ripped out to be replaced by a monstrosity in veneered plywood and chromium plate. If our church fathers are so blind to our ecclesio-architectural treasures, then the sooner that English Heritage or even the National Trust assumes responsibility for the fabric of our churches the better.

Yrs etc

Alasdair Prudholm, FRIBA

The Civic Society

Outrageous! I do not remember ever seeing this Civic Society person in Church, nor any of his pagan acolytes, but I am sure that Ken will see him off with a flea in his ear. Ken knows that I am on his side defending our Church from the hostility of the secular world without. I will ask Ken if a letter from his Organist (and Choirmaster) would help.

All is now clear. Without doubt it was this letter which upset Mum so much this morning.

I will make her a pot of tea and take it up to her room.

Thursday 13 July 5:00pm

Being an Artist by inclination and temperament, I do not take any science subjects at school. Science is, from my experiences in my first years at secondary school, either very smelly or very messy or even both. Science, although it created Antiobiotics which you cannot take any more in case you become addicted and then catch a nasty disease when you are in hospital, also created the Atomic Bomb which is not a good thing for mankind because fall-out makes milk radioactive, which is very upsetting for cows, and even sheep, who probably thought they could go on safely grazing even unto Eternity.

But I am very worried about Mum, and Simon suggested I have a word with Miss Smith because Miss Smith knows everything about Human Biology especially Hormones.

So I waited outside the staff-room until Miss Smith emerged and introduced myself.

Miss Smith is a very beautiful lady, and I am not at all surprised that Simon enjoys dillying and dallying with her in grassy dells, but she is also very patient and very kind and I imagine she is a very good teacher in her own field or even dell.

She explained a lot about Hormones (even I have them!) and the Chemistry of the Body, and how Ladies are built differently to Men, which of course I had noticed, even though I am a Church Organist by profession. I told her a little bit about Mum, and why I was so worried, and then suddenly Miss Smith smote her brow and said: “Of course! It was your Mum who was in the paper this morning! You are that Barry!”

I smiled modestly. I do not begrudge Mum her five minutes of fame – it might, after all, help her recover from her hormonal afflictions – although sometimes I think it would be nice if people said “Oh look, there is Barry the Young Organist, but who is the Lady with him?”

I must look at the paper, but Mum is still in her room with it. Though at least she has stopped throwing things about.

Thursday 13 July 8:15am

Mum has locked herself in her room with the paper and she is throwing things about. Mrs Ramsbotham has just phoned but I told her that Mum was indisposed just at present. Mrs Ramsbotham did not seem surprised. She said: “Is she throwing things about?” and then she did a sort of harrumph.

I have decided to go to school and bravely face the last few days of term. I feel quite nervous what with Mum’s hormones and runny eggs, and even Mr Grudge’s vinegary visage would be an improvement I am sure.

Barry is fast asleep when the paper is delivered...

Readers of a nervous disposition are advised not to click on the image

Wednesday 12 July 5:45am

Mum has been up for an hour waiting for the paper to arrive. She woke me up and asked me to help her wait or at least make her a cup of tea to calm her nerves.

I made her a whole pot of tea to keep her going, and I was very polite, even though it is the middle of the night.

I am now going back to bed to continue my rudely interrupted dreams of a future career as Organist of King’s College, Cambridge, beautiful wife Rachel by my side lovingly turning the pages, and our delightful golden-haired offspring monopolising the trebles’ choirstalls, Decani and Cantoris both.

Tuesday 11 July 7:30pm

Unexpectedly I take up my Diary again – for I am to resume my duties at the Church Organ a week on Sunday, and on an enhanced stipend!

And I think I shall have to appoint Mum my Agent, for while I was on my sickbed she has been working tirelessly on my behalf, with her ear to the keyhole of the PCC on which her friend Mrs Ramsbotham sits. Mum says Mrs Ramsbotham has taken great personal risks by keeping her informed of events, because PCC deliberations are supposed to be secret, rather like the Star Chamber or the town’s Golf Club committee minutes, but Mrs Ramsbotham knew where her duty lay, Mum said.

Our relief organist has been poached by St Gandalf’s across the river! And he has taken his choir and all their fans and hangers-on and aunties with him! St Gandalf’s is a bigger parish than ours and the Parish Church has a four-manual organ, about which they are very smug. But Mum says the irony is that the organ which lured him is not a proper Church organ, but one bought at a knock-down price from a theatre which was forced to close in 1963, having fallen foul of the Lord Chancellor by allowing the use of the word “Bottom” in a play (by Shakespeare, actually.) The pipes which inflated balloons at climactic moments in the Drama having been tactfully removed in transit, as well as the Vox Humana Cliffordo Ricardi stop, there was no obstacle to an Organ Blessing service conducted by a Suffragan Bishop, so everything was all right as far as the Church was concerned.

Mrs Ramsbotham says it is all the Vicar’s fault: the clergy should take services and shake hands with people on Sundays and give comfort to the sick and bereaved or do weddings the rest of the week, not go round behaving like Football Club Managers poaching other people’s players without consulting the Board of Directors – that is, the PCC. Apparently the relief organist was practically an ARCO and so he demanded £4,000 a year – plus weddings and funerals – to stay in my Church, but the PCC only offered him the same as me, £52.00pa.

But Mum persuaded Mrs Ramsbotham that Grade III Piano is nearly as good as an ARCO, and guess what – when I take up my duties again I will be paid £40 a month! And the PCC has agreed to refund the cost of my notebook, as well as allowing me to buy some new music to play. It is all down in my new Contract of Employment which is even now being drawn up by the Diocesan Personnel Department (Lay Division).

And I will make jolly sure I keep all my receipts in future, I can tell you!

But it is riches undreamed of! I shall at long last be able to purchase a proper computer for my IT studies when I have saved a little. One with e-mail so that I can correspond with other organists Around the World and perhaps help them along their careers in our Church, as I am sure they will do for me!

Tuesday 11 July 9:00am

Rose early (6:30am!) and decided to do some piano practice, which I have neglected of late. I was halfway through my Grade III Scales and Arpeggios when Mum came downstairs, pointed to an egg, and said: “Cook it yourself if you feel up to it. I am going out.” Whatever it was must have been urgent, because it was only a quarter to seven am when she slammed the front door shut and left me to my own devices.

Mum has been behaving very strangely of late. It is either hormones or the onset of the Middle Ages, which I understand can affect ladies in peculiar ways such as interfering with their cooking abilities.

An uneventful morning otherwise, though my egg, boiled for exactly three and a half minutes, was perfect.

Monday 10 July

Did not go to school today. Mum phoned the Secretary and told her I was unwell. In any case Exams are over and it is practically end-of-term: even Mr Grudge has a smile twitching on his face as holidays approach.

Mum will not say when I am supposed to resume my duties at the organ – she says only that it all depends, but does not say upon what. No doubt she is concerned about my health, for it has indeed been a stressful few weeks, and my immune system is surely in tatters.

It is proving very difficult to find a rhyme for Rachel, apart from Satchel, which is both an imperfect rhyme as well as a word lacking in Romantic associations. Seychelles comes to mind, and that is indeed Romantic, but as my poem would be intended for English readers they would insist on pronouncing the final S and blame me for lack of craftsmanship. The lot of a poet is, I find, a cruel one. Brenda would have been a lot easier –

“No Borrower of Love’s bloom, I, but Lender”

would have gone down particularly well, with its modest but knowledgeable allusion to Polonius’s speech to his son Laertes in Act I* of William Shakespeare’s masterly play Hamlet, which 4A did in Eng Lit last term. It is a line of which I am sure Shakespeare himself would have been proud if he had thought of it, and rather than waste it I will attempt to work it into a sonnet for Rachel, which I have provisionally entitled “A Sonnet for Rachel.”

* Scene 3, I think, but I will have to check when I next visit the library.

Sunday 9 July 3:00pm

Big sigh of relief. Ken (that is my Vicar, but he has asked me to call him Ken, which I think is a great privilege) had not come in his Clerical Capacity to administer the Last Rites, but to inquire after my health as a friend of the family. He gave me a bunch of green grapes, some of which must have fallen off in our car in his haste to Visit the Sick, for there were only seven left, but it was a kind thought nonetheless.

But my Vicar – Ken - has asked me when I can resume my duties at the Organ! I said that I hadn’t finished the Task yet, but when he had finished choking on the last grape and going pink all over his face, he said that that was now a minor consideration.

I am sure that Ken wanted to talk to me more about church music and my role in its development, but I think Mum thought I was tired by now, for she said “Enough!” in her dangerous voice, seized him by a triceps (or should that be tricep? I must look it up) and practically dragged him out of my room.

Luckily, as it happens, for my James Bond book was lying open on my Spiderman quilt at page 136, which is the last page I would wish Mum and/or the Vicar, sorry, Ken, to notice that I had been reading.

Sunday 9 July 11:15am

Mum said she would have to go to church in case it was a Day of Obligation that she had overlooked but she had left an egg out for me to cook if I regained my appetite. I did actually feel a lot better, but I didn’t say anything to Mum in case I was Tempting Providence. When she had left to pick up Mrs Ramsbotham I found some sausages and bacon and tomatoes in the fridge and, with them and the egg and another egg and three slices of toast, made myself a light breakfast to keep my strength up. I am sure that I cannot have been suffering from a terminal fever, for I found that I was quite hungry. Mum always says “feed a cold and starve a fever”, and, drawing comfort from these wise words, I decided that I had just got a cold, after all, so I opened a large tin of Sainsbury’s peach slices to celebrate my return from the dead and ate the lot.

I was just about to start writing a poem to Rachel, but Mum’s just come home. And my new Vicar is with her. I had thought I was feeling so much better, but now I am not sure. Does Mum know something that I do not? After all, she spoke to the clinic yesterday. I do not believe that my Mum is capable of dissembling, but the advent of the Vicar is, I fear, not a good omen.

Saturday 8 July

Woke at 4am bathed in perspiration and the echoes of unpleasant dreams, and with a very sore throat. Mum says I am to stay in bed lest I have caught a germ. I feel too weak even to read my James Bond, which I remember I bought from Help the Aged (20p) and which may therefore be the source of my infection, elderly people being renowned for their lack of attention to personal hygiene. Mum brought the little radio up in case I wanted to listen to Classic FM, but even that felt like too much effort.

I have little to report today, having slept through most of it. My temperature is 103 degrees, and I am forcing myself to write my diary in case this day is my last. But I must also write to Rachel, wishing her well in her future.

Mum said she phoned the clinic, but they were too busy with paperwork and expenses claims to deal with sick people and could only advise a visit to the chemist’s, who refused to give her some antibiotics without a proscription. Mum bought me some Rennies and a bottle of after-sun lotion instead.

I am sure the Rennies will come in handy sooner or later. Mum is very tidy in the kitchen – in fact it is spotless – but cooking is not her strong point. Sometimes I think that if Mum made a cup of tea she would manage to burn the water.

I will write more tomorrow if I feel stronger. If, that is, I do not pass away during the night.

Friday 7 July

I didn’t sleep very well, tortured by images of my darling Rachel and by indigestion from the baked beans Mum burned for supper. Not even the arrival of my pay cheque (£4.00, as usual) cheered me up. Well, £3 really, because of that wretched television set.

The morning was spent yearning and not attending to my lessons, as a result of which I may never now understand the secrets of the subjunctive or differential equations, and I do wish my teachers would not be so sarcastic. None of them goes to church, of course, which could explain why they behave in so churlish a fashion. I asked Mr Grudge who teaches English why sentences with the subject “none” require a singular verb, even though the sense of the subject phrase is plural, and he could give no satisfactory explanation. I do not know why I waste time with Mr Grudge, for it is well known that he would be only too happy to reintroduce capital punishment for pupils who ask awkward questions.

This afternoon, being sunny, was again declared free by Simon, who evidently, from the garb contained in his bulging holdall and the fact that he has a small canvas vessel attached to the roof of his Renault 4, intends to take Miss Smith on a canoedling trip down the river. I hope Miss Smith is in the sort of romantic mood which forgives all, for our river is not a river at all but a stagnant branch of the Canal, and on a hot day it stinks to high Heaven of rotting fish.

I spent the afternoon treading and retreading my route to school, but Rachel did not appear. And it occurs to me that I do not know where she lives. I do not even know her surname.

Helped Mum watch Coronation Street, then retired to my room to write my diary, after which I will probably read some more James Bond and have an early night.

Thursday 6 July

Oh diary! I have been looking forward all day to this moment.

Diary, I can tell you that this was the best day of my life, even better than the day I got my Grade 3 Piano. I am in love!

But I must try and control my passionate thoughts and place events in sequence.

It was like this.

I was walking to school this morning, thinking of nothing in particular, when a girl on a bicycle passed me, her bloomers or something flying in the wind like unto the wings of angels. She stopped, with a squeal of badly adjusted brakes, and turned. “Why, it is Barry!”

I said the first thing that came into my head: “Oh Rachel...”

I was going to continue “...(or Brenda)” but she put her finger to my lips to hush me:

“And you remember my name!”

“Barry”, she said, “that was such a sweet letter you left in church for me to find. I shall always remember that first innocent dawning of young love, as girls are inclined to do. I will treasure your letter always, and probably tie it up in pink ribbon with all the others.”

Then she stooped and kissed me on the head, remounted her bicycle, and pedalled off, waving gaily and blowing kisses to such an extent that her bicycle wobbled alarmingly until she regained control, just in time to avoid being squashed between two Eddie Stobart lorries (Agatha Millicent and Edna Jane, I believe, though I could be wrong, being as you can imagine in a state of agitated bliss at that moment.)

“With all the others”! She is being coy, I know, but surely that is a hint that already she can see far ahead to that mountain of correspondence between us that will extend far into the future, well beyond the bounds of my GCSE results!

Oh Diary, dear Diary! Oh Rachel, dear Rachel!

Oh Joy!

Wednesday 5 July

Mum is going to have her name and picture in the local paper! A reporter telephoned her this morning to ask her about the Dostoyevsky incident which another customer in the Library overheard and tipped off the Press about! The Press are very concerned about Moral Turpitude among Young People which they blame on inappropriate reading matter, the reporter said, and he arranged to meet Mum outside the Library for an interview. Mum put on her special Easter hat for the photo. She was very excited and nearly forgot to watch Coronation Street.

Tuesday 4 July

Life can be very cruel - two of the questions in the Eng. Lit. paper were about soap operas of which Coronation Street was cited by way of example.

I looked desperately for a spelling mistake, but there was none. I was ticking little boxes almost at random until I controlled my panic and faced Question 3 – “Compare and contrast two of your favourite authors, with reference to their writings”, it said, and I could breathe again. I wrote a lot about my James Bond book and concluded, by rational argument, that it was a lot better written than Crime and Punishment and engaged the reader’s attention more readily, with excellent characterisation and a fast-moving plot. I might not get a Distinction, but at least I am now confident of a good Pass grade, upon which, of course, my future depends.

I haven’t decided yet whether Oxford beckons me, or Cambridge. I know I shall have to make a choice sooner or later. But now everything hinges on the results of my Woodwork and IT examinations.

Monday 3 July 4:30pm

Disaster! While I was at school Mum took my Dostoyevsky book back to the library and exchanged it for a Biggles book (which by the way I had read years ago, when I was young.) She said she had looked inside the Dostoyevsky book and it was horrible, all about how to bump off pawnbrokers if they were little old ladies. She said it was not suitable for young people to read that sort of thing in case it gave them Ideas and turned them into Annerchists and she has complained to the Librarian about Dostoyevsky. I am very annoyed that Mum took it upon herself to interfere in my studies, but secretly relieved because actually it was a very hard book to follow. Even the names were hard to read. It also turns out that Dostoyevsky is Russian, so it is most unlikely that any of his books would turn up in Eng Lit.

But it is no use trying to explain about Culture and English Literature to Mum, who watches Coronation Street all the time. I cannot abide Coronation Street myself because I have decided that I am intellectually inclined as well as extremely sensitive, thanks mainly to a recent emotional upheaval from which I am not yet fully recovered.

I wrote a poem after our little argument. It went:

Mum is a fish

who watches Coronation

Street & stuff like that

from inside a little glass

bowl that

is

her world.

At least I think that is how it went, because I tore it up and flushed it down the loo as soon as I had finished writing and admiring it, in case Mum saw it. I had not realised that as well as being a Musician, I am also a poet-in-the-making.

memo to self: must find better hiding-place for my James Bond book. Also this diary.

PS. The new Television came today. It is of course second-hand, but it seems to receive the same programmes as the other one, which is a profound relief. It is on rental, and I have to pay Mum £1 a month out of my measly stipend. I shall be much more careful the next time I have sardines.

Monday 3 July 7:30am

I am doing some quick revision with my Dostoyevsky book before breakfast in case there is a question about it in Eng. Lit. tomorrow. Eng. Lit. is the last of my GCSEs, thank goodness. I am in the fast-track class, 4A, where we brighter students are permitted to take some of our examinations a year early in case there are glimmerings of Oxford and Cambridge potential. I shall have to put my diary down now, because I am only on Page 5 of my Dostoyevsky and there is a great deal more yet to read.

Sunday 2 July

I was on tenterhooks all morning (tenterhooks were actually things used in the cotton industry to hold your cloth in place while you were making it, but it is nevertheless a useful Metaphor). But when Mum got back from church she didn’t mention no, I mean a, letter, so I breathed a very large sigh of relief, so large that Mum looked very concerned and asked me if I would like a Settler.

It was a very strange service, Mum said. The old choirstalls have been half demolished, so the choir had to sit in the seats reserved for Sunday School, and when Sunday School came in during Communion two children started crying because they had nowhere to sit. The choir and the organist were annoyed because the children were crying while they were trying to sing some holy Communion music, and they were still crying when Antony came to do his solo, and a lot of other children had joined in the crying by then. Mum said nobody could hear Antony because of all the weeping and wailing, and then one of the teachers muttered that the children were all right until Antony started to screech at everybody. Then after the service the relief organist had an argument in the parish hall with Miss Brandish, the Head Sunday School mistress, during which Miss Brandish’s coffee became knocked over, and the Vicar went home suddenly, saying that he had quite forgotten to write his sermon for evensong, which puzzled me, for we have not had an evensong at my Church in Living Memory.

But the best thing was that the Treasurer refused to pay Antony his fee because nobody could hear him! Mind you, I think £20 quite extortionate for two minutes of that pigeon song by Mendelssohn, so it serves him right for being greedy and shrill.

I shall remember to say Rabbits again on the 1^st of August. Though we Christians are supposed to eschew pagan superstitions, they certainly seem, in some mysterious way, to work.

Although I have done nothing further on my task, and my heart is still broken, and my breakfast egg was runny, it hasn’t been a bad day, all things considered.

Saturday 1 July

Rabbits! If you say Rabbits as your first word on the 1^st of a month you are supposed to have good luck all month. I remembered to say it when I woke up this morning, and I am also writing it here because I could do with a double helping of Good Luck. Mum let slip at breakfast (boiled eggs, but Mum hadn’t given them long enough so they were all runny and disgusting) that the relief organist has invited Antony to sing a solo in church tomorrow! In MY church! I do not hold grudges because to do so is unChristian, but I can no longer consider Antony one of my small number of friends. He is evidently immature, and I cannot understand how he managed to wangle himself into the Cathedral choir. His voice is very shrill and he cannot read music if it has more than one sharp (or flat.) I generally try to be charitable, but with Antony it is very hard work. Is it a sin, I wonder, to give somebody like Antony a good hard kick up his bottom? Probably it is, for the Lord insists that Vengeance is His (I read it in one of the Old Testament books while I was hunting for elusive musical instruments.) Further, Antony is six inches taller than me and he used to take boxing lessons because his father is a Policeman. So I have to swallow my pride and take the line of forbearance, and just hope that the Lord, if he is reading this, will give him a good hard kick up his bottom on my behalf.

Also that book, Crime and Punishment, is very hard work. I read a bit after tea (eggs and chips, and the eggs were properly cooked, so all is not doom and gloom) but it is not as exciting as my James Bond book, so I read some of that instead.

Friday 30 June

Because it is the Exam season we had the afternoon off. I should have had Woodwork but Simon said we had all worked very hard and we deserved a reward. Personally I think he wanted to go dillying and even dallying with Miss Smith, for the day is pleasantly warm and no doubt some grassy knoll beckons, or perhaps I mean dell, for dillying (etc) on a grassy knoll could render one a bit conspicuous, “knoll” meaning a small rounded hill, according to Mum’s Collins English Dictionary.

I have been to the library and borrowed a book called Crime and Punishment. It is by Dostoyevsky, and it appears to be a thriller, like my James Bond book. I hope it will take my mind off things.

There was still no sign of the Letter when I popped in to church to check. With luck the Post Office will have lost it, as they lost the letter from Auntie Grimsdyke at Christmas, the one with the £5 note in. I wrote to them to complain, but they didn’t reply (that letter probably got lost as well!)

It is all very well going around losing people’s letters, but there can be serious financial consequences, especially to Professional Musicians, who are regarded as being so dedicated to their Muse that they shouldn’t expect to be paid as well. Auntie Grimsdyke was very annoyed when she received no thank-you letter from me, and she phoned Mum to ask why. Mum said we had never received her letter but I don’t think Auntie Grimsdyke believed her, for when I spoke to Auntie Grimsdyke to ask if she would mind sending me another £5 note to replace the one that had been lost by the Post Office, she said something so rude that I cannot repeat it here and then she said she would not never send me no money again ever, and when I pointed out that she had just used a double negative, she said the rude thing again and slammed the phone down on me. I calculate that if I live to be 70 (the customary span, according to my Bible) I shall be out of pocket to the tune of £270, and it is all the Post Office’s fault. The best thing the Post Office could now do to make amends is to lose my letter to Rachel (or Brenda.)

Thursday 29 June

The IT exam. I have just ruined the rest of my life. I used to laugh when people on The Weakest Link said “he got two questions wrong”, and say “No he didn’t – he got two answers wrong”, but now I know how they felt.

I wish Mum had let me have that computer I needed. I might have understood the questions better. I couldn’t understand a single word.

I need to find that letter quickly – my whole future hangs in the balance. Evidently I am not cut out for a career in Silicon Valley or Carpentering (despite its honourable historical antecedents for church people such as myself), which leaves me only one option – continuing in my present profession of Church Organisting, and, I suppose, Choirmastering.

I have made a mid-year resolution. The options were: do away with myself or read Dostoyevsky. After careful consideration and two Mars bars I have decided to read Dostoyevsky. He, of all the great English writers, would understand.

Wednesday 28 June

Disaster! I’d left my letter to Rachel (or Brenda) on the hall table and Mum has put in the pillar box with all the letters she writes to Age Concern and Interpol.

I waited for the postman who empties the box at 16:45pm GMT, but he said there was nothing in it. Everything must have been collected at 12:30pm.

I told him it was addressed to someone at The Choir in my parish church.

“Aha”, he said severely, wagging his right forefinger at me. “Then it will have been shoved through the church door, chum, lacking as it does a full and correct postal address, complete with requisite postcode.”

I will have to retrieve it somehow. If the new Vicar opened it by mistake my job would be forfeit, for I might have said some things of which he would not approve (I had, after all, been reading the Song of Solomon before I wrote it), and – oh horror of horrors! What if one of the flower ladies opened it? They all have to sit together at the front every Sunday, just behind the Sunday School, and they’d be bound to mention it to Mum, or even worse, the Vicar.)

I pretended to have another one of my migraines after French Oral, and was excused lessons. I ran as hard as I could to church, but there was no sign of the Letter anywhere. I even peeped into the box where people pay for Parish Magazines and Holy Bookmarks, but as usual it only contained a 10,000-Lira banknote and five IOUs for sums ranging from 5p to 40p.

But no Letter.

Tuesday 27 June

Tabor and Zither, but my heart is no longer in it. Mum is furious about the Television. There was a bit of sardine sticking to the Volume Control which I had overlooked, but Mum hadn’t, and she put two and two together and said the cost of repair would have to come out of my earnings. Then, when I got to school everybody was sniggering at me. It seems that Antony has been going round informing everyone that it was he who wrote the steamy letter with S.W.A.L.K on the back of the envelope – “for a giggle.”

It is my fault for mentioning it to Garnham, in strictest confidence (he has the beginnings of a dark moustache, so naturally I thought he would understand.) Word seems to have got around, all the same. I braved it out, of course, pretending that I thought it was a huge joke as well, although I felt as though I had been hit in the tummy with a sock full of wet sand.

Thank heaven I haven’t posted my reply to “My Darling Girl.”

Monday 26 June, 00:15am

Back door still open. Remembered to lock it behind me. Comfortable bed beckons. O Rachel (or Brenda)!

Oh Joy!

zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz

Sunday 25 June, 5:30pm

I am very hungry. Mum is still in her room sulking. I made a sardine sandwich from what was left of my lunch and turned the television on for company.

I think I am emotionally over-excited, what with the pressure of exams and domestic crises and everything, but I’m afraid that when Aled Jones started singing Amazing Grace I threw the sardine sandwich at him. And the plate. I think it was the plate that broke the protective glass in front of the picture rather than the sardine, but I fear Mum is in no mood for reasonable explanations, so I phoned my friend Antony (who is in the cathedral choir) seeking a sleep-over.

Antony used to be really friendly until he got involved with the cathedral people. Now when you ring him you get his Answerphone message: “Thank you for ringing Antony. I will try to find time to return your call, provided you say who you are, but you must understand that my duties in the Cathedral are onerous and very demanding of my time, so please do not waste it on trivial matters. Kindly leave your message after the Beep.”

Unfortunately the Beep occurs in the middle of the word “Onerous” (“taxing; demanding” – Collins English Dictionary) and the tape has run out before you have time to say anything. So I am going to sleep in Dad’s shed instead, but I did have the presence of mind to leave a note for Mum:

“Urgently summoned to meeting at Antony’s. May have to stay over. Do not worry.

Love, Barry.

PS Sorry about leaving the washing-up. Will explain broken TV on return – severe hailstorm. Hadn’t realised you didn’t close kitchen window before taking early night.

PPS Have shut window for you.”

Have brought torch; have brought letter from Rachel (or Brenda). Floor a trifle uncomfortable, but what is true love if it cannot endure a little hardship?

Have found new pimple on thigh, possibly insect bite. It is very itchy and is stopping me from sleeping. And who knows what other creatures dwell within these wooden walls in the dead of night and crawl silently in search of Human Flesh across the same floor as the one that I am about to enter sweet slumbers upon?

Sunday 25 June, 2pm

I must say that I am very surprised that in the olden days they allowed the Song of Solomon to go into the Bible at all! I bet Saint Paul tried to get it banned when he got involved in writing the New Testament, which is basically about a lot of letters that he wrote in early AD. I read it from start to finish. I will have to read it again, more slowly, because unfortunately I quite forgot to look out for the names of musical instruments. There are parts of the Song of Solomon that I will have to ask Rachel (or Brenda) about when eventually we become better acquainted.

I was about to start on Solomon again when Mum came home from the 10:45 service. She was in a bad mood. The Vicar has asked all the flower ladies if they would sit together at the front, because of the importance of their job. Mum says they do the flowers in shifts, so she didn’t know any of the other ladies, and what was worse, Mrs Ramsbotham was asked to sit with all the other ladies who have Communion brought to them on account of their legs, so they were unable to converse.

So it was perhaps not a good moment to ask Mum about the computer I need for my IT (I have an important exam on Thursday, the result of which will determine my future career prospects.)

I tried to explain to her that it was not the fault of the computer that Dad went off to live in Mallorca with the lady from the check-outs at Aldi. The computer is a wonderful tool, I told her, like the typewriter or the electric telephone, but it is only a tool, and that’s when she burst into tears.

“Just like your dad”, she said, and went to her room and slammed the door, so after a quarter of an hour I decided to get my own lunch (a quick repast of sardines on toast – rich in Omega oils and therefore very good for the brain.)

How do I explain to Mum that my chances of passing my IT exams are minimal if I do not have access to something more up-to-date than Dad’s old Sinclair Spectrum, which also nestles secretly in my satchel, next to the letter from Brenda (or Rachel)? Mum doesn’t realise that dad was a genius – he had worked out how to get Broadband on his Spectrum, which is how he met the lady from Aldi. When he left us to live in Mallorca he left me the Spectrum, of which he had no further need, with a strange note that said “this is also your escape route.”

If Dad is even mentioned Mum throws her hands in the air and bursts into tears and wails “Aldi!”. I think it was the shame – she wouldn’t have minded so much if the lady had worked on the check-outs at Waitrose or Marks & Spencer or even Sainsbury’s – but Aldi!

I’d just started on the Task again when Mum came downstairs.

“By the way”, she said, in a very unpleasant tone of voice. “The Vicar announced in the Notices that the Church requires the services of a good albeit inexpensive carpenter to extend the choirstalls. I had a word with him afterwards. He will probably be in touch with you.”

I think Mum might have hissed, if it were possible to hiss while enunciating the words “By the way...”

Sunday 25 June, 6:12am

I think I might be in Love. They do say that Absence Makes the Heart Grow Fonder, and obviously Rachel (or Brenda) is broken-hearted because I am no longer there glaring at her in a masculine way every Sunday. I am going to write to her to apologise and say I probably wasn’t glaring at her in particular, and then I had a brilliant idea when I had to get up to use the toilet a few minutes ago. I shall write A.M.T.H.G.F on the back of the envelope! It would be a hint that her affections are reciprocated. And I do not need to say “Dear Madam” – I can just start by saying “My Darling Girl”!

Since I am up now (”with the lark!”) I will get on with the Task – with renewed vigour. I shall resume with the Psalms, because of their beautiful exotic poetry, and then I think I will venture into the Song of Solomon, for surely King Solomon must have had musicians to beguile him when he wasn’t being called upon to resolve matrilineal disputes or polishing his collection of e.g. Amethysts and Carbuncles and Lapis Lazulis from his extensive network of mine-workings. I do not think they had Radio 3 or even gramophones in BC, let alone CDs or MP3 players, so Solomon probably had to make do with live music.

Saturday 24 June

I am in turmoil, and I was trying to study for the IT exam next week! The girl in the choir – Rachel or Brenda, I think her name is – has sent me a letter with S.W.A.L.K written on the back of the envelope. I looked S.W.A.L.K up in the big dictionary at home – it means Sealed With A Loving Kiss, which is apparently an example of an Acronym, a word I had not encountered before, not even in my James Bond book. I cannot of course reveal the contents of the letter because of the Laws of Privacy, and I am very annoyed that she forgot to sign it, because I am not actually sure what her name actually is. Luckily the post came when mum had popped out to the shops so I was able to conceal the letter in my satchel for later consideration. I would like to reply, but I am worried that “Dear Madam” might not be the best way to start. Rachel (or Brenda) mentions something in her letter about Facebook. I shall have to find out who wrote it and see if I can borrow it from the library.

Wednesday 21 June

English today. I do not understand why we have to waste time learning about English. It is, after all, our own native language, well most of my class anyway, and even Naziz speaks it fairly well. I have been speaking it for as long as I can remember so I think I can claim to have acquired some knowledge of it along Life’s Way. I think though that it is some of my teachers who need to take GCSE English, for their spelling is abismal in the main. In fact the teacher who is the best speller at my school is Simon, and he teaches woodwork! Mind you, he has probably had lots of practice writing secret letters to Miss Smith when he should have been attending to his educational duties.

There was a spelling error in Question 2 of this morning’s exam – accomodation instead of accommodation. I am writing to the Exam Board about it, also about the attitude of the invigilator when I pointed it out to him. He was quite rude to me, which upset me and may have caused me to lose concentration, as I also mentioned in my letter. I expect that the marker of my paper will be informed and instructed to make appropriate and sympathetic allowances. I should have told the Exam Board that the marker need not, however, make allowances when marking my answer to Question 1 (it was about the Gerund and it had a lot of boxes to tick, most of which contained the wrong answer, but I expect the Exam Board know that already) because I had answered Question 1 before the invigilator chose to make an issue out of a perfectly innocent observation.