Once, my hometown.

When growing up in my hometown, I was in a bubble that I created myself but looking back I can see that the place I grew up in, created that bubble instead.

The small town was once a leading fishing port making a lot of money and jobs for the surrounding areas and with its neighbour being a lovely little seaside town straight from a postcard, it made good with the tourists too. I don’t know when it’s decline started but as soon as I saw that I was on a one-way train to a stereotypical ‘small town, small mind’ destination, I made Saturn trigger back a couple of years early and when I was about 19, I jumped off that train and ran, quickly.

In my hometown your eyes were left closed and your mouth open. I was scared to be my authentic self and actually, scared in general which helped me sculpt a hard exterior which kept the soft boiled optimist inside safe and sound. I was exposed to the ‘real’ world of where I lived at about 14 or 15. I wasn’t quite sure who / what / where I was and so I was trying to find my place, as I guess most teenagers do, on the internet, specifically YouTube. A couple of guys from school would make odd video’s that they thought were funny, where they would create a full sketch which would get the full edit for the online platform. I often think about them, now knowing how big YouTube is and how they were right on the money but before their time.

Admittedly I only really used YouTube to watch music video’s to songs as we didn’t have any way of watching it on the TV and so that was the only way I could. I found ‘emo’ music quite early on and I loved the whole emotional yet emotionless sense that came with it. I would buy the magazines, blue tacking the posters to my wall, on my paper round I would listen to my then MP3 player that would only hold about 40 – 60 songs and I would pay barely anything at all to go watch similar type bands at local venues. I think I became a near enough groupie of one band, I don’t remember their name but I do remember how I thought I was really cool to be ‘hanging around’ with them but I can now see that I was a bit creepy...

Spending a lot of time on MySpace you get to know all sorts of people through the ‘fame’ of the rookie social media days and so I knew a couple of, what my parents would call ‘wrong-uns’ but to me, just different people with a different background to mine. Due to my angst (and the luck of being the only child) I would do what I wanted and that including drinking before I could. My tipple as a wee nipper was vodka and Redbull, a drink I can’t stomach for long even now as an adult, my poor young stomach… On one Friday evening, I was at my friend’s house whose mother was out which gave us free rein on the house as well as the elusive alcohol cupboard. I was drinking my favourite poison before going to one of the gigs, where of course we were only able to buy soft drinks. I don’t remember much of the night but it went from my friends living room drinking to hanging out of the car window with my tongue wagging like a dog to being dragged out of the venue like a mother carries its pup around, by the scruff of my neck.

I was crying for some reason, likely the thought of getting told off my strict yet relaxed parents. The gig was at a venue by the beach so I was stumbling through the sand, crying my eyes out, shouting moans at my friend who was holding me up when I heard and somehow felt a loud noise. It happened a couple more times and I was spun around and onto the ground, through my blurry eyes I couldn’t see a thing but I could hear my friend screaming and chants from other lads as they continued to kick and punch me whilst I was on the ground. A couple of passers-by managed to have the confidence to stop and ward the offenders off. Again, I don’t really remember much of what happened after that but I do know, that was the night I realised that it wasn’t all smiles and rainbows I thought life was… I realised there was a lot about the world that I didn’t know and I should learn to fix up and look sharp as Dizzee would say.

Another lesson I learnt was the humans can not only hurt you psychically, but verbally too. When I next went to school, I heard laughs and talk about how a bunch of lads at my school beat up some fa%*!? On the beach the other night. They relished in hurting someone else and that someone was me. I couldn’t stomach admitting that it was me that they had beaten up but that was when I started building the foundations of my wall to create that bubble, that protective barrier between the naïve, little old me, and the hard, brutal world.

My hometown. I learnt a lot from you but with the ugly memories there are also the fond memories that shaped me too. The friendships that I learnt how to craft, how to gain a job and excel professionally, how to learn from your mistakes and most importantly, how to love, or at least how to lust.

To give the town credit where it’s due, where I lived you could leave your back door unlocked and your gate open (no pun intended…) and your house would be safe. I remember a time when the gate was never shut and we used to play out in the streets, stocking up on balloons and using the outdoor tap to have water fights with neighbours or collecting tennis balls from the tennis court opposite and wasting precious childhood hours playing ‘curby’ and even only having one bath or shower a week… I wouldn’t dream of going a day now without a shower or washing myself but when I was a closely shaved headed kid with no care in the world, it was a Sunday only task which I dreaded.

The bubble that I think I created was created by others in my hometown. My sheltered upbringing, the small-minded people with animalistic and prehistoric traits and my lack of exposure to all things that benefit you in this life. I thank you, my hometown. You shaped who I am today and I am entirely thankful for that.

Once my hometown, now a place I can go to remember and not forget, to reminisce and savour those precious moments and to have serenity.