Catesby Road, Rugby.

Catesby Road

This is the address at which I spent the longest time in my life and this first section of it covers the period up until I left school at age 18 and then went to do my National Service.

The house we moved in to had belonged to my maternal grandparents but my grandmother had died of cancer at an early age (I have few memories of her) and my grandfather decided to move five miles away to Crick where he was headmaster of the village school.

Maybe that is the prompt I needed to say something about my own school days, the first part of which were spent at Paddox County Primary. I remember being caned on one occasion, the only time in my life, and my memory is not clear because I was innocent of the alleged offence, which I was, but because of subsequent events. A line of blood vessels on each palm burst beneath the skin and I was terrified that they would be spotted. Of course one day my mother spotted my hands, my excuse for them was that I'd caught my hands in a door; sorry Mum for thinking you would have been daft enough to believe that: she never mentioned the incident though. I suppose that I ought to add that at the age of eleven I left my primary school having won a number of prizes and passed my eleven plus (scholarship) with flying colours. I was a star pupil and much was expected of me.

To be continued.