- Wed Aug 04, 2021 9:37 pm
#7600
Much of the family on my mother's side came from Cinderford. There had been some massive scandal just before the Great War which caused my direct descendants to move to the desperate slums of - er - Maida Vale, but they started to move back in the late seventies. My mother and sister are laid to rest close to the Speech House which, of all the places to be dead, must rank amongst the bestest imaginable
But yes, Cinderford is a reasonably desperate place unless you are comfortably off which we were not. Granted, I haven't been there in decades but I have been to far worse, and I would imagine that a ready supply of pills and a mountain bike could keep even the most surly of teenagers happy. Not the scrumpy through, that stuff is lethal and I can still barely face an apple, let alone a glass of Calvados, the thick end of 45 years later.
I spent many a summer there as a kid and thoroughly enjoyed it - except the aftermath of the scrumpy, obvs - and I do still have a degree of affection for the old place. I can still remember the smell of the stale pale ale rising toxically from the foundations of the The Woodlands boozer, and the week-old boiled ham from the Bristol House offy-cum-corner shop. From about the age of thirteen, there was no problem getting served in either.
On a Friday, the whole place came to a standstill, as least for us. My grandfather would get the fresh batch of faggots from the butcher in Minsterworth and they were, beyond question, the best in all Christendom. Fresh from the gas oven with mash and peas from the garden, I can taste them even now.
Now that we are pretty much done with the funerals, there is little reason for me to ever go back to Cinderford, especially as the uncle who fucked me as a child is still drawing breath. Moreover, Samothraki is firmly in my sights and how the hell we are going to pull that off before the end of the summer.
I wouldn't say never though, old butt.
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