image by christine renney
My uncle burnt his scrap
On the waste ground behind
My nan’s bungalow
He fed the bonfire
Tossing off-cuts of
Electrical wire
Too short for use
They resembled sticks
Of seaside rock
The flames reduced the
Colourful plastic to fumes
A plume spiraling up
Into the sky
Polluting the air
Back in an era when
No-one really cared
Together we raked and
Sifted through the ash
The precious strands of
Copper glinting up at us
The colour of coins
Whilst we were all in lockdown, I began to get nostalgic about breakfast cereals, the cereals I ate as a child. I found myself craving for a bowl of Rice Krispies or Shreddies, especially Shreddies. Really it was all about the Shreddies. After much deliberation, weeks and weeks of deliberation in fact, I was ready. I visited the supermarket and, as we needed to stock up on muesli and porridge, I made my way to the Cereal Aisle.
There I was confronted by boxes and boxes of Shreddies. It was all a little confusing to me as I hadn’t realised that there were quite so many different types of Shreddie. I immediately dispensed with the possibility of the supermarket’s Own Brand and I quickly deduced that there were, in fact, just five versions of Nestle Shreddies (in this store at least): Frosted, Coco, White Chocolate, Simple and Original. I was a bit troubled by the packaging but I supposed that, back when I was a kid, Shreddies had just been…Shreddies and the words The Original emblazoned in massive letters on the front of the box was all for the benefit of someone like me.
As someone returning after a lengthy hiatus of, let’s say, thirty or forty years or even longer (damn, had it really been that long?) since I had enjoyed a bowl of this fine cereal, I grabbed a box excitedly of The Original. Home again, I ripped open the packet and filled a bowl poured in milk and I wondered if I should add sugar.
‘Do you think I should put sugar on them?’ I asked Christine.
‘I don’t know,’ she shrugged. ‘Did you when you were a child?’
‘I don’t know, I can’t remember.’
I helped myself to a spoonful and thought, yeah, they definitely needed sugar and after adding a fairly liberal sprinkling I sat at the kitchen table and started to munch them as Christine put away the rest of the shopping.
I’ll readily admit getting through that large bowl of Shreddies was pretty hard work. But I persevered and when at last I put the empty bowl down on top of the counter Christine asked, ‘Well?’
‘Not as nice as I remembered.’ was all I could manage to say.
When I was a kid, they said I had a good head on my shoulders and I was an old soul. I didn’t push and force them to explain – I knew what they meant. That I was sensible and not impulsive and could be trusted. It was a compliment and I couldn’t help feeling a bit smug.
But they also said I had an old head on young shoulders and this I didn’t like so much. It made me want to rebel, to stop acting so sensibly and to be impulsive but of course I didn’t because they were right.
I was six, maybe seven years old, and I couldn’t help but visualise it – my body with a different head, a bigger and older head. It was scary and I had nightmares. I remember waking up in the middle of the night and clutching my face, unsure if it had changed or not and, stumbling across to the mirror, terrified that I would find someone else gazing back at me – a future version of myself, the old man I would eventually become.
THE STAND DOWN ROUTINES 