Getting your teeth into it

Sitting at my desk on a Monday morning on my first S_warm free day and it’s wonderful.

The past eight days have taken us to Hell and back. Organisationally a nightmare, creatively stifled, and yet it contained moments of such beauty and focus that I am more convinced than ever that this sort of event is a positive step for the National Youth Theatre and for the public at large.

To watch the concentration of my cast as they took forty five minutes to cross Jubilee Bridge at Charing Cross using a series of numbers and yellow umbrellas was a joy. To see members of the public engaging with them spontaneously, little girls grabbing mum’s umbrella and joining in – a delight. And to stand with my partner and watch 500 white suits cross the Millennium Bridge at Sunset was just breathtaking.

After all this I need a holiday. We are heading to Valencia at the end of September, but that’s nearly a month away. First we have the joys of that great British institution the Bank Holiday. I always used to regard it as a day for staying in and watching tv, but now they don’t provide good Bank Holiday telly.

As a child a Bank Holiday meant a coach trip somewhere –the seaside or a stately home. I think that’s quite a Northern thing. In fact it still goes on. My mother may be 88 but she gets out and about at an alarming rate. Bridlington, Skegness, Blackpool and various cathedral cities all with the British Legion, the Bowls Club or the Church. Last Monday was Southport with the British legion.

While we suffered damp and inclement weather at the Swarm boot camp, Mum had a day of gorgeous sunshine on the front at Southport. A little overindulgence in ice cream may have been the cause, but on the way back she turned a shade of grey and started to feel ill. A Sainsbury’s bag was found, and promptly used. Mum still felt worse so another bag was found. The coach drivers assistant, keen to help, and very perky according to Mum’s friend Pat, took the first bag, and disposed of it.

Mum was keen to get home so the bus driver pulled off again and they set off for home. It was only when they were home that Mum decided to ask what anyone had done with the bag.

The coach drivers assistant told them he had thrown it out of the window somewhere north of Bradford on the M62.

Imagine his shock when my mother responded that her top teeth were in it.. They’d come out when she was ill and she hadn’t noticed at the time.

A toothless mother told me this story from her bed that night. It gets better…and so did she. Next morning I ring to see how she is.

“Fine” is the answer” and Linda wants to chat to you about the dentist in Dalton”

My mum’s friend Linda, who is a tower of strength and support to her comes on the phone.

“Hello Paul…….Now there’s a new dentist in Dalton we could go to. I say new,. She was struck off for malpractice. She’s Asian but very nice!”

If Alan Bennett is reading this, please borrow without further delay. It’s the world I come from. A language of beautifully turned phrases of slightly misappropriated structure and punchy undercurrent glazed over with the innocence of the Northern brogue. I love it

This weekend we’re going down to Richard’s parents in Devon . We’re intending to return teeth intacta!