Everything I Have Always Forgotten (29 page)

Needless to say, as a young boy I worshipped him. His drunken eccentricities were not my problem – his cars and his enthusiasm were my joy. As for my Parents, they were intrigued by this attractive, eccentric young couple (whose palpable mutual attraction was fiercely magnetic) and their arrival to the neighbourhood… though their sympathies later went to his (by then) abused wife.

I assume we were both carried out to the Jeep after dinner. I have no memory of our departure. Later, Mother remarked only that she had never seen two such filthy dirty little boys as we, when they picked us up. Not in Tangier, nor Naples, nor in the slums of Liverpool. I shall never know if, in fact, she was anxious when I was away with Alan for so long without communication, or if she was satisfied that we were sensible enough and could cope alone. Life in general and communications in particular were so very different then.

Was this, then, the great ‘eureka' moment? Did this truly mean that henceforth I could just get up and walk to Kabul or Tokyo? Not exactly, but now my foot was in the door and I had been introduced to the concept that the world could be my stomping ground… you, the reader, may see this as the End. For me, it was only the Beginning.

AFTERWORD

H
ow Parents raise their children certainly went through a sea-change after May 25th, 1979.

On that day, a six-year-old boy was walking to the school bus two blocks from his parents' loft in Soho, New York. For the first time he was, very proudly, alone. He had been trying to persuade his parents to let him walk to the bus alone and had just received the green light. He disappeared without trace. His elfin smile became famous, it was printed on milk cartons all over America. The search was intense. His name was Etan Patz.

The chief suspect was a kind and gentle African American odd-job man named Othneil Miller. He had done some work for us and for the Patzes. More than thirty years later, another man confessed and, as I write, is standing trial. Poor Othneil must have suffered hell all that time, his life in tatters knowing that he was innocent and his gentle character besmirched.

So it was that I could not dispute the paranoia of my children's mother – for an absurdly long time, one of us would take them to school and pick them up. They were not even allowed to take the school bus until they were too old to be allowed to take it! They have, of course, since declared their freedom with many adventurous journeys in more or less arduous conditions and successfully negotiated the perils of nature and man… coming home intact, wiser and more developed in every way.

It is debatable as to whether there are more or fewer tragic disappearances today than when I was a child, or even a hundred years ago – what is certain, is that modern media (now even using milk cartons) has made us all much more aware of such dangers. I doubt that there is any more or less pederasty today than in the past. I do know that if a child spoke to their parents of abuse, that frequently they might be shushed-up, “it's in your mind”, “…such a respectable person”, “wouldn't ever do such a thing”. Nowadays, they are more likely to be heard out.

On the one hand, one might conjecture that the ‘sexual liberation' movement could defuse sexual frustration and thus reduce abuse. On the other, perhaps permissiveness breaks down any social inhibitions.

I shall leave that debate to sociologists and only say that, despite the pain and anguish, I suffered an amazing childhood, which would not be easy to duplicate today – any more than Tom Sawyer might be reincarnated.

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

I would like to acknowledge and thank all those who helped in this modest endeavour. My Parents who gave me this life, this view, these strange tools with which to stay afloat. My wife, Kimberly for her editorial skills, besides ferociously seeing off those ‘black dogs' that haunt any writer, trying to sabotage the very muse that actually does the writing. My oldest friend, Alan Trist, who I have recovered after so many years and who has edited my story and his. My siblings, for their lack of objections to the story – which I take as acceptance, besides correcting my dormant Welsh. For the kind and most professional editorial assistance from my nephew Dominic Wells and sister-in-law Ginnie Goff Greene. Besides encouragement from Jeannette Seaver (Arcade Publishing), Peter Blegvad, Mark Ellingham (Sort of Books), Richard Poole (for ‘helicopter parents'). And of course, Mick Felton (Seren) for providing this small tale of life in Wales with book form.

THE AUTHOR

Owain Hughes (born 1943) was educated at Shrewsbury School and Keble College, Oxford. All his life he has travelled world-wide, usually on the ground or by sea, rarely by air. He worked in Market Research for a Nationalised Steel Company in London, taught English in Iran, worked as electrician for a kinetic sculptor in Paris, then in Osaka, Japan. He wrote about North Africa, crossed Russia by train, scoured the whole of Latin America, sailed the European and East Coast American seas, both cruising and racing. Author of two novels, he now lives in New York and Mexico.

Well chosen words

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The author aged 3
left
; and with faithful dog, Iago,
below