A compulsive liar, thief and a born fantasist!

By Stanley Collymore

You came into the world on 1^st February 1958; an inauspicious

birth among one of three to a perennial drunken father and

a similarly inebriate mother who would subsequently

tragically die of cirrhosis of the liver. School, or

more importantly your attendance there, was

consequently and unsurprisingly given the particular family

circumstances that from your earliest childhood existence

you found yourself habitually growing up in, was never

ever going to be a requisite necessity much less so a

crucial priority either for your parents or you to

give any acknowledgement to, so apparently

and rather predictably, you were neither

encouraged by your parents nor from

your own perspective, assuming of

course you even knew what that

word meant, saw any pressing

need to attend; so naturally

you happily grasped that

consensual opinion to

heart and evidently

you rarely went.

Predictably from the very start of your puberty the

seemingly enticing sexual world of adulthood,

initially and curiously exposed by you then

soon afterwards keenly accommodated

on your part, rapidly ensnared your

passions and at sixteen and with

parental permission – clearly

from their point of view

one less mouth to feed and from yours the

desperate aspiration of finally escaping

a controlling and still consistently

inebriated woman as a mother

and an often drunk himself

but even so submissive

husband of hers as your biological father, and

when one added to this you going absolutely

nowhere either in social developmental or

even protected employment terms while

ongoingly as you saw it and possibly

forever so entrenched in a working

class area terraced council house

and what moreover was a demonstrably

dysfunctional and also noticeably a

debilitatingly oppressive home –

my reflection on the situation

not your own – you simply

got married! For having

queried the uncertain

wisdom of politely

putting up with more of the same

that you already had or actually

leaving home altogether your

responsive decision was

basically to earnestly

choose the latter

of these two

options.

An alternative arrived at more from the impulse

triggered by the desperation of your personal

situation rather than any motivation of real

love for the man who you married, since

as you well knew when you decided to

get involved with him that like your

father and mother, even though he

had the skilled knack of readily

turning the charm on at any

time that it suited him, he also was a heavy

drinker and quite discernible to someone

like you who had grown up in a house-

hold of drunkards an unmistakably in

denial alcoholic; yet quite bizarrely

you carried on your relationship

with your then lover, married

him and astonishingly and

of your own free volition

sedulously protected

him by maintaining

your firm silence

concerning his

intensive and

financially

crippling

drinking

habits.

But worse was to come for as with your mother drink

only brought out the worst in your husband and

with his obsessive jealousy that any man who

spoke to you no matter where or however

trivially so, or even glanced admiringly

at you either fancied you or you him

and therefore beating the hell out

of you when you got home was

an appropriate solution and

additionally a necessary deterrent to stopping you

being attractive, if not physically at least then

psychologically, to any man, your specific

experiment of leaving the family home

for one of your own clearly wasn’t

paying off as you’d hoped and

had even become more of a

terrible problem for you.

For in the interim you had become a mother

thrice over: giving birth to two girls: Cathy

and Tracey and the boy child that rather

fixatedly your husband always wanted.

But even the significance of being a

mother couldn’t or didn’t alleviate

your parlous situation; for your

son tragically died as a baby –

a random cot death incident;

however with his passing

blamed firmly on you by

his enraged father your

husband’s hedonistic

binge drinking and

periodic beatings

of you suddenly

became nastier

and a lot more

unpleasant in

their cruelty.

About this time you finally saw sense and considered having

a divorce, itself made easier by the fact that your husband

John seemingly wanted to get out of your marriage too.

He’d in the meantime got himself a mistress who

evidently craved much more than just being his

bit on the side and in addition to that for him

the irksome problem of all the accumulated

HP debts that you and he had jointly run

up coupled with child support for his

two daughters and maintenance for you who wasn’t working

didn’t the least bit rank favourably with what he generally

considered to be a worthwhile or profitable way for him

to be living, so he willingly consented to your starting

divorce proceedings against him, knowing full well

that by the time they in essence got underway he

and his girlfriend, who apparently came from

the north of England, would long and quite

permanently have departed from the area

of your marital residence that consisted

of the absolutely charming and rather

pleasant Berkshire town of Reading;

making it quite unfeasible with his

whereabouts distinctly unknown

for him to be logically pursued

by the courts in any resolute

fashion for either for child

support God forbid his ex

wife’s maintenance that

he had no intention at

all of ever of paying.

There are all sorts of mysterious reasons that baffle

questioning minds as to why completely out of

the blue things suddenly happen, and your

accidentally meeting at a local bus stop

Pauline, on account of a late bus that

on its ultimate arrival would then

take both of you into Reading’s

town centre where somewhat

coincidentally the two of you were independently

heading, an unfamiliar man that as it happened

lived just one hundred yards distance from

where your home was but who previously

you hadn’t met, were unknown to each

other and accordingly were what you

would call archetypal strangers but

all the same following that chance

meeting between the two of you

would fatefully, spectacularly

and markedly constructively in every possible

way change for the infinite better not only

your patently muddled life Pauline and

your gloomy outlook on it but equally

the lives, potential and expectations

of both your daughters: eight and

four years old then, and which

providentially for all three of

you would turn out to be

unquestionably one of

life’s truly amazing

and unsurprisingly

so unfathomable

and distinctly

mystifying

omens!

Happily too for you the man you met that day Pauline

and whom you got talking to afterwards on that late

bus on your shared and reciprocally pleasurable

journey towards Reading’s town centre was

by any criterion which you could possibly

have devised a very exceptional person.

Clearly a local himself he was deeply

involved in a local community and

communal extracurricular education

programme that he’d altruistically, voluntarily

and solely devised and besides was himself

the coordinator of and that was expressly

tailored for and perceptibly directed at

educationally deprived members of

all ages over eleven years within

Reading’s broader community

devoid of the benefit of any

significant education or else if they were still

of lawful school age had found themselves

discriminatorily and immediately kicked

out of their learning establishment on

the basis of rather specious reasons

for not having them there, and as

assuredly as hell in those very

prescriptive circumstances

never ever likely to get

any sort of education

much less so minus

a determined and

committed try a

practical one!

However, with amorous intentions noticeably on your part

Pauline and quite obviously resulting from this chance

encounter that you had with this stranger focusing

intently in your head while simultaneously and

calculatedly encouraged by your similarly

actively cultivated, and themselves even

having a degree of urgency all their

own about them, expectations that

quite rapidly and unimpeded coursed through

your highly stimulated veins; a passionate

assignation, more so than any uplifting

educational agenda operating as the

principal motivation behind your

eager desire for pursuing this

brand new and exploratory

relationship, became your

superseding focus and

single-minded remit.

A promising association, as you very much saw it,

quite manifestly in the physical mode and itself

largely uninhibitedly complemented by - and

as you plainly and grievously felt in your

ambitious and overtly outlined personal

circumstances an exceptionally cruel

and wholly gratuitous sex-starved,

emotionally unsatisfied and, as

well, a marital, sexually-constrained and completely

insufferable situation –full-blooded, extravagantly

indulged in and consummately unrestrained acts

of truly licentious coitus. And having as agreed

met up later on in Reading’s town centre after

your personal business there was out of the

way you amicably had coffee together in

one of the local restaurants – you said

you weren’t hungry so no need then

for you to be fed – freely swapped

phone numbers with each other

and amidst the cheerful chatter

expectantly waited while the

stage was set for the next

chapter of this evidently

unforeseen but, all the

same, gripping and

fascinating saga.

Later that night you phoned your new friend, explained

that the children were soundly tucked up in bed and

therefore you were all alone; thus categorically

through what you intentionally said during

that specific conversation coupled with

the explicit and accompanying well-

rehearsed and quite purposeful,

coquettishly enticed invitation that you proffered and

which was instantly and likewise decidedly taken

up and satisfactorily signalling that both of you

were fervently conducive to the impending

chance of fucking each other, decisively

conferred the green light on the 1 July

1984 for the first sexual encounter

ever within the confines of your

marital home between you and

the man you’d intentionally

and somewhat deviously

as pivotal events would

later show assigned to

be your latest lover.

And in contrast and most profound in every way Pauline

was the positive contribution that this new man you’d

taken into your life brought not only into your own

but also and distinctly so the separate and joint

lives of your two children. Taking both girls,

after careful consideration for their future,

out of the sink school close to their home

that they were unsurprisingly expectedly

in, he constructively spoke to the then

incumbent Headmaster and an ingenious acquaintance

of his and had them both transferred from where they

were being “schooled” for their envisaged devalued

function in life to the absolutely first-rate English

Martyrs Catholic Primary School with its truly

exceptional teaching background, and from

where Cathy: the senior of the two girls,

would subsequently by virtue of adept preparation

at English Martyrs and her passing the requisite

entrance exams be promptly registered at and

become a highly gifted pupil of the all girl,

well-renowned and justifiably esteemed

Kendrick School in Reading. A very

apparent improbable prospect had

she and Tracey been obliged to

remain at the primary school

where previous to them

relocating to English

Martyrs they had

formerly been.

Furthermore, this thoroughly engaging man in your life

Pauline had at the voluntary and consistent request

of both your daughters, since their biological

father had long ceased to play any role

either meaningfully or financially

in their two young lives, been

asked to become their Dad

and following detailed discussions that were had

individually with them and collectively with

all three of you Pauline in favour of this

particular outcome willingly acceded

to do so. A terrifically gratifying

realization for him since in his

now constant dealings with

Cathy and Tracey, a direct consequence of his

steady and developing relationship with you

their mother, his feelings for and his every

day reactions with them had ever more

taken on a purposely and very much

appreciated and embraced by the

girls fatherly aspect; so in the

inclusive scheme of things

he fully understood the

girls’ filial sentiments

to which he fittingly

and accordingly

conferred the

maximum

respect.

A situation none the less that long before this collective

decision, which relative to them formally assuming

their new dad’s name for themselves had either

been consensually arrived at or agreed upon,

both girls had outmanoeuvred and also pre-

empted as was acknowledged by yourself

Pauline. For Cathy and Tracey had of

their own free volition unilaterally

and determinedly taken their new dad’s surname

anyway, which they then routinely applied to

all their schoolwork that in turn prompted

their teachers and the school’s admin –

as the surname they were using didn’t

match the official one in their class

register or the school’s records –

to politely request individually of the girls, you

Pauline and their new father too what really

was going on? Then fully satisfied after

their detailed investigation that it was

all initially the children’s very own

idea and purposive wish to be so

named and that no coercion or

unwarranted dominance of

them was involved at any

time in Cathy or Tracey’s

independent decision,

uninterruptedly and

officially this time,

let this definitive

action by their

pupils’ own

assertion to

jubilantly

carry on.

However, there was an unseen fly in the ointment. The

children’s new dad had with their explicit blessing,

that of their biological father, who he’d earnestly,

secretly and successfully tracked down but only

for this one specific purpose alone as no one

within the family honestly wanted anything

further to do with him, and your express

authorization too Pauline as your new

man’s locally accepted and generally acknowledged

involved relationship partner, faithfully wanted to

legally adopt the girls, drastically assuage and

finally heal the sense of estrangement that

they were agonizingly experiencing at

being in limbo over the constancy of

having a biological father who’d

callously abandoned them and

didn’t care, and a surrogate one: immensely

responsible, marvellously understanding

and always there for them but whose

personal rights regarding them as a

father weren’t just an unspecified

matter but lawfully as well were

disturbingly unclear; and thus

in what through this altruistic

measure he was assiduously

trying to do was genuinely

and amiably balance the

progressive state of the

link, which apparently

existed between him

as your decided on

loving companion

Pauline and you.

For everyone who knew of it, including the outstanding

and tremendously conscientious, local Labour Party

councillor for your area, Jo Lovelock to whom not

only your family but also its circumstances were

especially well known, and who I see is now in

2016 not only the leader of her party locally

but also that of Reading Borough Council

while continuing unsurprisingly to serve

the electorate she represents and the general public

too in the selfsame committed and conscionable

manner she has always done and in that regard

alone causes me to truly believe that she is

intensely blessed to have been fashioned

in the same unparalleled mould as her

national Labour Party Leader Jeremy

Corbyn, all readily and with sound

justification Pauline congenially

concluded and encouragingly

commented on the genuine

attachment which they’d

perceptibly and equally

receptively discerned

and that intuitively

was transparently

present between

your daughters,

their dad, and

your partner.

Life being what it is in Britain it seldom means that

what’s being sensibly desired or even necessarily

required will always be allowed to happen. So

conscientiously and responsibly as was his

nature and in the given situation that you

were all in relative to the prospective

and important realization of your

daughters’ adoption by him, your partner with

a studied conviction that was pragmatically

conceived undertook to fully discuss the

issue in hand of your daughters hopeful

adoption with a highly recommended

and, as it conveniently happened,

local firm of solicitors whose

particular specialization

was family matters.

However, the outcome of his in-depth discussion

with them ended up leaving him in no doubt

whatsoever and also devastated that his

ambition to adopt Cathy and Tracey

would be vigorously thwarted by

the court system that was

further compounded by

a general, profoundly

entrenched and a distinctly racially motivated

mindset held by the magistrates and judges

within the exclusively white run courts

operation that having non-white and

especially Black fathers, or even

mothers of colour, adopting

white children wasn’t for

them an ideal prospect

in any circumstance, however emotionally or

suitably attached these children and their

likely substitute parents were to each

other, and bearing in mind also the

marked negative connotations in

relation to the social fabric and

constructive cohesion of the

United Kingdom. So rather

than fighting a battle that in all possibility

couldn’t absolutely be won, if at all, it

would instead be much more rational

and to circumvent all distressing or

unwarranted anguish on the part

of your daughters and yourself

Pauline to knock that precise

aspiration of adopting your

children decisively on the

head; that after key talks

with Cathy, Tracey and

you, your partner quite

plausibly, regrettably,

But thoughtfully did.

But life has to go on and this harshly impeded

expectation cruelly suffered by the children,

disappointing though it was for them, only

served to reinforce the already intense

bond which freely and unreservedly

existed between your partner and

daughters that largely owing to

their sterling and impressive

resilience quickly and admirably bounced back

from their own enforced disappointment and

courageously embarked on the challenging

but resourceful task of optimistically and

confidently moving on in the interim

with their youthful lives under the

comprehensively guiding, and

correspondingly subliminal,

influential motivation, in

relation to their mutual

and daily interactions,

inspired in them by

your partner, their

obvious mentor,

and the person

they joyfully

prized and

absolutely

cheerfully

declared

as their

ONLY

father!

Motivated both by their father and also from within this

twin-pronged assertive stance taken by Cathy and

Tracey also began to reap other constructive

dividends and not least so as regards their

mother Pauline. Previously not having

throughout her life, and it was the

same for the girls too, set foot outside her hometown

Reading far less so the county of Berkshire that

Reading is located within, now and thanks

solely to her partner foreign paid for and

additionally lengthy vacations spent

in previously unaffordable and

not used to holiday destinations in far away

places cloaked in all year round tropical

sunshine routinely in virtually every

way for Pauline and her children,

and very much so through the

courtesy and generosity of

her partner and the girls’

father, became the

order of the day.

And it was the same from Pauline’s educational perspective.

For having initially and resolutely declined her partner’s

casual but all the same purposeful suggestion that she

might care to get involved in the extra-curricular

educational project he had locally initiated,

vigorously championed throughout its

continuation and was transparently

efficiently running, and besides

with both Cathy and Tracey

progressing by leaps and

bounds educationally and in other respects to

boot at their new school, Pauline not at all

desirous of being left behind began to

think there might be some valuable

benefit after all in her acquiring

a bona fide education too; and

having for the first time and

of her own volition raised the matter

of improving her education with

her partner’s assistance, as a

result of her deciding that

was what she actually

wanted to do keenly

revised her earlier

decision and, by

doing so, also

changed her

own mind.

Thrilled, very impressed and immensely encouraged all

the more by her straightforward decision relative her

positively upgrading her education, which in the

interim her partner had propitiously but also

guardedly out of his genuine concern not

to inadvertently give her the distinctly

mistaken notion that he was craftily

putting any coercion on her to get

the requisite decision which he

wanted and consequently to preclude that, even

after her previous and resolute refusal to be

educationally implicated in what he was

doing had secretly got in touch with a

number of progressive and standard

universities on her behalf, rather

eloquently outlined to them her

particular circumstances and

considerable potential, the

project he was involved

in, and confidently outlined too that he

could create a worthy student of her

if any of them had a mind to have

her; and in response delightedly

had received from all of them

their explicit agreement that

were he in turn to deliver

on what he’d promised,

all of them would be

ready to accept you

Pauline on to an

honours degree

element as an

adult student.

A year of devoted, intensive and comprehensive

tutoring of you then Pauline by your partner

coupled with a reciprocal appreciation of

and your own commitment to what he

was conscientiously doing gainfully

saw you through this demanding

but all the same commendable

endeavour you had willingly embarked upon,

and following the conclusion of the formal

UCAS clearing house procedure that all

prospective university students must

officially go through the aforesaid

universities which your partner

had formerly contacted plus

a couple more of them had

individually and officially

proffered you a place at

their establishment to

begin the instigation

of your undeniably

life transforming

undergraduate

Uni-training.

But this social and quite promising upliftment on your part

Pauline wasn’t without its unwarranted and deprecatory

impediments, with your father for one openly damning

what you’d done and making it absolutely clear that

no way should you be going to university; since as

far as he was concerned a woman’s place was in

the home permanently caring for her husband and children,

and with your pie in the sky and attendant irresponsible

notions about achieving an education it was hardly

surprising then that your former husband – your

divorce by then had officially gone through –

had left you for another woman. While in

the meantime your neighbours on the

council estate where you lived quite

cruelly ridiculed your university

aspirations, considering them

from their own constrained

and a discernible lack of

their self-progression

aspirations as you

vainly essaying

to be socially

above your

particular

station.

Even the bailiff who thankfully it did appear hadn’t a clue

regarding your impending university commencement

else in all probability he would have got those who

were employing him to sequester what meagre

assets you had together with your university

student’s grant – this by the way was the

epoch long before students’ loans were

ever conceived let alone inaugurated – to pay off some

at least of the enormous HP debts that you and your

former husband had quite improvidently run up,

sporadically kept on calling at your house as

was his stipulated remit no doubt although

realistically expecting nowt financially

from you, as he evidently and rather

injudiciously still thought that you

were still on DHS remittances as

your solitary redoubt following

your husband’s abandonment

of you and the children; and

which was something that

neither you Pauline nor

your partner were the

least predisposed to

apprise him about!

Reading University just three miles distance from where

you then lived Pauline readily accepted you for a place

there but you politely turned down their offer after

clarifying to your partner that you didn’t want to

give your detractors further ammunition, as it

were, to fire in your direction as an apparent

to them social turncoat with affected ideas

socially that in their eyes were manifestly

above your station and commensurately

theirs too as it happened. Since several of them likewise

single parent moms from the same council estate or

neighbouring ones were longstanding recipients

completely on social security benefits of one

kind or another that some of them covertly,

and often out of necessity, supplemented

with black market activities and hence

didn’t want you being pointed to by

the snoops of the Social Security

Department as some kind of a role model which they

could all emulate while personally viewing them

negatively. And for these basically convoluted

reasons and also because you still had to live

among these people Pauline you shrewdly

steered clear of moving to the university

in your hometown Reading and chose

in its place to be an undergrad at the

City of London University where,

on a regular basis, you wouldn’t

be so visibly in their faces, as it

were, but generally speaking

would be diplomatically in

the given and worrisome

circumstances, be truly

and consequently less

provocatively, it was

clear, in their way!

However it was an agreed decision that meant your partner

would now be primarily responsible for looking after the

children’s welfare for example: getting them up in the

morning, preparing their breakfast – no need for any

packed lunches as they had their midday meals at

school – meticulously but jovially supervising

their preparation for school, after that taking

them there and naturally fetching them for

their return journey home when their school day was

over; and in this overall process fulfilling every

other expedient role in between that a loving

and caring father instinctively, to the best

of his ability, with the utmost sincerity

that he’s humanly capable, and also

as someone who is always there

and as a result intuitively does

for every dependent charge

that rewardingly for him

rests within the ambit

of his devoted care.

And in the midst of all this you were neither overlooked

nor ever forgotten Pauline; for while making sure that

undisturbed you unfailingly had the maximum time

possible allotted for your university studies your

partner additionally, willingly offered, agreed,

and with your receptive backing undertook

to assist you in every way that he could

academically and supportively, and

from then on painstakingly and most diligently efficiently

carried on helping out with your studies. Then to amply

assist this accommodating strategy and process time-

wise and also in terms of any required adjustment

contingent on your daily travelling to and from

London positively and practically made sure

that on your return home, and in the most

favourably relaxing circumstances and

approving environment manageable,

that a suitably cooked, nutritional

and appetizing meal was always

ready and waiting for you on

the table, and appropriately

as well that there were no

household odd jobs still

pending and logically

waiting to be done.

A splendid option all round and made possible by your

partner’s welcomed innovations: like him for example

moving in with you and the children although he’d

rather judiciously decided to still keep his own

place; a situation which per the Department

of Health and Social Security’s rules in

situ would not only have specifically

forbidden him from cohabiting with you in your home

in view of your status as a recipient of social security

benefits but also negatively and very significantly

too affect your social security payments if these

said regulations were knowingly to the DHS

contravened. However with your changed

social and economic statuses now those

of a full-time student at university and

furthermore in receipt of a statutory Local Education

Authority grant this transformed situation on your

part of you no longer a “National State Benefit

Recipient Employee” Pauline, that decisively

established DHS constraining and besides

all-encompassing prohibition predictably,

understandably, most welcomingly and

now rationally; no longer, neither for

you Pauline nor your partner, had

any officially permitted or come

to that restricted authorization.

But just as leopards never change their spots with

some human beings, and you’re sadly one of

them Pauline, old habits die hard; and with

your partner now living almost full time

with you and the children unspecified

and vigilantly concealed incidents,

shall we say, willing occasioned

by you Pauline and that before

and understandably didn’t register with your

partner because you made absolutely sure

they were out of the way, entirely under

the radar of his intimate observation or

else given that you knew impeccably

well that trusting you as he plainly

did he wouldn’t be acting in any

distrustful fashion by looking

out for them, as quite simply

he wasn’t the sort of person to do anything

like that with no sound reason, none the

less gradually and puzzlingly for him

and particularly ill-starred for you

unanticipated things now began

to sink into his consciousness.

Which however you wilfully and rather

duplicitously in your deftly construed

Siren scenario to his conspicuously

involuntary Jasonesque situation

did everything in your power

in these totally unexpected

and potentially damaging

circumstances for your

relationship, to ensure

that this likely threat

to it, and especially

from the viewpoint

of the girls you’d

extremely bewail,

would not attain

any real chance

to ever prevail.

© Stanley V. Collymore

1 February 2016.

Author’s Remarks:

This poem and its associated articles were conceived and written in January 2016 for publication on the 1 February 2016 but were subsequently deliberately withheld by me for a number of salient reasons that really don’t concern you but were and still are important to me. And both the poem and its accompanying articles, now published a year later and fittingly on the 1^st February 2017, are specifically dedicated to Pauline Cassidy and her accomplices.

Usually I comment on the poems and other literary work I write and publish. I shan’t this time however, as some things are beyond the pale and I most certainly do not only have my red lines over which I shan’t under any circumstance gratuitously or otherwise cross – and frankly have never done so in the past – but also similarly and quite significantly I neither appreciate nor would I contemplate for a solitary moment living in the sewers of perceptible degeneracy which considerable numbers of other people seemingly and thoroughly enjoy experiencing and even relish in permanently doing! But you, whether you willingly choose to or not and totally with my utmost indifference, are completely at liberty to either dismissively ignore or else form your own opinion on that matter; and that too is of no significance to me.

For in this specific case I’m just the chronicler of this poem and these accompanying articles, fully cognizant of all the pertinent facts, and consequently am not the arbiter of your personal judgement; a position I’ve no aspirant desire of undertaking or any intention whatsoever of ever aspiring to becoming.