The Alexander Quartet

My father, Alexander, died thirty seven years ago today. Building on my blips on the three last anniversaries, I am sharing below a fourth piece that illustrates some aspects of his too short life, this time intertwining it with my own - the baton being passed. I couldn't resist calling them, collectively, 'The Alexander Quartet', given his Christian name, their number and my own connection over the years with Alexandria where Durrell set his own quartet. By the way, there's no intention to suggest that I write as well as Durrell, just that I have an aspiration to do so! Time will tell! Until then, I hope you enjoy this piece if you decide to read it.

So, this is for Dad, none finer.


The Diary

I stand alone at the front of the stage. Before me, eighty of my senior colleagues from around the world sit at tables set with mineral water and crinkly-wrapped sweets waiting for me to begin. I’ve been asked to talk about ‘purpose’.

A battery of lights nearly blinds me. Stand straight, don’t squint, I say to myself. My new shirt feels crisp despite the heat and I am wearing Dad's white chino trousers from the late forties. My right leg is trembling and I take a deep breath.

‘A couple of years ago, I found my late father’s diary for 1944. His name was Alex and he was serving in the Royal Army Service Corps.’ I take the diary out of my shirt pocket. It’s tiny, the colour of dried blood and has the brand name Charles Letts’s embossed in silver on the cover. It feels wrinkled and brittle as if it has been soaked and then dried out over the years.

‘In the frontispiece, he’s written “Entering my 21st year”, and, on the tenth of May’...if I can find it... “My 21st Birthday - shall I ever see it?”’ My voice catches slightly, and I pause as I look up. I can make out Adam English with whom I worked in France; Paula, from my time in Brazil; and Bob Donaghy, our Australian Chief Executive, among the many shadowy faces. Silence seems to billow from the back of the room.

‘The entries from January to March are accounts of training in the north of Scotland, with the odd exception.’ I read out Dad’s miniscule, copperplate handwriting:

‘Thursday 3rd February 1944
Excitement galore. Heard we’re
going on leave Friday. Hope so.
Will know tomorrow when
I get on that train.
Very Good Day. Still at Elgin.

He did go on leave, back to his home town of Paisley. The first thing he did after dropping his kit bag at home was to go for tea at Mrs Calderwood’s; her son Matt was in his platoon. That night he saw The More the Merrier starring Jean Arthur, at The Rex with his own father; he went to the cinema every day of his leave. And then on Monday 14th February 1944, St Valentine’s Day, he writes:

Got up to Glasgow at 9.30 to catch the
train after saying good-bye (sad).
Rotten Day. Leaving Paisley.

From the end of March there are no more entries in the diary; only page after page of silence - keeping a diary was prohibited in case of loss or capture. But he did write one more word.’

I turn the pages, past the empty months, until I reach 11th June 1944. ‘Here, on D-Day +5 at the beaches of Normandy.' I hold the page up. 'I've thought about this day so often that I feel I can see it all, beginning with his large American-built amphibious vehicle called a DUKW with its ribbed boat-like flanks, propeller sticking out the back and six huge road wheels being lowered into the sea from his ship. Then he pushes the throttle forward and the turbo diesel engine bellows into life easily coping with the fifty thousand pound load of oil drums, tank tracks and ammunition. Dad tastes the salt spray as he manoeuvres into formation with the others from his platoon whose vehicles are already launched. Sid from Swansea, one year younger and already engaged; Davie, the “Essex Boy” who is the most sensible of the lot; Len, the cheeky, 21 year old Liverpudlian; Willie, a genuine tight-fisted “Jock” from Dundee; Matt his best mate who would become his best man; and Johnnie, a sensitive lad from Glamorgan, who always looked drowned in his helmet.

Dad grins as they exchange 'A.O.K.' signs across the water; they've spent the whole of the last three years preparing for this moment; stripping down their DUKWs, greasing and oiling every part, reassembling them, being sick in the seas around the Scottish coast, counting and recounting their stores, and spending their 15 shillings a week on beer and cigarettes in the mess.

Three Hawker Typhoons scream overhead at 150 feet. Dad ducks instinctively, then, as he rounds the stern, tightens his grip on the wheel, his grin gone; as far as he can see there are cargo ships, warships and frigates lining the coast like a giant, granite necklace and a swarm of smaller craft plying to and from the shore. The beach is studded with both serviceable and wrecked vehicles, stacks of equipment, rusty steel defences with coils of barbed wire, discarded helmets and lines of men moving up to the escarpment. He smells cordite and burnt rubber.

Twenty yards from shore, he engages the wheels. He feels the familiar shudder, lurch and deep vibration as the tyres dig into the seabed. France! Remember this, he says to himself. His DUKW rises from the sea, dripping like a Noah’s Ark on wheels, and thunderously blasts diesel fumes skywards as he powers it up the beach.

That night, the hurricane lamp hisses in their tent. Sid is lying on his stomach reading a letter. Davie sits on the edge of his camp bed darning a sock. Len and Willie play cards. Johnnie smokes at the door flap. Matt lies on his back with his hands behind his head, staring at the tobacco-coloured canvas roof. Without turning his head, he says to Dad, ‘You know that’s not allowed.’
‘What?’
‘That!’
‘Och, away with you!’ Dad has his diary in his hands and pulls a pencil from the waxed cloth roll where he keeps his pay book and the photos of his mum and dad.

The others gather round, interested. The diary is open at 11th June.
‘Come on…just one word,’ he says, ‘…and don’t you go telling, Matt, or I’ll have your mother onto you!’ He pauses and looks round. ‘This is for us all.’ He licks the lead of the pencil and writes: “Landed”.

There is absolute silence. They look from one to another with wide, unblinking eyes. Sid nods almost imperceptibly. A smile spreads across Johnnie’s face. Len presses his lips tightly together. Dad opens the inside back cover of the diary and offers it to Sid along with the pencil. Sid takes them both, and solemnly signs “Sydney Goss”, before passing it to Len who writes “ L. O’Brien” with an underscore. It’s passed round the circle; all sign.

‘Thanks, boys.”, says Dad. Then he closes the diary and holds it for a moment before slipping it into his breast pocket. He lies back on his bed and within a minute is asleep, still wearing his fatigues and boots.'

I stare down at that word ‘Landed’ in the diary and then look out again to my audience. ‘There is no single written word of which I am more proud.’ I feel a tremble deep inside me. ‘My father went on to marry, raise three children and own a butcher’s business in a country village including a travelling shop in which he visited the surrounding farms bringing news and his irrepressible good humour wherever he went. He sang whenever he could in a perfectly pitched baritone, took home movies, wrote loving letters to his wife and insisted against convention that I, as a nine year old boy, partner him on every round of golf he played in the early morning at Brodick golf course with the men only gallery looking on. In the few years that I shared with him before he died prematurely, he talked of how the camaraderie and shared purpose of his platoon helped them achieve so much in those war days; more than they had ever thought possible, so desperately keen were they to preserve the life they loved and return home safely to develop and enjoy it even more.’

I look down and shrug my shoulders, taking two steps to the left. ‘Now, you may be wondering why I’m telling you all this. What’s it got to do with us today?’ I look out again. ‘Well, here’s the thing I want to leave you with.…my standing here, right now, talking about these things, in this way, using these words and expressions…well, it’s not my Dad’s story…it’s my story.’

I am aware that my toes are over the edge of the stage. The lights seem to have dimmed. I see Bob Donaghy nodding. ‘It’s an expression of my life’s purpose, …it’s all about the abundant expression of self… triumphing over adversity...inspiring others to explore and create. In short, it is “everyone grasping life’s fullest opportunity.”’

It hangs in the air. ‘And I am one with it. When my purpose is present in my conversations, then opportunity always opens up, for me and for others. That, I can tell you, makes me very happy…very grateful.’

My leg has stopped shaking. I feel calm, at peace. I slowly close the diary and slip it into my breast pocket. I wonder, just for a second, what Dad and his mates would think, before I continue.



The Alexander Quartet Links:

1. Govan Road
2. Bless 'Em All
3. The Travelling Shop
4. The Diary

Copyright in the above and linked to material is asserted by the physical person who owns the Blipfoto.com journal 'Around the Block' with username 'Barrioboy'.

Published, as always, at 3.30pm UK time.

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