h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

Today is M for Midlands

I was born in Leicester, which apparently makes me a woollyback (from the sheeprearing and woolmaking traditions of the area). But I don't remember Leicester, because we moved to Birmingham when I was one. The story goes that my parents went looking at the house on a Sunday and, only when they moved in, did they realise it was close to the Longbridge car plant! I don't remember Birmingham either, because we moved to Rugby when I was four.

I remember arriving at our house in Rugby. It was raining, the house was new and undecorated, and our belongings were late arriving. So we sat in our plastic macs drinking tea from a thermos while we waited for the removal van. While we were in Rugby, my father built a boat in the garage, which was a bit too short, so he added a small extension.

I used to walk across a field to the primary school nearby. It was a recent school, but the attitudes of the staff were very strict. They valued neat handwriting highly, and made us do dictation exercises which were judged not just on spelling but also on handwriting. I once got a minus mark! They also compelled us to eat our school dinners. One girl failed to eat hers and was made to stand at the back of the class looking at her plate for the rest of the afternoon. Her parents complained, because she wasn't well.

Do I count myself a Midlander? Not really, because we moved again - to South London this time and I spent the rest of my youth there. I don't count mself a Londoner either, but I have to admit to being thoroughly English!

You certainly moved around plenty!

I spent my first 10 years in Deal, Kent (apart from a year in Plymouth when I was about 3) then I lived in Orkney for the next 10 years, then Hertfordshire, then London, now Cannock. I've been here 19 years (which is the longest I've lived in any one area) and have spent most of that time working in first Birmingham and then Halesowen, so I consider myself to be "almost a Midlander".

Deb

From my birth to the age of fifteen, the family lived in eleven different houses, sometimes in different areas, sometimes no more than the next street or three away. I think it was because my Dad was always one step ahead of the bailiffs.

I do have a very vivid memory of the entire family, carrying all our wordly possessions, running across a field in the middle of the night.

Not that I have ever mentioned this to my brain care specialist. The amount she charges, she can work for it.

That's an amazing memory pebbledrook.
Apparently, we move house on average 8 times in a lifetime, often ending up where we began.

The thought of moving hosue again makes me shudder, even though I'd love to be beside the sea.

My parents are threateneing to sell their house - it's a terraced house with too many steep stairs for them. I'm trying to think positive about potentially finding a valuable cigarette card album in the attic....

I used to work for a family business, and the family had lived in the same house since about 1700 and small change. They were the sort of people who never threw anything away, they just stuffed it in the attic.

Good luck with the cigarette cards Beatrice, and watch for the small watercolour that visiting Frenchman knocked off for them.

I hate to think of moving from our present house in Sussex, because there's so much junk.

wibble.

[Amy P]