As we all know, and we’ve all done at some point, we agree to things for love that we wouldn’t normally even consider. I say ‘agree’: I actually offered my services for free at John’s Tyres and Exhausts – yes, you have read it right. Me – working at a tyre depot.
I had decided to give up my Saturday morning dance classes to prove how much I wanted this; if my parents and family were prepared to make sacrifices, I knew I had to do the same. I would face this challenge full-on.
It was called John’s Tyres and Exhausts because it was my dad’s, John’s – well there were a couple of partners, I don’t really know, I was only a kid. When Dad accepted my offer, the enormity of what I had suggested to him hit me like a Louboutin over the head.
Shit!
You see, the thing is, I had never really spent much time with Dad. One, because he was always working and he just wasn’t the kind of dad who would take us swimming or playing football. Not that I wanted to play football! I was more than happy in my Lycra, thank you very much. And it wasn’t just with me, he was also like that with my sisters. It was just the kind of dad he was.
We never felt for a second unloved by him; he is, and was the kindest, funniest man you could wish to meet. Everyone seemed to fall in love with him because he could always crack a joke and make you smile. I suppose I get my sense of humour from him, but with a lot more camp.
The thought of having to spend a whole day with my dad – what was I going to talk about? At 12 I had already discovered masturbation and I knocked my first one out in the downstairs loo. But I didn’t really want to discuss that with him, especially when it was about Mr Whippy!
At that point I couldn’t have told you the difference between a remould tyre, a back box or whether your tracking needed doing. Not that I didn’t find out! I’ll give you my tyre and exhaust knowledge later on – I think you’ll be surprised.
I suppose what I’m trying to say, at 41 years old, is that I love my dad.
Even at the age of 12 I knew I was gay, and I was very comfortable with who I was. My family didn’t treat me any differently for being a high-kicking, backflipping, Lycra-wearing gay but there were certain situations when I felt uncomfortable with Dad. Now, I was never bullied – I was called poof, fairy, whatever, but it didn’t bother me in the slightest. The only time it would have bothered me is when I would have been with Dad.
I know that he would have wanted to protect me and would have stood up for me in such a situation, and I didn’t want him to be put in that situation because of me. Because it truly, truly did not bother me. I suppose that’s why, if there were situations that arose when Dad asked me to do something with him, I would always say no, just in case somebody did make a comment about me and my lisp, or my knowledge of women’s fashion and make-up. That’s only because Mum used to sell Oriflame, which was a brand of make-up. And I wouldn’t miss a Wednesday going down to the market with her, helping her choose a dress for a night out at the Windmill Club with the girls, in Copford, near Colchester.
So, how was I going to cope with a whole day down at the tyre depot, with mechanics in grease-stained overalls smelling of man sweat? Well, if you offered me the chance now, I’d be more than happy: I’d jump at it and fix a puncture.
Back then, I didn’t know if I would be able to cope with being a tea-boy and having to work in a filthy kitchen. I say kitchen, it was a piece of MDF and some dirty mugs, next to the toilet – I’m sure it wouldn’t pass Health and Safety these days. But I had offered my services for my love of dance and it had to be followed through, and so it was.
SATURDAY MORNING, 6.30 rise. Tea and toast with Dad. Now the day had only just started and already this felt awkward. We didn’t have much to talk about over tea and toast, and I had a whole day to get through, not only with Dad but with all the other men who worked at the tyre depot, one of them being Uncle Glen, who would constantly take the piss out of me.
I knew that none of them would be interested in the disco flip, or rib isolations; maybe a pelvic thrust would have been interesting. Women always tell me they like a man with a good pelvic thrust. But this wouldn’t do. Football? Shit, I didn’t have a clue. Page 3. There you go! That’s what I would do, I would concentrate on Page 3.
There we were in the car, it was only a 10-minute drive. Still nothing to talk about: I didn’t want to exhaust my Page 3 conversation with Dad, it had to get me through the morning with five of them.
Dad always arrived first because he would open up and as soon as the door was open, quicker than you could say ‘gay’, I had the marigolds on with my hands down the toilet, trying to scrub the brown-stained bowl. I just couldn’t help it, even though I’d told myself, ‘butch, butch, butch’ – it was just instinctive. Well, it’s not all my fault actually: I’m sorry, I was just following what Mum did. And yes, the mugs were being soaked in bleach and I’d nicked a bit of Shake’n’Vac from home, which I sprinkled on the carpet tiles on my way in.
Well, I was pleasantly surprised: all the boys were very happy to come in to a clean toilet, a fresh-smelling reception area with tiled surfaces shiny enough to reflect your face. They were more than happy to have someone with a feminine touch around them. And for me, I can look back on it as a really happy time bonding with my dad and not feeling uncomfortable with who I was around his work colleagues and friends. In fact, believe it or not, I really looked forward to Saturday mornings at the depot. I was promoted from tea-boy to puncture boy, but that didn’t mean that I used to get punched all day. When customers brought their punctured tyres in, I would take the tyres from them, ‘thank you very much, sir’. I would blow them up with the air gun and place it in the water butt, which was like a big paddling pool full of water. It was very dirty water: it didn’t get changed every day, so I always had my marigolds in my overall pocket. Yes, I was also wearing a pair of blue, grease-stained overalls at this point.
Obviously I would always work a look with it. I would have the top rolled down with the arms wrapped around twice, with the bow featuring on the side. At that age, I had a 23-inch waist.
While the tyre was in the water butt you had to check to see where the bubbles were coming from to indicate escaping air. Then you would take a piece of yellow chalk from your pocket and mark the spot with an X. Don’t ask me why it was yellow, but it was. You would then roll the tyre over to the breaking-down machine. I don’t know if that is the correct name for it, but you would remove the tyre from the wheel rim and see if it was repairable.
If it was repairable, you would put a rubber patch on it (after putting glue on), and get a roller and roll over the patch until it was sealed, put the tyre back on the wheel rim and hopefully, Bob’s your uncle, Fanny’s your aunt and it’s fixed. Now, if this didn’t work, you had a second option: you could just stick an inner tube in because a lot of tyres were tubeless, you see. Are you following me, or have I lost you with my immense knowledge of puncture repair?
I’m not going to bore you with tracking, or holes in your back box (you could just fill it up with a bit of gum or weld it). It would be cheaper than buying a new exhaust.
Surprised? Yes, I thought you would be. I did have my moments. But this was all for a reason, and the reason had arrived.
CRASH, BANG, wallop, there it was! On the porch floor, my letter from Italia Conti. Oh, before I get to that – yes, we had a porch. Not only did we have a porch, we had patio doors at the back: we were fully double-glazed with a picture window at the front, brick wall at the front and a wrought-iron gate.
There weren’t many houses like that on the Goldingham; this was part of the problem, you see. Pat and John, Mum and Dad, had bought their council house in 1978. Well, you can imagine Mum – as soon as she got a mortgage, not only did she have her tits done, which she thought we all didn’t notice when she came back from her ‘holiday’ in Billericay. For some reason she couldn’t lift her arms and she suddenly had tits. I mean, really, for someone who used to shop for all her dresses with her, I knew something had changed but I just went with it, I wasn’t about to kick up a fuss.
The