Just as it was for the funeral directors who did this stuff day in, day out, and even the priests who, at times, sounded like they were reading out a shopping list as opposed to the recently deceased’s best qualities, death – or at least the spiritual task of delivering some poor soul unto the hands of their beloved maker – was run-of-the-mill stuff to us. It was a job!
And like any job you had to find the fun in it, whilst still projecting a sense of public dignity for those genuine mourners ‘… gathered here amongst us’. Flashing the reflected sunlight off the big cross we held was a favourite. If you were bold, you might then swish it briefly across the priest’s eyes as he was reading, but Simon was a bugger for highlighting the priest’s genitals – shining a light on his unholy of holys, and it never failed to get me giggling.
Dimon was the grand master of subtle mischief and could set me off so easily. Too much incense on the charcoal was his favourite: the altar would end up looking more like Top of the Pops. And you could sense he was smiling, even when looking straight ahead.
Remember that worst case of giggles you ever had as a kid? Someone sets you off and the severity of the situation just makes it worse, and makes the laugh even harder the more you try to bury it? Imagine that when you’re working the funeral of someone with a grieving family who’s hard as bloody nails, and you know you’ve caught the eye of a nutter sitting at the end of the front bench ...
If Dimon set me off, I’d have no option but to focus on my feet, hold my eyes open as long as possible without blinking till they’d water, and, whilst working the sniggering shudder in my shoulders into the routine as respectful sobbing, hold my head up at just the right moment to let the light catch a false tear running down my cheek in profile. Let me tell you, the young Ricky Schroder bawling his eyes out at the end of The Champ? That kid had nothing on me!
‘It feels forced, Ricky daaahling. Remember, keep it minimal, less is more!’
It sounds utterly disrespectful I know, but messing around with your back to the congregation, I reckon, actually gave me enough guilt to achieve genuine sorrow throughout the final procession out of church. And then a quick sniff of the altar wine to take the edge off the agonising wait to see if the funeral director had any tips to pass on courtesy of the grieving family. I wasn’t on pocket money like some other kids my age, so £1 or £2 was a small fortune.
There were also the rare days when you got a free pass to piss yourself laughing. Like when the priest dropped the burning charcoal on the new altar carpet, and tried, in a blind panic, to pick it up with his bare hands. It was definitely swearing, but edited like you’d see in an in-flight movie. He started off unintentionally shouting but managed to swallow the end of each curse, kind of like a stroke victim with Tourette’s: ‘FUrrrgh, SHIheeaah, WANhugh!’
The inappropriate fun we had might possibly have helped blindside me to the extent of the commitment required from anyone genuinely wanting to enter into the priesthood. The sacrifices required simply didn’t seem all that daunting at the time.
I remember my dad taking me aside after I’d yet again announced I was going to be a priest and saying, ‘Are you serious about the priesthood – about following your vocation?’ I had no idea what a vocation was. To be honest, I was probably as serious as I’d been about joining the Rebel Alliance after seeing Star Wars. In fact, I remember thinking Jedi Knights were basically kick-ass priests, but with swords. With a typical 10-year-old’s disregard for the implications of my answer I simply said, ‘Yes’ and gave no more thought to the wheels that simple little word had set in motion.
My decision to go into the seminary was certainly tough on my family. I knew money was tight, but I now realise the boarding fees must have been a massive burden on my mum and dad. The diocese used to decide what they thought families could afford and, as a result, my parents had to fork out for this endless list of school-sanctioned uniforms and assorted gym kits, which just about bankrupted them.
Family knitted what we couldn’t afford. As a result, I would be permanently posted to the outfield during cricket in case my jumper brought shame on the school. My mum said she’d never spent so much in one shop – not to make me feel guilty, you understand: we just didn’t do sprees in our house. My parents never said, ‘Do you know what this is costing?’ But I had a dawning awareness that they were making huge financial sacrifices, as well as some emotional ones I knew nothing about.
I’d find out later that my mum desperately didn’t want me to go. She said nothing at the time, though – she wanted to support me and kept her fears well hidden, but I suspect that they ran deeper than the normal mothering instincts. I believe she was concerned about the potential for abuse at the seminary. Years earlier, she hadn’t let me join the Cubs because apparently the then troop leader had instructed some boys that in order to get one badge, they had to run around the Scout hut in their undies!
Because I came from a family of practising Catholics, I think a lot of people thought my parents were living vicariously through me, that I was unwittingly fulfilling their dreams by going to the seminary. I know my dad was proud of me and what he thought might be my chosen path in life, but beyond that, other peoples’ criticisms couldn’t have been further from the truth.
The material necessities took a bit of sorting out, but otherwise at home – when I think back – there was almost a unilateral denial that the big day was coming. If anything, it was the parish as a whole that made me feel like I was torch-bearer for their collective ambitions in the build-up to my imminent departure. I remember a dinner lady at my junior school taking me to one side and looking at me with this odd expression of reverence. I thought for a moment she was going to burst into tears. Then she said to me, very earnestly, ‘What you’re doing is a wonderful thing. You know that, don’t you?’ All I can remember thinking is, ‘Well, this is awkward,’ because I didn’t understand what all the fuss was about.
At heart I remained pretty carefree – like most 10-year-old boys – as to me, the prospect of this new school I’d be going to was all just a bit of fun. But when an ordinarily stand-offish dinner lady hugs you like that, you can be forgiven for thinking she knows something you don’t. She made me feel more like a terminally sick kid being given one last treat: ‘Am I ill? Why have you bought me a baseball cap? Why do all the adults keep hugging me?’
When I visited the seminary for my entrance exams/orientation day, the place looked positively idyllic. Near Wigan as it was, it had lakes for canoeing and fishing, two tennis courts, even its own nine-hole golf course! Upholland resembled a posh Butlin’s, but with priests instead of Redcoats; in fact, I was a little disappointed not to see a mono-rail running around the grounds it felt so like going on holiday.
My older brother Mark had become very protective, and spoke his mind about his misgivings in my build-up to leaving. He was worried that I didn’t entirely know what I was getting myself into – and God, he was right. A month earlier, he’d taken me on to the back field by Hankey’s Well and said, ‘You know where you’re going, there’s no sex and no booze, don’t you? It ain’t fuckin’ worth it, if you ask me.’
I’d just shrugged. It was the first time this marvellous decision of mine had been directly challenged. ‘Well, if you are gonna do it, you’re gonna need a vice.’ He’d taken out one of his Benson & Hedges, sparked it up and passed it to me. Teenage boys don’t tend to be big on sharing, whether it’s their B&H or their feelings. Offering me my first full cig, as inappropriate as it might seem, was the nicotine hug he was incapable of giving me himself, and it felt like a monumental gesture at the time.
UPHOLLAND FIRST YEAR: ‘UNDERLOW’
It’s hard to do justice to just how frightening and real it felt that evening I was taken to Upholland to begin