Somerstown

Another day, another quiz. Yesterday’s was in the City and tonight’s was in Kings Cross in that curious district called Somerstown which runs for a few blocks north of the major railway terminuses. It’s traditionally quite a Bengali area and it’s extremely deprived: a stark contrast to the opulence of the British Library and the newly renovated St Pancras, which surely has to be one of the world’s most stunning railway stations.

I once worked in a primary school situated in the concrete jungle of Somerstown. It was a charming little school and I used to go in and teach music whenever there was a tiny bit of extra budget which wasn’t being spent on classroom assistants with the languages required to teach a revolving door of newly arrived immigrants from the Indian subcontinent. It was often heartbreaking work. One little lass took a huge shine to me and used to want to come and sit on the piano stool with me. She was a wonderfully musical child and actually had perfect pitch. The great sadness was that she’d been born with no eyes, so was obviously blind. Music wasn’t really encouraged at home. It’s often not in Muslim families. Staff told me that she would regularly attach herself to anyone who came into the school to talk about music. It seemed very sad to me that she wasn’t able to have regular lessons. Music could probably have offered her a way out of her predicament or certainly an opportunity to feel more of a sense of self esteem. I always thinks about that girl when I’m in the area. She’ll probably be about twenty now. I wonder how she turned out.

Anyway, after setting up the quiz in Somerstown tonight, I went off to write in a cafe in St Pancras station. I found a lovely quiet spot in what used to be the old lost-and-property office and had a cup of tea and an orange juice. A couple of women sat next to me and talked for two hours solidly about mental health. They talked about cycles, breakdowns, trigger points and “fear of representation” whatever psycho-babble that is. One of them said she’d banned herself from reading her self help books, because she’s “well now.” She said she’d put them all in a box so she knows they’re there if she needs them. Which she doesn’t. But she might. They talked in very studied calm voices but it was very clear there was a franticness right underneath the surface, dying to explode. What made me very uncomfortable was the fact that both of them were blaming their mothers for their mental health problems. One of them said it was a very important moment when her mother had finally apologised to her, which made me feel incredibly sorry for her mum.

Look, I know that lots of people have terrible childhoods but I’m just not sure it’s particularly useful to look to blame everyone but yourself for the way you behave. Part of the process of becoming an adult is learning to take responsibility for your actions. Yes there are exceptions and yes I am aware that I had a golden childhood presided over by the two of the best parents I’ve ever come across, but, by and large, most parents are simply doing their best under incredibly difficult circumstances. Bringing up kids is difficult. End of. And parents make huge numbers of sacrifices which it seems really unfair to throw back in their faces because we now have trendy terms for all the errors they made. Just be grateful they didn’t kill you and be thankful for everything they got right.