I was quite aware that my plan would not happen
overnight. It would take quite a lot of
hard work and determination. The actual
trade of air traffic control was changing too.
From the rank of sergeant upwards people would become controllers, however,
the air force realised that there were people like Joe Pearson about so
everyone would have to undergo a form of assessment at Biggen Hill. Those who were successful would become
controllers and those who failed would work on the admin side. It was good news, however, had they said that
those who failed were to be culled, and they would start with Joe Pearson, that
would have been better. We were being
sent off to Biggen in pairs, to be assessed.
I suggested to Joe that as I had just been assessed successfully
by Biggen, for aircrew, that I might not have to attend. Joe Pearson assured me that he knew what he
was doing and that I would still have to go.
I went off with a WRAF from Wattisham, Sandy. She was quite nervous about the assessment and
as we drove down I tried to convince her that she would breeze through it. We would only have to sit some multi choice
papers and I told her about the ones I had completed previously. We were in a classroom full of air
traffickers and about to start when the instructors asked if anyone had been
through Biggen before. I explained that
I had.
They took my service number and went off to check their
records but said that I could continue with the tests anyway. Not long after they came back and told me I didn’t
have to sit the tests. Had I bothered to
telephone them and explain my situation they could have told me that I didn’t
have to attend and I could have saved myself the drive down and wasting their time. Once again Joe Pearson had proved to me that he
was probably the most useless man on the face of the earth. Of course I now had to sit twiddling my
thumbs and wait for Sandy to complete her tests. Unfortunately she failed and it quite upset
her, in fact the drive back was much quieter than the drive down.
I still had to load up with secondary duties which would
involve joining various committees and giving up my free time. There were not that many committees actually running
that I could join so I would have to start my own. I started a silver fund for the airmen of the
tower. Everyone paid fifty pence a month
so on leaving they would be presented with an engraved tankard. This was standard practise in most units but hadn’t
even been considered at Wattisham. They didn’t
have an entertainment committee, so I set one up. Summer was approaching so I decided to
organise a barbeque. Before anyone knew
it posters were appearing, informing people that an event had been organised by
their entertainment committee.
It was as some bloody foreigners say a ‘fait accompli.’ I had been talking to one fellow who had been
posted out and he jokingly asked me if I would like to take over his secondary
duty which was to be in charge of the Q sheds.
The Q sheds were where battle flight was held. Occasionally one of the squadrons at
Wattisham would have to provide cover for the air defence network and they
would use the Q sheds, parking up two phantoms in the sheds, while the ground
crew and air crew stood by in the adjoining buildings. Why someone like me should become the
inventory holder for the place was beyond me but I agreed to take the duty on.
Things were going well and not only was I adding to my list
of secondary duties but I had a fabulous place to hold a barbeque. Naturally I made sure that neither of the
squadrons were providing air defence cover when my barbeque was to be held and
as I was in charge of the buildings, all I had to do was ask myself for
permission to use the place, which of course I very generously gave. I’m such a nice fellow. This allowed me to control every aspect of
the barbeque and I don’t know if this indicates that I would have been a
control freak, but I knew if I was in charge then it would be done right. I now upped the odds and decided that I would
produce one of my treasure hunts. This
wasn’t going to be another party; this was going to be the social event of the
year.
It would be a fun day.
Starting with a timed treasure hunt around Suffolk and then returning to
the Q sheds for a barbeque and party. If
I didn’t get a handful of smarty points for this event then something was wrong
with the system. Once again I produced a
story, mimicking the language used in the bible. I made O C Operations, Moses, and gave most
of the major personalities in the air traffic tower some function in the
story. They had to drive around Suffolk,
solving clues which would lead them on to the next clue. It was quite a clever piece of work
actually. Unlike Valley, Wattisham did
not present me with a certificate when it was over.
As the barbeque was a real success there was no question that
the entertainment committee was my committee.
You have to understand that other people would be after secondary duties
and predators were always waiting in the shadows. I still needed more duties and although it
would have been quite easy for me to volunteer to join the rugby club committee
I felt that it was too far away from Shotley for me to join, but I did hold in
at the back of my mind just in case. I
then turned my attention to the Families Club at Shotley Gate. They had a committee, but from what I had
already experienced I knew that they were quite a pretentious lot.
I made some enquiries and found out that the committee that
ran the Shotley Families’ club was quite a serious affair. Not only was it viewed as quite an important
body by the senior management on Wattisham but they took themselves quite
seriously as well. This was not a turn
up and volunteer sort of affair. They had
specifically designed positions which when vacant could be applied for. When they asked for volunteers to run the
youth club I jumped at the chance. If I
could work with Joe Pearson without reacting violently there was a good chance I
could suffer this lot.
I was accepted for the position I don’t suppose anyone thought
that running a disco for the teenagers from married quarters on a Friday night
would be much of a laugh. The only other
established duty was to take two coach loads of children to the pantomime every
Christmas and that actually sounded like fun.
It was quite obvious that I was the underdog of the set up. The Americans were represented on the committee
which I found interesting. It was a guy
called John Lansafame, a dental technician from Bentwaters. What I did find interesting was that there
was a definite pecking order for committee positions. I was at the bottom, and I suppose I was used
to being there.
Above me was the entertainments guy who organised various
functions at the club. Above him was the
treasurer, then the deputy bar manager, the bar manager and the top guy was the
chairman. Despite the fact that these were
the only fixed positions there were a lot of hangers on, who because of their
time at the place had established themselves as ordinary committee members. Even more bizarre were the wives who actually
believed that their husband’s position on the committee reflected on them in
some way. More than once I would have
been tempted to tell one or two of the wives what to do with her opinion.
There was quite a lot of pretence in the way that certain people
presented themselves. They would have to
have a special glass, sit in a specific seat, be addressed by a certain title
and of course, no swearing. I beavered
away every Friday night swearing my head off at teenagers who would have been
to the local off license, drank all their pocket money and then turned up drunk
at the youth club disco in order to cause trouble. When the grown-ups arrived I would be mister
niceness himself. I did an awful lot of
watching and listening and it wasn’t long before I could see the huge cracks in
their world of pretence open up. They were
all involved in a huge wife swapping circle and the first fellow I had met
there, the air trafficker who had considered whether or not to let me back in
the club for swearing, was the leader of the pack.
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