The Isle of Man is perhaps best well known for the
Tourist Trophy, the TT motorcycle races, where the main road that circles the island
is closed for a fortnight and the most mental motorcyclists in the world tear
it to bits and occasionally themselves. Many
Manx residents vacate the island for the fortnight and leave the riders and spectators
to it. I would have seen this fortnight
as a golden opportunity to make some money, but that‘s just me. Many people I met spoke as if the event was
beneath them treating all the participants and fans as if they were greasy, uneducated,
leather clad, thugs. The island is also
known for a liberal tax rate, its own government, the Tynwald, which is of
Norse origin, over one thousand years old and claims to be the longest running parliament
in the world with an unbroken existence.
It has its own breed of cat with a very short tail, the Laxey wheel, again,
claiming to be the world’s largest working water wheel and is the birth place
of the brothers Gibb, better known as the Bee Gees.
It is also famous for its kippers and the use
of the birch, which is where young delinquents would be sentenced to a lashing
on the bare buttocks by a police officer with a number of birch rods. It was seen by many as an effective deterrent
and used widely to try to attract people to the Isle of Man saying that it was safe place to live or holiday. Basically the young person, once found guilty
and sentenced to birching, would be held down over a table by two police officers;
his trousers would be pulled down, his shirt lifted and the punishment administered. Usually four or five strokes, but as each ‘birch
spray’ contained four or five rods, it was similar to, on average, twenty lashes
on the bare buttocks. Some of those who
had been birched stated that it felt like having red hot wires thrashed against
your skin. The practise is now illegal
although many would still like to see its return.
But the Isle of Man is perhaps best known for, or
is most famous for, the fact that John Clancey lives there. Some of you may recall me mentioning him
before. John had been stationed at RAF
Jurby Head which was a bombing range on the Isle of Man. John liked to tell people that he was special,
but many of us knew the truth. I mean
come on, if the Ministry Of Defence placed you on a remote beach and had not
just the RAF but the USAF drop bombs on you, every day of the year, how long
would it be before you got the message?
He was such a slippery character that they could never get a direct hit
on him so they gave up and closed Jurby.
John of course tried to return to England but they wouldn’t let him
in. He claims however that he elected to
stay on the Isle of Man, but we know different.
John does have one or two things going in his
favour the best of which is that he used to look like me. I say ‘used to look like me’ because time has
not been very kind to him. Whereas I am
still quite pretty, in a masculine sort way you understand. At one time when stationed together in
Norfolk, John and myself would go around telling people that we were twins separated
at birth, John being brought up in London and me being brought up in Ireland. It was fun and we were bought many beers to celebrate
our reunion. I contacted John and let
him know that I was on the Isle of Man. He
insisted on meeting up and taking me out for a few beers with his mates, which unsettled
me as he was quite a lightweight when it came to drinking beer, despite his
wild claims.
John picked me up from Tony and Mary’s house in
an old BMW motorcar. It may have been
the first time I had ever been in an antique vehicle but I didn’t say anything
as John seemed to be rather proud of the ancient machine. We went to his house which I have to say I
was very surprised at. Anyone who met John
would immediately recognise a hard and fast urbanite but here he was living in
a small cottage with his partner Sally, a lovely young lady who has had to put
up with so much. It really was idyllic
and I couldn’t believe that someone like John had such good taste in choosing somewhere
like that to live. Of course had I
thought about it I should have realised that the locals probably did not want
him living in their midst and forced him to live in the middle of nowhere. It was a lovely little quiet spot and I’m
sure that they were very happy there, or at least pretended to be, as John is
quite a stubborn fellow.
John took me off to Ramsey where he was going
to show me the night life. Ramsey is the
second largest town on the Isle of Man but is still quite a rural place. The pub car park was full of tractors and trailers
and I really did expect to find sheep dipping or dwarf throwing inside instead
of the standard darts or pool table. I
do remember meeting some of John's rugby mates and as I had respected the occasion, unlike John, I had dressed appropriately, I was surprised
to find my clothes being ridiculed as I was repeatedly asked, by one fellow, rather
loudly, why I had come out wearing my pyjamas.
I think John was a little embarrassed as he knew I was being sophisticatedly
stylish, in the extreme, and that his friends were exhibiting their complete
lack of taste. We left and began a pub
crawl in Ramsey, meeting up with more of John's rugby mates as we moved from pub
to pub.
A big rugby match was taking place the following
day, against a visiting Welsh team, and most of the Manx players were out
training hard for the match, by drinking their own bodyweight in beer. Throughout
the evening John and his friends tried to get me to agree to play for them the
following day. John’s main argument, apart
from the fact that there would be an enormous piss up afterwards, was that if I
played for them, the following day, I would in fact be representing the Isle of
Man and this would afford me International player status. Well; I already had international status, as
a criminal mind you, and juggled with the idea that it might make an
interesting little snippet in years to come, not that I could ever find something
to talk or write about myself or my life.
I found what I though was the perfect excuse
that would allow me not to play and would save face for all concerned, especially
John who had probably told his friends that he would be able to convince me to
play for them. I think they were looking
forward to not just having an experienced and graceful player join them, but I
think some of them just wanted to look at my legs, and who came blame
them. They were all red blooded, meat
eating, men and I did have the loveliest legs in Ireland. I explained that I didn’t have my kit with me,
which of course they claimed was no problem, until I mentioned that I had man
sized feet, size thirteen, I had no boots.
There followed a lot of muttering which is understandable but as you
know, the most loveliest legs in Ireland do need a decent pair of feet to hold
them up.
I don’t know how I got home that night, I can’t
remember, but I do remember waking up and recognising the room as being in Tony
and Mary’s farmhouse. Despite having
been viciously attacked by my pillow during the night and having checked my perfect
bottom for lash marks, just in case I had been birched the previous evening, I
went downstairs and completed my daily writing task of seven hundred and fifty
words. Much later in the morning John turned
up, with his car making quite a commotion in the small farm yard, it sounded
like someone had been feeding barbed wire into a bailing machine. I asked Tony and Mary not to say anything to John
about his beloved BMW motorcar as he really did seem to adore it.
We drove into Ramsey and joined his rugby mates
who were gathering at a pre-arranged spot.
It was obvious that most of them had been attacked during the night by pillows
and I wondered if I should apply for an international grant, or funding from the
European Union, so that I could expand my research into the subject. It was going to be a nice day, a little grey
but not cold, no rain and no wind, well; in the sky at least, John and his friends
sounded as if they could have filled a squadron of zeppelins. I was looking forward to having a few beers
and watching a decent rugby match when a car pulled up. The passenger window was wound down and a hand
came out. “John!” shouted the passenger in
the car, to which John responded. “Was
it size thirteen you wanted?” said the voice behind the hand, which I now knew
was holding a pair of size thirteen rugby boots.
Up until that moment the most violent rugby
match I had ever been involved in was against Brussels British, at their home
ground in Brussels, and it was during that match that John Clancy had been
carried off with concussion. I immediately
realised why John so desperately wanted me to play rugby for the Isle of Man,
he wanted me to protect him, I wasn’t his twin brother any more, I was his big
brother. I don’t want to say too much
about the rugby match but it took sporting violence to a new level. The ball was ignored and thirty fellows had a
stand up boxing match in six inches of blood stained mud. In fact it is the only match where no one
wanted to share a beer afterwards the feeling was so bad amongst the players. After a few beers, with Manx players, John
took me back to Tony and Mary’s and went off to live in the wilderness with
poor Sally. But that wasn’t the end of
it, no, much worse was to come, John and Sally were to marry, each other of
course, and he had invited a gang of Pheasant Pluckers to the ceremony. Unfortunately one of those Pluckers was me.
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