Don’t know where

John’s aural facilities are not what they were.

To use the phrase “as deaf as a post” as applied to John is a tendentious slur on the hearing ability of the post.

He wears his affliction lightly, he has never allowed it to impair his 60 years of service to the movement.

It irritates the hell out of Lucy, but that has gone way past the family joke stage – it is now a polished gem of music hall extravaganza sent down to us to lift the spirits when its pissing down outside and we’ve only got as far as Matters Arising. And Ray hasn’t even got here yet.

They, and we, have been together a very long time indeed.

And now.

Its over.

They will be packing up the tent in the next few days and leaving us to continue the struggle alone.

It is right and proper that Nightwatchman make some inadequate attempt to describe the cataclysm which befalls us. A very large hole has appeared in the middle of our floor. And it’s a long way down there. I am tempted to compare it to the day Trevor Francis left the Blues. Grown men were weeping unashamedly into their Mild Ale, season tickets were torn in half, Blues shirts piled up at the Jumble Sales. The Villa were ecstatic.

So it is today. Old men weep silently into their bottles of Sol (happily the slice of lemon keeps the tears out of the beer), unread second hand books pile up in Roys garage; redundant posters curl up at the corners in silent tribute. The Tories are chuffed.

And Suffolk, Suffolk, of all places, will be the unseeing benefactors of this downturn in our fortunes. It is they, whoever they are, who will receive, unknowing, not one, but two Party obsessives. Steeped in the traditions, lives hardened by years of disappointment, then shining with satisfaction and anticipation then back to dismay. But never, never deviating from a joint core belief in the good things.

They are an inspiration, they have by- electioned up and down the land, they have run book sales, they have leafleted Lucy’s knees away, they have collected funds, they have counted funds, and in John’s case they have tended the funds well away from the predatory fingers of the Candidate. The Conference itself marked their wedding anniversary.

We have absolutely no doubt that they will shortly been as indispensable to Suffolk as they are up here ………

But you have to speak up.


Nightwatchman