Chapter 8

Donkey Je’teine

My Mum and my Aunt Louise were close as sisters could be. Now strangely although Dad had been a truck driver during the war and drove troops, supplies, tanks and stuff to the front line, when he left the army, he became a haulage truck driver, but we never owned a car. He preferred a push-bike, yes, a bicycle! And I never did ask him why we never had a car.

Auntie Louie’s husband was a bricklayer, he got to work by driving his car to building sites and developments.

Once he had landed a job on a building site and he knew it would last for a while, he would start to commute by bus or train and leave the car at home. Auntie Lou decided that because the car was at home nearly all the time, and that her job allowed flexible hours, she would take driving lessons and learn to drive the car. The car was a big red Humber and was manufactured in the UK.

She told Mum that as soon as she passed her driving test that she would take us away to the coast for the weekend for a treat in the car, and that’s exactly what happened. A weekend away and a trip to a caravan park at Margate for two sisters and me.

After Auntie Louise passed her test on Friday, she excitedly telephoned Mum and let her know. And Mum had booked the caravan less than an hour later, and I found out I was going to the seaside when I got home from school that day.

Eating my breakfast on Saturday morning I hear a car “Honk Honk” outside our house, I run over to the window and looked out. I see and recognise my Uncles bright red Humber and see my Aunt Louise getting out of the car and waving to me at the window.

Ten minutes later we were all in the car and on the A2 main road on our way to Margate. I’m sitting in the back on this big red leather seat. I’m sliding left and right on my bum as we go around corners, as there are no seat belts in this old car, so going around roundabouts is a lot of fun for a six-year-old.

We drive onto the dual carriageway (Motorway) and Auntie decides the inside lane seems the safest, until we get behind a very very slow car,

MUM: Lou? Is this left lane the one you need to be in?

LOU: Yes, I was told to keep to the left lane by the driving instructor,

Auntie Lou had given Mum her learners driving manual just in case she would want to drive. Mum was reading though it,

MUM: you can overtake this slow car in front of us you know,

LOU: I know, I was just waiting so there were no cars or lorry’s behind us,

Mum looks behind, and so do I,

MUM: Nothing behind us now!

LOU: OK! HERE WE GO!

Just as we start going up a hill Auntie Lou puts on the cars old side indicators that stick out of the side of the car like a small illuminated pointed orange ear.

She pulls out into the middle lane, but we don’t seem to be going any faster, we seem to be maintaining the same speed, but the engine sounds loud and like it is straining.

I stand up behind the big front bench seat and look left at the car we are overtaking.  Oddly, the car beside us seems to be slowly gaining speed on us. I then look at the dashboard dials and then at the gear shift. I see the car is in top gear. Even at the age of around four, I know how the car gears work.

ME: Mum? Shouldn’t we be in a lower gear to go up a hill?

Mum looks over at Auntie Lou,

MUM: Lou?

Auntie grabs the gear stick and crunches it into a lower gear, we then start to very slowly gain speed and overtake the car on the inside lane.

Then Auntie starts to act very strange. She sternly rocks back and forth quickly, getting close to the steering wheel and thumping back into the bench seat. Mum (and me) confused by this unexpected action ask’s Auntie what she is doing,

MUM: What’s up Lou? You need to go to the toilet or something?

LOU: NO! We need to go faster; a lorry is right up my bum!

I look behind and see the front grill of a truck. A.E.C is the make; I know this because I can clearly see the one-inch high chrome letters on the lorry’s grill just behind us.

I look in front and see Auntie going back and forth and saying…

LOU: Go faster car, go faster,

On my left I see that Mum has joined in the rocking back and forth quickly aerobic workout now, but as auntie went forward Mum went back in the opposite direction.

Then I see a Jaguar car with a family inside overtake us and the lorry behind on our right side (Outside lane) that was going just a bit faster than us, the family of adults and kids in the Jag looked at us in wonderment as they passed us by while watching Auntie and my Mum going back and forth. I ducked down.

We must have looked like a family of clowns that had just escaped from the circus in a big bright red car. Or that maybe that we were just a car full of nutters on a day trip from the asylum.

We get to the Caravan Park near Margate, Mum and Auntie go off to the local shop to get supplies and I get a hand full of coins to go and play in the penny arcade next door.

Later we go and get takeaway fish and chips to eat. While Mum and Auntie consume a bottle of wine and chat about the day, I watch TV for a bit and then go to bed for the night.

Next day I get thick sun-cream rubbed all over me by Auntie who uses nearly the whole bottle of lotion. It’s a white cream. I look in the mirror at myself. The cream isn’t rubbed in properly, and I look more like an anaemic marble statue than a six-year-old kid.

We take a short drive to Margate. Mum and auntie hire some deck chairs, and I get bought a bucket and spade.  We find a nice place on the beach to stay and I dig a hole in the sandy beach so deep I find seawater at the bottom, then a large man who is not looking where he is walking falls down my excavation and I am told to fill it in.

So, Auntie buys me a kite because she feels sorry for me, but after running up and down the beach for nearly an hour trying to launch this kite without any success, I give in.

I sit down and read the kites instructions that say I should run into the breeze to launch the kite. And today there is absolutely no breeze at all.

When running up the beach dragging my kite along the sand behind me, I did see Mum and Auntie pass the instructions back and forth to each other. And at one-point Auntie Lou licked her finger and held it high up in the air and she crossed her head at Mum, probably saying something like…

LOU: Not much wind,

MUM: No, none at all,

I am pretty sure the responsible adults realised the kite needed a breeze to get it into the sky, and they let me run up and down the beach just to tire me out.

Exhausted, I lie down under Mums deck chair and nodded off. I get woken by Mum who has an ice cream for me,

MUM: Leo! Here is an ice cream for you. And we are leaving now to go back to the caravan,

LOU: Lets let Leo have a go on the Donkey ride on the way back to the car and take some photos. I’ll pay,

We walk across the sand to where the tied-up donkeys are. One donkey is untied, and Auntie lifts me up onto its saddle.

My feet cannot reach the stirrups, so I hold the reign and saddle horn in my left hand and balance myself on the shiny slippery saddle.

I sit there and eat my ice cream held in my right hand while waiting for Auntie to pay for the donkey ride. The man who will lead the donkey and me along the beach drops the lead on the sand while hunting for change in his leather waist pouch.

All this time the donkey had been looking around the other way at another donkey ride further down the beach, every time this donkey turned around the man pulled him (The Donkey) back to face the other way. The Male donkey I am sitting on looks down at the dropped lead and turns around, the man looks up and goes to pick up the lead. Too late, the donkey has walked away quickly with the man in pursuit.

The man shouts at the donkey, but this just makes the animal start to trot along quicker than the man can run. I’m just trying to hold on and eat my ice cream and enjoying the bumpy ride, because I think this is what the ride is all about.

Here I am, on this donkey, bobbing up and down holding on with one hand and trying to eat this ice cream. Because of the unstable ride I try and guide my ice cream cone to my mouth, but I push the cone into my nose instead.

Then, with my mouth wide open, I manage to push it into my forehead, then the ice cream falls off, so I take a bite out of the wafer cone before I grab the saddle horn with both hands now trying to hold on.

We reach the other donkey herd at the other end of the beach. My donkey slows down and sniffs this other donkey’s arse, then mounts it and starts to shag it. I slide backwards off the saddle and summersault onto my bum into the soft Margate sand.

My Auntie got her money back, and I got my first donkey ride.