by Sue Townsend
Pandora has gone to London with her father to hear Tony Benn speak. Pandora’s mother has gone to a SDP rally in Loughborough. It is a sad day when families are split by politics.
I’m not sure how I will vote. Sometimes I think Mrs Thatcher is a nice kind sort of woman. Then the next day I see her on television and she frightens me rigid. She has got eyes like a psychotic killer, but a voice like a gentle person. It is a bit confusing.
SATURDAY FEBRUARY 13TH
Pandora has got a crush on Tony Benn, just like the one she had on Adam Ant. She says that older men are exciting.
I am trying to grow my moustache. Valentine’s Day tomorrow. A big card came today, it had a Sheffield postmark.
SUNDAY FEBRUARY 14TH
Sexagesima. St Valentine’s Day
At last I have had a valentine from somebody who is not a blood relation! Pandora’s card was charming, she had written a simple message of love:
Adrian, it is you alone.
I gave Pandora a false Victorian card, inside I wrote:
My young love,
Treacle hair and knee-socks
Give my system deep shocks.
You’ve got a magic figure:
I’m Roy Rogers, you are Trigger.
It doesn’t scan very well, but I was in a hurry. Pandora didn’t get the literary reference to Roy Rogers, so I have lent her my father’s old Roy Rogers annuals.
My father threw the Sheffield card in the waste-bin. My mother took it out when my father had gone to the pub. Inside it said:
Pauline, I am in anguish.
My mother smiled and ripped it up.
MONDAY FEBRUARY 15TH
Washington’s Birthday, USA. Moon’s Last Quarter
Came home from school to hear my mother talking to creep Lucas on the phone. She was using a yukky voice and saying things like: ‘Don’t ask me to do it, Bimbo,’ and ‘It’s all over between us now, darling. We must try to forget.’
I can’t stand much more emotional stress. I am up to my ears in it already what with studying hard and vying with Tony Benn for Pandora’s attention.
TUESDAY FEBRUARY 16TH
Pandora’s mother came round last night to complain about her spice-rack. It fell off the wall and spilt rosemary and turmeric all over her cork tiles. My mother apologized on behalf of my father who was hiding in the coal shed.
I am seriously thinking of giving everything up and running away to be a tramp. I would quite enjoy the life, providing I could have a daily bath.
WEDNESDAY FEBRUARY 17TH
Miss Elf told us about her boyfriend today. He is called Winston Johnson. He is a Master of Arts and can’t get a job! So what chance do I stand?
Miss Elf said that school-leavers are despairing all over the country. She said that Mr Scruton should be ashamed to have a portrait of Mrs Thatcher over his desk.
I think I am turning radical.
THURSDAY FEBRUARY 18TH
This morning the whole school was ordered to go to the assembly hall. Mr Scruton got up on the stage and acted like the films of Hitler. He said in all his long years of teaching he had never come across an act of such serious vandalism. Everybody went dead quiet and wondered what had happened. Scruton said that somebody had entered his office and drawn a moustache on Margaret Thatcher and written ‘Three million unemployed’ in her cleavage.
He said that defiling the greatest leader this country has ever known was a crime against humanity. It was tantamount to treason and that when the culprit was found they would be immediately expelled. Scruton’s eyes bulged out so far that a few of the first-years started to cry. Miss Elf led them outside to safety.
The whole school has got to have handwriting tests.
FRIDAY FEBRUARY 19TH
Miss Elf has resigned. I will miss her, she was responsible for my political development. I am a committed radical. I am against nearly everything.
SATURDAY FEBRUARY 20TH
Pandora, Nigel, Claire Neilson and myself have formed a radical group. We are the ‘Pink Brigade’. We discuss things like war (we are against it); peace (we are for it); and the ultimate destruction of capitalist society.
Claire Neilson’s father is a capitalist; he owns a greengrocer’s shop. Claire is trying to get her father to give cheap food to the unwaged but he refuses. He waxes fat on their starvation!
SUNDAY FEBRUARY 21ST
Quinguagesima
Had an argument with my father over the Sunday Express. He can’t see that he is a willing tool of the reactionary right. He refuses to change to the Morning Star. My mother reads anything; she is prostituting her literacy.
MONDAY FEBRUARY 22ND
Once again I am spotty. I am also extremely sexually frustrated. I’m sure a session of passionate lovemaking would improve my skin.
Pandora says she is not going to risk being a single parent just for the sake of a few spots. So I will have to fall back on self-indulgence.
TUESDAY FEBRUARY 23RD
Shrove Tuesday. New Moon
Ate nine pancakes at home, three at Pandora’s and four at Bert and Queenie’s. Grandma was very hurt when I refused her kind offer to whip me a batter, but I was full up.
It is disgusting when the Third World is living on a few grains of rice.
I feel dead guilty.
WEDNESDAY FEBRUARY 24TH
Ash Wednesday
Our school dinner-ladies have got the sack! The dinners now come in hot boxes from a central kitchen. I would have staged a protest but I have got a Geography test tomorrow.
Mrs Leech was presented with a microwave oven for her thirty years of toil over the custard jug.
THURSDAY FEBRUARY 25TH
Got fifteen out of twenty for Geography. I lost points for saying that the Falkland Islands belonged to Argentina.
FRIDAY FEBRUARY 26TH
My thing is now thirteen centimetres long when it is extended. When it is contracted it is hardly worth measuring. My general physique is improving. I think the back-stretching exercises are paying off. I used to be the sort of boy who had sand kicked in his face, now I’m the sort of boy who watches somebody else have it kicked in their face.
SATURDAY FEBRUARY 27TH
My father hasn’t made or sold a single spice-rack all week. We are now living on Social Security and dole money.
My mother has stopped smoking. The dog is down to half a tin of Chum a day.
SUNDAY FEBRUARY 28TH
Quadragesima (First in Lent)
Had egg and chips and peas for Sunday dinner! No pudding! Not even a proper serviette.
My mother says we are the nouveau poor.
MONDAY MARCH 1ST
St David’s Day (Wales)
My father has stopped smoking. He is going around with a white face finding fault with everything I do.
My mother and him had their first row since she came back. The dog caused it by eating the Spam for tea. It couldn’t help it, the poor thing was half crazed with hunger. It is back on a full tin of Chum a day.
TUESDAY MARCH 2ND
Moon’s First Quarter
My parents are suffering severe nicotine withdrawal symptoms. It is quite amusing to a non-smoker like me.
WEDNESDAY MARCH 3RD
I had to lend my father enough money for a gallon of petrol, he had an interview for a job. My mother cut his hair and gave him a shave and told him what to say and how to behave. It is pathetic to see how unemployment has reduced my father to childish dependence on others.
He is waiting to hear from Manpower Services.
He is still ill from not smoking. His temper has reached new peaks of explosion.
THURSDAY MARCH 4TH
No news yet about the job. I spend as much time as I can out of the house. My parents are unbearable. I almost wish they would start smoking again.
FRIDAY MARCH 5TH
He got it!!!
He starts on Monday as a Canal Bank Renovation Supervisor. He is in charge of a gang of school-leavers. To
celebrate he bought my mother sixty Benson and Hedges and himself sixty Players. I got a family pack of Mars bars.
Everybody is dead happy for once. Even the dog has cheered up a bit. Grandma is knitting my father a woolly hat for work.
SATURDAY MARCH 6TH
Pandora and I went to see the bit of canal bank that my father is now in charge of. If he worked for a thousand years he will never get it cleaned of all the old bikes and prams and weeds and Coca-Cola tins! I told my father that he was in a no-win situation, but he said, ‘On the contrary, in one year’s time it will be a beauty spot.’ Yes! And I am Nancy Reagan, Dad!
SUNDAY MARCH 7TH
Second in Lent
My father went to see his canal bank this morning. He came home and shut himself in his bedroom. He is still there, I can hear my mother saying encouraging words to him.
It is uncertain whether or not he will turn up for work tomorrow. On the whole I think not.
MONDAY MARCH 8TH
He went to work.
After school I walked home along the canal bank. I found him bossing a gang of skinheads and punks about. They were looking surly and unco-operative. None of them wanted to get their clothes dirty. My father seemed to be the only one doing any work. He was covered in mud. I attempted to exchange a few civilities with the lads, but they spurned my overtures. I pointed out that the lads are alienated by a cruel, uncaring society, but my father said, ‘Bugger off home, Adrian. You’re talking a load of lefty crap.’ He will have a mutiny on his hands soon if he’s not careful.
TUESDAY MARCH 9TH
Full Moon
My schoolwork is plummeting down to new depths. I only got five out of twenty for spelling. I think I might be anorexic.
WEDNESDAY MARCH 10TH
My father has asked me not to bring Pandora to the canal after school. He says he can’t do anything with the lads after she has gone. It’s true that she is stunningly beautiful, but the lads will just have to learn self-control. I have had to learn it. She has refused to consummate our relationship. Sometimes I wonder what she sees in me. I live in daily terror of our relationship ending.
THURSDAY MARCH 11TH
Pandora and Pandora’s mother have joined my mother’s women’s group. No men or boys are allowed in our front room. My father had to be in charge of the crêche in our dining room.
Rick Lemon’s baby daughter Herod was crawling under the table shouting: ‘Tit! Tit!’ My father kept telling Herod to shut up until I explained that Tit was Herod’s mother’s name. Herod is a very radical baby who never eats sweets and stays up until 2 a.m.
My father says that women ought to be at home cooking. He said it in a whisper so that he wouldn’t be karate-chopped to death.
FRIDAY MARCH 12TH
My father had a good day on the canal bank. He is almost through to the grass now. To celebrate he brought the skinheads and punks round to our house for a glass of home-made beer. Mrs Singh and my mother looked shocked when the lads trooped into our kitchen, but my father introduced Baz, Daz, Maz, Kev, Melv and Boz and my mother and Mrs Singh relaxed a bit.
Boz is going to help me fix the brakes on my bike, he is an expert bike-fixer. He has been stealing them since he was six.
SATURDAY MARCH 13TH
Boz offered me a sniff of his glue today, but I declined it with thanks.
SUNDAY MARCH 14TH
Third in Lent
All the women I know have gone to a rally to protest about a woman’s right to work. Mrs Singh has gone wearing a disguise.
Saw Rick Lemon in the park, he was pushing Herod too high on a swing. Herod was shouting: ‘Tit! Tit!’
MONDAY MARCH 15TH
I am loved by two women! Elizabeth Sally Broadway gave Victoria Louise Thomson a note in Science. It said: ‘Ask Adrian Mole if he wants to go out with me.’
Victoria Louise Thomson (hereafter known as V.L.T.) passed on the message. I replied to V.L.T. in the negative.
Elizabeth Sally Broadway (hereafter known as E.S.B.) looked dead sad and started to cry into her bunsen burner.
It is really wonderful to know that Pandora and Elizabeth are both in love with me.
Perhaps I am not so ugly after all.
TUESDAY MARCH 16TH
Pandora and E.S.B. have had a fight in the playground. I am disgusted with Pandora. At the last meeting of the Pink Brigade she swore to be a pacifist all her life. Pandora won! Ha! Ha! Ha!
WEDNESDAY MARCH 17TH
St Patrick’s Day. Bank Holiday (Ireland). Moon’s Last Quarter
Mr O’Leary was brought home by a police car at 10.30 p.m. Mrs O’Leary came over to ask my father if he would help her to get Mr O’Leary upstairs to bed. My father is still over there. I can hear the music and singing through the double-glazing.
It is no joke when you need your sleep for school.
THURSDAY MARCH 18TH
I am reading How Children Fail, by John Holt. It is dead good. If I fail my O levels it will be all my parents’ fault.
FRIDAY MARCH 19TH
My creative English essay:
Spring by A. Mole
The trees explode into bud, indeed some of them are in leaf. Their branches thrust to the sky like drunken scarecrows. Their trunks writhe and twist into the earth and form a plethora of roots. The brilliant sky hovers uncertainly like a shy bride at the door of her nuptial chamber. Birds wing and scrape their erratic way into the cotton-wool clouds like drunken scarecrows. The translucent brook gurgles majestically towards its journey’s end. ‘To the sea!’ it cries, ‘to the sea!’ it endlessly repeats.
A lonely boy, his loins afire, sits and watches his calm reflection in the torrential brook. His heart is indeed heavy. His eyes fall on to the ground and rest on a wondrous majestic many-hued butterfly. The winged insect takes flight and the boy’s eyes are carried far away until they are but a speck on the red-hued sunset. He senses on the zephyr a hope for mankind.
Pandora thinks this is the best thing I have ever written, but I know I have got a long way to go until I have learned my craft.
SATURDAY MARCH 20TH
Vernal Eguinox
My mother has had all her hair cut off. She looks like one of Auntie Susan’s inmates. She doesn’t look a bit maternal any more. I don’t know whether to get her anything for Mother’s Day or not. She was going on about it last night, saying it was a commercial racket fed by gullible fools.
SUNDAY MARCH 21ST
Fourth in Lent. Mothering Sunday
11.30 a.m. Didn’t get my mother anything so she has been in a bad mood all morning.
1 p.m. My father said, ‘If I were you, lad, I’d nip round Cherry’s and get your mother a card and present.’ He gave me two pounds so I got a card saying ‘Mummy I love you’ (it was the only one left, just my luck), and five boxes of liquorice allsorts (going cheap because the boxes were squashed). She cheered up and didn’t even mind when my father took a bunch of tulips round to Grandma’s and came back five hours later smelling of drink.
Pandora’s mother was taken out and spoilt in a restaurant. I will do the same for my mother when I am famous.
MONDAY MARCH 22ND
I have catalogued my bedroom library. I have got a hundred and fifty-one books, not counting the Enid Blytons.
TUESDAY MARCH 23RD
I will be fifteen in eleven days. So I have only got to wait one year and eleven days to get married, should I want to.
WEDNESDAY MARCH 24TH
The only thing that really worries me about my appearance now is my ears. They stick out at an angle of ninety degrees. I have checked them with my geometry set so I know it is a scientific fact.
THURSDAY MARCH 25TH
Lady Day (Quarter Day). New Moon
I have had a spiritual awakening. Two nice men representing a religious group called the Sunshine People called at the house. They talked about how they alone could bring peace to the world. It is twenty pounds to join. I will get the money somehow. Nothing is too expensive wher
e peace is concerned.
FRIDAY MARCH 26TH
Tried to persuade Pandora to join the Sunshine People. She was not swayed by my arguments. They are calling round tomorrow to meet my parents and sign the agreement.
SATURDAY MARCH 27TH
The Sunshine People came at six o’clock. My father made them stand on the doorstep in the rain. Their robes got wet through. My father said they were trying to brainwash a simple child. When they left my mother watched them walk up the cul-de-sac. She said, ‘They don’t look very charismatic now, they just look bloody wet.’ I wept a few tears. I think I was weeping out of relief – twenty quid is a lot of money.
SUNDAY MARCH 28TH