Stairlift to Heaven

by Terry Ravenscroft

  This was around the time of Joan’s soft-porn movie ‘The Stud’, and it crossed my mind that if I were to perhaps unzip my fly and get my dick out under cover of the tablecloth and draw her attention to it she might consider me for a part in ‘Stud 2’. Then I realised that if I were to do this it would be more likely to land me a role in a remake of ‘The Smallest Show on Earth’ so common sense prevailed and my trousers remained zipped.

  This was over twenty years ago but I swear that Joan looked exactly the same as she does today. Dog rough. No, that’s unfair, because I couldn’t really say what she looked like due to the entire year’s production of a small cosmetics factory having been trowelled on her face. She was white. Not just white, but white ‘white’. A charitable person might say her faced looked like it had been fashioned out of porcelain, an uncharitable one from Polyfilla. However she must have been over fifty at the time so I suppose she felt nature needed a helping hand even then.

  As a person though she was charm itself, no edge with her at all, and I won’t have a word said against her. Even though I never got to be in ‘Stud 2’.

  ****

  November 22 2006. FORGETFUL.

  I am a few months shy of my sixty-sixth birthday and today is the first time I’ve ever been upstairs and forgotten what I’d gone up for. I’ve done surprisingly well by some accounts; it started happening to The Trouble before she was sixty and I know several people younger than me who it happens to on a regular basis.

  “What are you stood there like that for?” said The Trouble, coming out of the bathroom.

  “Like what?”

  “Just stood there staring at the walls.”

  That was all I needed; she’d given me something I could build on. I built. “I was just thinking it was about time they were decorated,” I said. Well I wasn’t going to admit I’d forgotten what I’d gone upstairs for. It’s the one thing I have over The Trouble in the ‘things that happen to you when you’re older’ category. She’s still got twenty/twenty vision, I have to wear glasses to read; she’s still got all her teeth, I’ve got hardly any of mine; she’s still got all her hair, ditto any of mine.

  Of course my pride or vanity or whatever you want to call it is going to cost me whatever Hughes & Son, the painters and decorators we use, charge me for decorating the landing, because The Trouble instantly agreed with me and said she’d get them on the job right away. But then everything has a price, or, in the case of Hughes & Son, a fancy price.

  When The Trouble went down the stairs I gave it a minute to remember what I’d gone up them for. I didn’t remember it. I gave it another minute. I still didn’t remember it. I did remember someone saying, Atkins I think it was, because it happens to him, that immediately you go downstairs again you remember what you went up for, so I went downstairs. Atkins doesn’t know what he’s talking about, as per usual, because I still didn’t remember. The Trouble came out of the living room on her way to the kitchen. I went back upstairs again before she could ask me what I was doing stood at the bottom of the stairs and I managed to lie my way into having to have the hallway re-decorated along with the landing by the mercenary Hughes and his mercenary offspring.

  I gave it a minute at the top of the stairs, in case the trip back up had jogged my memory and I remembered what I’d gone up for in the first place, but no such luck. I was determined it wasn’t going to beat me. I knew if I gave in that it would just be the start of my going upstairs and forgetting what I’d gone up for - at my age I recognise a slippery slope when I come across one, alcohol, cigarettes, other women, so I was determined to beat it. I thought of all the possible things it could be that I’d gone up the stairs for. To change my shoes? For some money? For a book? I thought of about fifty things. None of which I’d gone up for. The Trouble came upstairs again. “I can’t make up my mind between off white and avocado,” I said, giving the walls a good coat of looking at prior to the exorbitantly-priced coats of paint Hughes & Son would soon be applying to them. “We’re having it peach,” she said.

  I had to go back down again as I’d no excuse to be standing there now she’d sorted out the colour scheme but when she came down again I went back up again. An hour later, an hour’s racking my brains, and I still didn’t know what I’d gone up for.

  The Trouble came back upstairs. I was just about to tell her I was having trouble with peach and would she compromise with primrose when she suddenly stopped and stood there, looking thoughtful. “Now what did I come up here for?” she said.

  “You must be getting old,” I said, and went back downstairs.

  ****

  December 14 2006. BLIND MEN.

  There aren’t too many advantages in being old, and many disadvantages, but one of the few benefits that we coffin-dodgers have over younger people is that we can get away with things a lot easier as allowances are made for our advanced years. “Oh take no notice of him, it’s his age,” they say, in that condescending way, never for a moment suspecting that the artful pensioner might sometimes be using the cover of his age in order to get away with something that he otherwise might not have. Such as Atkins and I do when we play one of our daft games; because I’m quite sure we wouldn’t be tolerated or excused as easily if, say, we were in our thirties. Take the game of ‘Blind Men’ we often play, and which we have never yet failed to walk away from without insult or assault being visited upon us, where similar antics from younger people would probably bring down the wrath of the public on them. In fact I remember playing a version of Blind Men as a child and often receiving a slap round the ear-hole for my pains. However the adult version of the game is a bit more refined, as indeed are Atkins and I.

  We usually travel to Stockport or Buxton, and Manchester on one occasion, to play it, as we’re too well known in our own little town and probably wouldn’t get away with it so easily.

  It all went off as usual. Armed with white sticks we stood at opposite sides of a busy street, facing inwards, as though waiting for someone to help us across the road. And as usual someone soon did. Quite often a helpful man or woman will stop to help me before one stops to help Atkins, or vice versa, and when this happens, and for our game to work properly, we have to take delaying action by engaging our knight in shining armour in conversation, such as “You’re quite sure there’s nothing coming are you, because I wouldn’t like to be knocked over at my age?” or “Can you hold on a minute I’m going to sneeze, now where did I put my hankie?” That sort of thing.

  However today we were fortunate enough to get a willing helper at the same time. Holding onto our guides by the arm we each set off on our journey across the road, tapping our white sticks on the road the while, then, when we met in the centre of the road we suddenly shrugged off our helpers, brandished our white sticks high in the air as though they were swords, and took up fencing stances.

  “On guard, you French scum,” I demanded of Atkins.

  “Hah! You weel soon feel the cold steel of my sword you Eenglish peegdog!” retorted Atkins.

  Then we started fencing with our white sticks. It stopped the traffic of course, as usual, and a sizeable crowd soon gathered.

  Actually we’re getting quite good at it now; not to the standards of Douglas Fairbanks Junior and Errol Flynn maybe but certainly as good as Kevin Costner when he was Robin Hood, so we put on quite a decent show. After a couple of minutes or so of cut and thrust we simply packed it in and just walked away together chatting amiably, lest we got into trouble with Plod.

  Atkins once suggested that after a minute or so of fencing we should go round with the hat but I managed to talk him out of it; I’m not hard up enough yet to resort to begging, but perhaps it’s one for the future. Another suggestion from a friend at our local was that it might be an idea to take it to the Edinburgh Festival as apparently street entertainment such as our ‘Blind Men’ is a popular feature there. Atkins was very keen on the idea and said that if we do go we should definitely go round with the hat, if only to cover our expense
s. However I remain unconvinced, either of taking it to Edinburgh or going round with the hat. But if anyone reading this, especially students, would like to perform ‘Blind Men’ at Edinburgh, please feel free. Anything to keep you out of the charity shops.

  ****

  January 10 2007.EXCESS WEIGHT.

  Like most of us The Trouble tends to put on a few pounds over Christmas and the New Year and also like most of us she has ambitions to get rid of the surplus poundage as soon as possible. She happened to mention to me that this year she would have to do without the benefit of a set of scales in this annual quest to get back to her previous weight as unfortunately she had forgotten to weigh herself prior to the start of the festivities. No matter, she said, she would know when her weight was back to normal as the week before Christmas she had bought a new pair of trousers that fitted her perfectly. Her plan was to diet until the trousers fitted her as perfectly again. Foolproof. Not so. A sound method on the face of it, but open to abuse. I abused it.

  I have a sister who, along with a sewing machine and the seamstress skills to go with it, shares my sense of humour. Just for a laugh I had her take in the waist of The Trouble’s new trousers by a couple of inches. This morning The Trouble declared that she felt she had lost enough excess poundage to get into the trousers again and disappeared upstairs to our bedroom. I have never heard the howl of a banshee, but if it is half as terrifying as the noise that came out of our bedroom two minutes later then if banshees ever hit town I don’t want to be around when it happens. I ran upstairs. The Trouble is not a fat woman, on the contrary she has a nice figure for her age, but even a nice figure cannot get away with an attempt to force it into a pair of trousers deficient in the waist measurement by two inches. Consequently the small amount of fat she normally carries round her waist had become a roll of fat spilling out of the top of the trousers, which, if not of lifebelt proportions, certainly looked like something which could be an aid to buoyancy had she been drowning.

  Naturally I started to laugh. Not for very long though because she was clearly upset, which became clear to me when she threw a pot of Oil of Olay at me. I apologised, then in an effort to restore the good humour she had been in before she tried on the trousers I let her in on my little joke, adding as a bonus that she had probably reached her target weight after all. For some unknown reason she failed to see the funny side of it and she hasn’t spoken to me since.

  ****

  January 21 2007. SHITHOUSE.

  A few days ago there was an item on the BBC one o’clock news about a road death. Distraught parents lamented the loss of their seventeen-year-old child, the victim of a hit and run. She was a lovely girl, bubbly, everybody liked her. Two days later, on the evening news, a man had spoken of his soldier son, killed in action. He had been a son to be proud of, brave, a lion, looked up to by his men, they would have followed him anywhere. And on yesterday’s news a woman had told of her brother, shot dead when accidentally getting caught up in a drugs war. The victim had been really genuine, always had a smile on his face and a good word for everyone, would have given you his last penny, a veritable saint.

  This morning I attended the funeral of The Trouble’s cousin Norman. The service started with the congregation singing The Old Rugged Cross, Norman’s favourite hymn according to the vicar, although how he knew I’ve no idea since the last time Norman entered a church prior to entering it feet first was when he got married. When someone got up to read the eulogy I thought we’d gone to the wrong funeral because the man of whom he spoke sounded like a cross between Francis of Assisi and Nelson Mandela with a bit of Little Lord Fauntleroy thrown in, and not at all like the mean-spirited bigot I knew Norman to be. Indeed he was made out to be just as bubbly, genuine and saintly as had the people on the TV news who had died.

  It struck me that nobody who dies is a shithouse. Everyone is a smashing, wonderful person. No one dying is a swine, a coward, a tight-fisted vindictive twat who wouldn’t give you the dirt from under their fingernails and who went around kicking cats for fun. I reflected that if a Martian had only television reports of the deaths of loved ones with which to form an opinion of Earthlings he could be forgiven for believing there wasn’t a single arsehole in the whole world.

  The conclusion to be drawn from this is that only the good die, shithouses never. So, in an effort to live as long as possible, I have decided to become a shithouse. Starting today. I informed The Trouble and Atkins of my intention, and the reason why. Atkins said it sounds like a good idea and that he may very well become a shithouse himself (I sometimes think he’s well on the way). The Trouble said I should have no trouble whatsoever becoming a shithouse if my behaviour the other week is anything to go by. I assume she means the business with her trousers.

  ****

  February 12 2007. JUNK MAIL.

  I caught up with my junk mail return service today. I suppose I should know by now but it still never ceases to amaze me just how much of this unwanted garbage lands on my hall floor. It’s only four weeks since I last dealt with it and there must be fifty letters at least. When you take that over a year, and add to it the supermarket flyers, carpet cleaning offers, Wicks catalogues, freebie newspapers, election leaflets and sundry other bumf that infiltrates my letter box and pollutes my hallway it amounts to a lot of paper.

  At first I used to content myself with merely dropping it in the waste bin. Later I took to opening it, discarding the contents, sealing up the pre-paid reply envelope found inside and posting it back to from whence it came. This of course meant that the companies who sent me the junk mail ended up paying the postage on the letter whilst have nothing to show for it, at the same causing the pendulum to swing my way a little.

  Recently I refined the service and now the pendulum swings even farther in my direction. I now open two junk mail letters at a time, take out the contents, put the contents of letter ‘A’ into the pre-paid reply envelope from letter ‘B’, and vice versa, then send them back. I’ve no idea as to the reaction of the person at the other end who opens them. Probably apathy. But then I don’t care, either.

  A refinement of the above idea, which I have amused myself with quite a few times, is to actually fill in the order forms of offers and return them in the wrong envelopes. Except for my credit card details, which I falsify just in case, I fill them in absolutely correctly, age, address, where to leave the parcel if I am out, etc. For example the other week I received in the same post a plant catalogue and the offer of the latest in deaf aids. I ordered four dozen daffodil bulbs from the deaf aid people and two deaf aids from the plant catalogue people. I have yet to receive a reply from either. You might think that the plant catalogue firm, having received an order for two deaf aids, would pass the letter on to the deaf aid people, but no, apparently plant catalogue companies are only interested in selling plants; you could be as deaf as a post for all they care so long as you buy a hundred onion sets or a bag of early cropping seed potatoes.

  Similarly you might suppose that the deaf aid company, having wrongly received an order for four dozen daffodil bulbs, would see to it that the order reached its correct destination. After all there is a good chance that the man who sent the order is deaf, so you wouldn’t expect them to knowingly withhold from him the joy of seeing his daffodils blossom come next spring even if he’ll never have the pleasure of hearing them gently rustling in the breeze. But again, no.

  It isn’t just the plant catalogue and deaf aid companies that are so cold and uncaring; since I started doing it I must have sent at least a couple of dozen orders to the wrong address and I have yet to hear so much as a whisper from any of them. Seemingly there is zero liaison between companies, who are apparently only interested in selling their own goods. Well cut my legs off and call me Shorty!

  I have yet to meet the person who likes receiving junk mail, so with this in mind here’s a thought - why not take a leaf out of my book and do as I do? There’s no need to go to the trouble of swapping over the contents o
f the envelopes - although it is very satisfying and can be highly recommended - just send the empty pre-paid envelope back. If everyone were to do this there would be no junk mail at all after about twelve months. Bliss.

  ****

  February 14 2007. MY FUNNY VALENTINE.

  Every time Valentine's Day comes around with it comes messages of undying love from couples so besotted with each other that they seemingly don't mind calling their partner, and being called by their partner, the most ludicrous names.

  A brief look through the columns of just one of the three pages my newspaper devoted to these missives of love revealed all the usual suspects. Honeypots and Honeybuns abounded, as did Sweetpeas and Cheekychops. Gladiator, Spartacus and Hercules represented both the historical and film worlds. Popeye, Goofy and Cartman the world of cartoons. The Animal Kingdom fetched up with a Squirrel Nutkins, seven Tigers, two Piggywiggies, a Lion, a Wilderbeast (sic), a Slimy Slug (sick), a Dobbin, a Mr Toad, the twosome of Mr Leghorn & Broodyboos and an Eager Beaver (although as this was a woman it could of course have referred not to an animal but something else). We also had, unfathomably, a Mr Sock, and a Huggy Buggy, The Perminator (must be a hairdresser), a Tubbyblubbyhubby, and the inspired pairing of Janey Fatbum & Spanker, which sounds to me like a match made in heaven. I'll draw a veil over the homosexual fraternity, other than to say that they were well represented, and I thought that the partnership of Jimmy Tightbum and Dyna Rod to be almost as well-matched as that of Janey Fatbum and Spanker.

  Why do people call each other such names? More to the point, how can they call each other names like this? And is it only in the privacy of their own love nests, or do they refer to each other in this manner when they're out, and in company? “So that's a pint of bitter for me, a gin and tonic for Squidgypots, a pint of lager for Toddy Tiddler, a bacardi breezer for Minxy Moo, a scotch for Bunny Wunny Wabbit and a slimline tonic for Fatarse.”