The Sunday Post: As Good as it Gets – The Anna Raccoon Archives

by Petunia Winegum on December 7, 2014

The standard celebrity Q&A one sees with monotonous regularity on the inside back page of the Radio Times or in your average upmarket Sunday supplement often includes the ‘highlight of your life’ question. Beyond the usual ‘winning an Oscar/winning the World Championship/receiving the OBE/meeting Nelson Mandela’, there is the ubiquitous ‘the birth of my children’ cliché. The latter response is a little more universal than boasting about an achievement most will never experience; but I do sometimes wish the answer would be injected with imagination.

I would hazard a guess the majority of you reading this have never walked on the moon or scaled Everest or swum the Channel; yet I’m betting all of you, were you to look beyond the given sources of domestic elation, could describe a moment in which all the elements that typify what it is to be alive were crystallised into one event, a solitary epiphany akin to the one the Woody Allen character describes in ‘Stardust Memories’, when he is simply sitting in the same room as his wife and they exchange a smile without saying a word. For him, that was the sole second that made it all worthwhile. Yes, he happened to be married to Charlotte Rampling, which would cause many a man to wear a permanent smile; but he recognised, however brief its duration may have been, that he had experienced the culmination of everything he had been subconsciously working towards for the previous thirty-odd years. And he instantly knew it would be downhill from then on.

My moment came frustratingly early – before I had even reached seven and had any inkling as to what I was working towards, subconsciously or no. And it’s only in recent years that I’ve come to realise nothing has surpassed that moment in terms of what it made me feel. It was the summer of 1974; I can’t be any more specific than that, but I know connected events on either side of that date back up my memory. I had received my inaugural two-wheeled bike the previous Christmas, but relied upon pushing myself along with my feet on the ground for the first few months, as every attempt to pedal and balance was met with an undignified collapse. What made my failure to master the art overnight even more frustrating was that the boy-next-door, a playmate who was my senior by a year, already sped around the neighbourhood in a manner I craved to emulate. I never had stabilisers on my two-wheeler; that was almost regarded as cheating. If I were to apply the logic of Iain Duncan Smith to the situation, I could have been accused of becoming dependent on stabilisers instead of actively seeking to pedal on two wheels.

The urge to use the bike as it had been intended ate away at me throughout the first half of 1974; I was certain it must be possible. Nobody else seemed to have a problem with it, so why me? I kept trying and did slowly seem to be edging closer to the breakthrough when one afternoon in the school summer holidays, it all came together.

The house we lived in at the time formed part of a lengthy terrace, with a street culminating in a cul-de-sac at the front and an effective dirt-track separating the houses from their allotment-like gardens round the back, one that was a muddy quagmire in the wet autumn and a dust bowl in the summer; but as a six-year-old, it was long enough to be regarded as a ready-made racecourse. And it proved to be so come the day when my finest moment arrived. On this momentous afternoon, it appeared that everyone who mattered in my little world had gathered in expectation of seeing something of great significance, something that could have caused the focus of their attention to wilt under the pressure or could equally have inspired him to step up a gear. This he did, but not without assistance. Most have their dad on hand to provide them with words of wisdom and inculcate a belief that the sky is the limit for what can be achieved. But I was not of the generation whose parents were encouraged to inform their children that they are ‘special’, so he wasn’t there. Instead, there was a neighbour, a guy with shoulder-length hair who formed one half of a young couple who were relatively new arrivals on the street. To this day, I don’t know his name, but he did what dads are supposed to do; and for the part he played in my triumph, I shall always be indebted.

A hundred yards ahead of me, at the very end of the street, stood a small crowd consisting of my mum, the boy-next-door and his little sister and their mother; there may have been one or two others, but I can’t honestly remember now. Anyway, it appeared to be a sizeable number willing me on and I was about to attempt to pedal the distance on two wheels without falling off and letting them all down. Could I do it? Yes, I could – so the nameless neighbour told me in the manner of Angelo Dundee having a quiet word with Ali between rounds. I aired my doubts and he rubbished them. He convinced me I could do it. He was knelt down beside me and kept repeating over and over again that I could do it; there were no doubts on his side and – in his role as surrogate father – his absence of doubt began to infect me. Suddenly, from being in two minds as to whether I could achieve what everyone present expected me to, I felt invincible and I put the first foot on the pedal as my momentary mentor steadied the bike with his hand. A second later, I was away.

Beneath the eternal sunshine memories of this nature are always bathed in, I gathered such speed that a wind whipped up and kept me cool as the crowd of well-wishers at the end of the street hurtled towards me and me towards them. They reacted to my ride like Red Rum was galloping down that dirt-track and they’d stuck their life-savings on the likelihood of him reaching the finishing post before any of his competitors. But I had no competition on this day – Nixon may have been about to draft his resignation speech and Wilson may have been about to formulate the date of the next General Election to increase his tiny majority; but as far as I was concerned, the world was watching me. And I wasn’t about to shame myself when the spotlight was so luminous.

I reached the end of the track and brought myself to a screeching halt before an audience of whooping, cheering fans who swamped me in pats on the back (no hugs, please – we’re British) and massaged my ears with applause that still rings in them whenever I summon-up the memory. I had done it – ridden a full hundred yards on two wheels without failing to keep my balance. I could now ride a two-wheeled bike and the next phase of my childhood began with the presentation of a key to a door I couldn’t wait to open. I’ll no doubt never know who the neighbour was who instilled the conviction I could do it, but I couldn’t have done it had he not been there.

I cannot honestly think of a moment in my life since then that has matched the euphoria I felt that day; one could say that’s rather sad and pathetic, considering it took place forty bloody years ago. But I’m sure all of you out there have been there. It doesn’t really matter what age you were when it happened; what matters is that it did. Care to share it?

Petunia Winegum

{ 16 comments… read them below or add one }

backofanenvelope December 7, 2014 at 10:32 am

I also got my first bike when I was about 7. My father galloped up and down our road, holding onto the back of my saddle. Noticing he had gone rather quiet, I looked behind me – and he was standing at the other end of the road watching me! Success!

Mudplugger December 7, 2014 at 10:53 am

No rose-tinted reminiscences of paternity for me either, my ‘moment’, the one which still remains etched three-dimensionally on my memory also features transport. It was passing my Driving Test, an event which occurred even more distantly than Petunia’s primary pedal, although he was certainly still soiling his nappies at the time.

It was the 9th of July 1968. I recall relatively little of the Test itself, save for that magical moment when the taciturn examiner folded his paperwork and announced with due formality, “Your driving has reached the standard approved by the Minustry of Transport”, a moment which triggered a degree of elation never experienced before nor since. I still recall the blurred walk, both my feet fully detached from the ground, across the city centre and towards the bus-stop for home. Even the frustrating bus-ride was ennobled by an inner glow that, deep down, I knew that I no longer needed to be driven by others, I was now a fully qualified driver, free to take myself wherever and whenever.

OK, there remained the small matter of an unaffordable car and an otherwise-kind father firmly unwilling to let me loose alone in his precious 6-cylinder chariot, but that was mere detail. The Test was the key right-of-passage moment which granted me my own passage to freedom, in fact by far the most significant and life-changing exam I ever passed.

Around 2 million miles later, (yes, I’ve done quite a lot of it, on both sides of the road, from sports-cars to HGVs), lucrative jobs which depended on my mobility, distant romantic encounters similarly, a long period competing in motor-sport and a preparedness to drive anywhere anytime which still remains, all stemmed from that key moment now more than 46 years ago. I knew at the time that it was significant, that it would have a major role in defining the rest of my life. For sure, my life would have been wholly different without it, hence its continuing survival in the now-dwindling bank of memory-cells. It beat riding a bike.

Petunia Winegum December 7, 2014 at 11:00 am

I can imagine it certainly DID beat riding a bike! I took my test four bloody times and was met with the same ‘I’m afraid…’ on each occasion. I gave up then and haven’t been behind a wheel since 1987. I suppose I am missing out on something, but I couldn’t affford to run a car, anyway.

Justin December 7, 2014 at 1:30 pm: I remember parts of my test clearly. The preceding lesson had gone well, although I muffed the theory questions from The Highway Code.

The test itself started badly, unexpectedly taken in an unfamiliar car. I corrected the positions of seat and mirrors; the selection of neutral, after which I turned the key….of a car I had failed to notice was already running. His grimace; my apology, and then on command I exited the small car park, remembering just in time that I should have been signalling. I repeated this mistake 10 seconds later as we turned left into another road, which then approached the traffic lights on a slight incline.

As we slowed and my examiner instructed me which way to turn, the lights changed. Panicked by the last second instruction and the realisation that, yet again, I wasn’t signalling, I groped blindly across myself with my left hand to the indicator stalk. During this brief moment, gravity had begun to work its silent magic and the car had slowed significantly. A swift gear change to second was in order, that we should continue to coast through the lights, and then away, the small engine being unable to achieve this from third. More quiet terror ensued – my gear changing hand being otherwise engaged, I changed with my right hand.

And that was that. Those were the only mistakes I made in an otherwise flawless, textbook example of how to take a driving test, a test which at one point included a genuine emergency stop. I always thought it was this which swayed the mind of the examiner, for despite the dual controls and years of experience, it was I who perceived the danger and reacted; faster, I think, than he had even thought of stopping.

And the theory? I was asked half a dozen questions, ALL of which were the ones I had been previously asked by my instructor and had not known.

And with that, I passed my first and only driving test.

For me though it has never eclipsed by the memory of my science test, a mock exam taken prior to the end of year when I was about 14. The look on the face of my teacher and stunned pleasure and incredulity in his voice as he announced my name and the result – 100%. In the subsequent actual exam, I achieved “only” 98%, as did my best friend with whom I normally sat during lessons.

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windsock December 7, 2014 at 11:25 am

To be honest, it still happens. I occasionally DJ for friends and charities. I get that sense of euphoria every time I see a room/bar/hall full of people dancing, hands in the air, to records they don’t know or weren’t expecting to hear. It’s a lovely thing to see and to know you’ve made someone , even just momentarily, happier.

One significant occasion: an illegal immigrant is California, I was riding through downtown San Francisco on a bus that had just picked up a load of passengers by travelling through a sweatshop district. The bus was full of Chinese speaking people who were jabbering away. I was hanging on to a strap handle, on my way home to a walk-in closet I rented in a studio flat I shared with a friend (He had the rest of the studio as his space.)

I’ll never forget that clarity of thought I had on the bus that day in 1988. “I’m just a small cog in a very big machine that whirrs away around me but I’m doing what I want to do and I am HAPPY.” Being a stranger in a strange land (California can be very strange) made me realise whatever I do and wherever I go, I can get by and get on. It was liberating and I felt euphoric. Now travelling anywhere brings back that feeling.

Ms Mildred December 7, 2014 at 12:18 pm

My first dream bike trip was a lone mission to the pennine Green Lanes above Preston via The Trough of Bowland. This would be about 1951. My brother honed me a knife the go up the the left handle grip. He made it from scratch. Turning the wooden handle to snugly fit the hole with permission of his old teacher of woodwork. He made a wicked pointed blade and razor sharp. I was more in danger in Bowland YHA when the female warden crept in and hovered over my bed! I was 17 and very tiny and slightly built. Fortunately she turned and left the room and I got up and slammed the door to and latched it. The next day I found from a shopkeeper, she had fallen out very publicly with her lady partner the day before! To the delight of the whole village. My solitary moment of sheer wonder was along an old green shepherds road called Mastiles Lane. Larks singing, a long distant view, curlews calling…..sheer bliss. Thoughts about all those drovers who walked their sheep along these lanes in past times. I had read a chapter in a book about these drover roads. Later on my trip I was accosted, rather scarily, by a lone male cyclist. Reached in my front bag and got an apple…fast food in 1951, produced the knife, slashed the apple in two and stabbed it. He left rather hastily. It was downhill back to Preston and the grim realities of South Lancs coal mines and Lowry chimneys, smoggy air, tanneries and factories making metal items, foundries glowing and cotton mills clacking. A whole different era. I always seemed to get ‘pestered’ by men. So I realise what goes on. Mum and Dad were relieved to have their chick returned to the henhouse. Later in 1959 I relished 230 mile my trips to work in London and home, using a big electric start Bond Scooter (google it if you can). Only in production for 3 years and now very rare. No M1 yet, so sooty old A5 mostly. I ran Vespas but my first scooter was a Corgi that was dropped with parachutists in ww2. Later I realised I was another ‘contrarian’ who refused to conform to the female modes of the day. Still would not fit in now if I was 17.

The Blocked Dwarf December 7, 2014 at 2:48 pm

I had a CHOPPER!

/all that needs to be said.

DtP December 7, 2014 at 6:04 pm

No one would probably give a kid a bike these days unless supervised. None of the ‘your tea’s at 5′ stuff which governed summer holidays – just a ridiculous amount of cars. Maybe a good thing as I worked out that a bit ago that the spectacular crashes I had could quite easily have been terminal – BMX generation and none of those helmet restrictions – time definately slows down as impact approaches.

I think one of my fondest memories was at Glastonbury in about 2000 where my best chum and I had taken collapsable chairs and positioned ourselves about 100 yards back from the main stage equidistant from 2 beer tents with pot, newspapers and access to pies and it felt like everything that was going on was just an extension of our living room – quite peculiar. That and my first girlfriend but that’s kinda maudlin.

Den December 7, 2014 at 7:12 pm

The first time, a few seconds after leaving the balloon cage, that the parachute canopy developed and one knew one was going to make it. Euphoric? Next best thing to sex.

Mudplugger December 8, 2014 at 10:12 am: Our notions of what might be the ‘next best thing to sex’ may change over time.
One day many year ago, amongst a pub-group of 30-something blokes bantering as usual about sex, was a 75-year-old local farmer. After a few, probably exaggerated, tales from the ‘young bucks’, the farmer set aside his pint and calmly announced, “It’s over-rated, lads – these days I’d rather have good shit”.

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AdrianS December 7, 2014 at 8:25 pm

i fondly remember the first time I cracked the throttle open at 70 on a GSX-R750, it felt like Star Trek

Petunia Winegum December 7, 2014 at 10:47 pm

Some wonderfully evocative personal highs there – and all legal too!

Andy The Odd December 8, 2014 at 11:44 am: Except for that last one (assuming it was in the UK)

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Chris December 8, 2014 at 1:56 pm

I can clearly remember the moment I could take off on two wheels! One of the stabilisers on my hand-me-down Raleigh Dido sheared off, leaving me with no option than to balance on one. My dad came home from work, took the other one off and said ‘try it’, and to my delight I found I could balance on two wheels and what a marvelous feeling that was! The start of a fantastic relationship between me and my bikes – a blue Raleigh Boxer when I was 6, a red Raleigh Grifter when I was 8, a blue ‘Sun Solo’ when I was 11, a Raleigh Massif ‘all terrain bike’ when I was 15, a Raleigh Dyna-Tech Encounter (a ‘proper’ mountain bike bought with my own real money) when I was 19. The freedom of the open road was there as long as there was air in my tyres.
Passing my driving test first time was another great moment – I had a tricky examiner, a driving school Peugeot with 200K on the clock & knackered syncromesh on 2nd (it was to be traded in for a new 205 diesel the very next day) – but I passed more due to my confidence in driving and ability to negate the problems on the day. My dad put a dampener on it though by refusing to let me take my mum’s car out unaccompanied – it took another 3 months to get my own wheels.
As far as ‘sense of achievement’ goes, maybe it’s a childhood thing (or a thing of a childs mentality) – I remember accolades and praise galore when I was at infant & junior school, and I often had no idea why as I just ‘got on with it’.

Opus December 8, 2014 at 5:09 pm

How about this. I knew how to ride on two wheels (to this day it amazes me that it is physically possible) and aged about ten or eleven, at Xmas, I went outside to see the present I had wanted – a bicycle. What generous parents I had, I would be the envy of every other child in the street. The fact that it was a ten year old bike formerly owned by my cousin did not take the shine off my pleasure, though it should have as my cousin was … female. For the next ten years or so I cycled on a girl’s bike. No wonder I turned in to a sissy more at home in a bra and skirt than dressed as a lumberjack. Cruelty under the guise of kindness.

Chris December 8, 2014 at 7:11 pm

I tell you what though, I will shortly have a real sense of contemporary achievement when I have in front of me a complete set of existing Top Of The Pops 1977-79 on dvd, in correct order, 3 shows per disc in top quality, despite the best efforts of Operation Yewtree and a wave of National Idiocy derailing the BBC4 repeats at the exact point the show was complete in the archives.