Indoor Games Near Kirkton

I have always adored Indoor Games Near Newbury, John Betjamen’s tale of gentle first love set against a backdrop of Art Deco Buckinghamshire. Then I got to wondering, what if it were set in my own childhood in 1960s Scotland….

Chip shop signs and broken windows, light the lights of our Cortina, as we drive to Wendy’s party, pink sair heids and plates o’ mince,
And we meet your crooked cousins, Bill the Blade and Cross-Eyed Vince.
“Come in young ains, see a swetchy, gie’s a fag and see’s a beer,
Snoggin’s OK, but nae gropin’, we’ll nae have nae nonsense here!”

“Meet me when they’re pissed as plovers, by the meter, ‘neath the stair,
I’ll gie you a right good snoggin’, and show you my pubic hair.”
Wendy, Wendy, sent the fairies, brother Frank and boyfriend Twinky,
Showed me how to buy a condom from their local all-night Chinky.

Oh that dark and smelly cupboard, scents of puke and skelléd beer,
Wendy’s hand my fly unzipping, oh my god, it’s happening here,
Goodbye innocence, bye virginity, childhood’s over, just like that,
Lost it all at Wendy’s party, in a Kirkton council flat.