Sunday 30 January 2011

From Glasgow to Saturn (19)

Delighted to have a wee story (Parched) - very wee, very short - in issue 19 - of From Glasgow To Saturn, Glasgow University's free online literary magazine - wonderfully named after Edwin Morgan's poetry collection (1973). I try not to think that it's thirty years since I went to uni, that would mean I am very, very, very old. I went when I was just sixteen, a couple of months from seventeen. My brothers were the same, we were all pretty much the youngest in our year(s) - at school and uni. We can go to school at four in Scotland. The other day I had hot chocolate from a vending machine and was transported right back to the student union, known as the QM, short for Queen Margaret Union (the other union, the GU, the 'men's union', didn't let women join til 1981). I still remember vividly sitting on the QM steps during Freshers' Week, an unseasonably warm October, in my clogs and skimpy Indian dress, I had a hippy thing going on back then though I hated folk music and listened mostly to David Bowie and Frank Zappa.

I am so glad I didn't know what was ahead, just sitting on those steps, carefree as hell. I got ill in my third year and unlike Helen Fleet I didn't come home from France once, I came home three times, I kept going back 'cos they couldn't find out what was wrong. I still remember trudging up the gangway onto a cross-Channel ferry, knowing that something was dreadfully and completely wrong. And I don't mean my perm - yes, I had a perm! My hair is already crazy hair - and yet I had a perm! Because my cousin had one, I wanted one too.

8 comments:

Mim said...

Sweet, poignant: your looking back. Dear past you, lucid remembering you.

trousers said...

Nice to read these memories; I shall also have to download the pdf of From Glasgow To Saturn - good news on getting published in there.

nmj said...

Thanks, both. I have a wee confession, the 220 word story was a rejected submission for a flash fiction competition last year so I just recycled it and sent it to FGTS - I was so pleased to learn of their existence. And the original story actually was written about ten years ago and I pruned it right back and then jazzed it up for the competition. That is the beauty of writing, it is so malleable and you can use it when you want, with years in between. And it really does give you a warm feeling to be published by your old uni.

vw said...

Congratulations on your story, i love the title. I found it very moving but loved that you mention your wee nephew. Had a cuppa reading it & remembering my days at uni & unfortunately, permed hair (cos Charlene from neighbours had one). X

Digitalesse said...

Congratulations on having your short story published. You're a fine writer and I'm always recommending your book (including healthcare professionals with an interest in ME).

It was 30 years ago in September that I left home to study and begin life's big adventure. Of course I thought that my future was big and bright and everything would be wonderful. As for the fashions of the day ... we were young and full of ourselves and I wouldn't have missed my bad perms and misadventures with Born Blonde hair lightener for the world!

nmj said...

V, I think we all have a perm in the closet... D, Great you are recommending TSoM to health professionals, they are the ones that need to be reading it!

Charles Lambert said...

A lovely piece of writing... Thank you.

nmj said...

So glad you enjoyed, Charles, thanks for commenting.