I see faces and traces of home

The girls ushered in my day with the gift of two wonderful eggs. It’s a sight that still fills me with wonder despite being routine these days and long may it continue. The death clouds of summer seem long gone now.

I met Nick as arranged by the West Pier and at 11 we set off for ‘Piers and Queers’ an engaging tour of Brighton seafront and its gay history.

Dr James Barry provided the most intriguing story. He rose through the ranks to become one of the most highly respected surgeons of his day and performed the first successful Caesarean section in British medical history. He would come to Brighton and stay at the old Bedford Hotel with friend Lord Charles Somerset and their ‘unnaturally close’ relationship led to inevitable scandal at the time.

 

The irony is that James was actually Mary Anne Bulkley and technically, there was no need for gossip or notoriety. His true gender only came to light when he died and servant Sophia Bishop whilst preparing the body discovered that he was in fact a ‘whole woman’ with stretch marks indicating child birth. The discovery also made James the first female assigned at birth to become a qualified medical doctor in Britain. What a story!

After a coffee at the Red Roaster Nick went off to look at road bikes and I bathed in bright blue skies and my city in full swing. Strolling through the North Laine it struck me how many faces I knew and how embedded in the fabric of Brighton I was after all these years. For better or worse, this must be the place. ‘I see faces and traces of home’ ticker taped across my mind as I walked. Most of the Genesis cannon buckled under its own pompous weight but the track ‘Back in NYC’ has a visceral quality that allowed it to fare much better. It’s a song I never tire of and it’s a flashlight to Peter Gabriel’s later work. He would leave Genesis soon after. Jeff Buckley also famously recorded the song and kept the same edgy pumping menace.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ke3ETJh_u_k

I see faces and traces of home back in New York City
so you think I’m a tough kid? Is that what you heard?
Well I like to see some action and it gets into my blood.
The call me the trail blazer-Rael-electric razor.
I’m the pitcher in the chain gang, we don’t believe in pain
cos were only as strong, as the weakest link in the chain.
Let me out of Pontiac when I was just seventeen,
I had to get it out of me, if you know what I mean, what I mean.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1AS4-cxhsJI

I never got to see Genesis live but I did see Peter’s first solo tour when it touched down at the Birmingham Odeon on September 25 1977. I went to the afternoon show and I remember Gabriel looking trim and sans any of costume tomfoolery that marked the Genesis years. He lurched, shimmied and preened like a new wave Jagger but there were also moments of quiet like ‘Here Comes the Flood’ which I remember vividly; a portent as my life was about to turn upside down.

 

Lord, here comes the flood
We'll say goodbye to flesh and blood
If again the seas are silent
In any still alive
It'll be those who gave their island to survive
Drink up, dreamers, you're running dry.

Extract from ‘Riding with Stabilisers’ a memoir

A couple of weeks before I’d come home from a gig to find my mum sitting at the kitchen table with just an overflowing ashtray for company. She was slumped dramatically across the shiny surface weeping inconsolably. One hand clasped her brow whilst the other stretched and curved to hold a lit cigarette which bobbed as her sobs broke like waves. Smoke drifted in fingers and dropped ashes peppered the table like molehills on a lawn. Finding my mother crying was not in itself an unusual occurrence. She cried often when my dad wasn’t around to enjoy her tears. Strong willed and bloody minded she refused to give any indication that he might be winning the war when he was at home to see it. Tonight felt different, the crying had a timbre that was new to me; deeper, darker, muted and full of fear.

I looked around for signs of battle but there were none to be seen. No smashed dishes, broken chairs or anything out of place. What could have happened to upset her so? ‘Mum, what’s wrong. What’s he done?’ She looked up, her eyes red raw from the tears that had torn from her eyes. ‘You will come won’t you? Please come.’ I held her close. ‘Come where mum?’ I was puzzled, had she been drinking? ‘Come with me, please’ she begged. ‘You will won’t you?’ Still mystified I agreed that I would. ‘I’m leaving your father’ she said. My heart skipped a beat and my eyes widened in shock. ‘Where...where are we going?’ The words fell from my mouth with all the hope of a fledging bird leaving the nest. ‘Colin’ she said. ‘Sue left him at the weekend. He’s asked me to move in.’ It turned out that mum and Colin had fallen in love and had been having an affair for months. I didn’t press for the sordid details, despite wanting to know everything. In a nutshell, whilst Sue stood in the way their passion had remained just an affair and a well kept secret. Sue’s sudden departure to move in with Bill (another mutual friend, also married) had been the catalyst needed to get the love boat out to sea. To add further spice to this shocking tale, it later came to light that my father had also been chasing Sue but sensibly she’d chosen Bill. I wondered how Noel Edmonds would have coped with this suburban swap shop. We only had the three channels back then and too much time on our hands. ‘I was worried that you’d want to stay here with your father’ she continued. My mouth fell open in disbelief. ‘Stay with him? No, I’m coming with you.’ With that I knelt on the floor, held her waist and drenched her skirt with my own tears. There really is a light that never goes out.

Don't be afraid to cry at what you see
The actors gone, there's only you and me
And if we break before the dawn, they'll
use up what we used to be.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TlRLvaXVyk8