1973-1978 The Early Years

I was born at 3.20am on the 10th December 1973 in Taunton, Somerset, weighing in at 6lb 7oz. I wasn't a beautiful baby. I had a big nose. My father has brought this up from time to time and will say 'look how she turned out'. Obviously inferring I turned out ok, but I still have a nose that is larger than I would like! The youngest of the family, I have a sister who is five years older than me and a brother who is nearly three years older. The story goes that after the quite traumatic births of my siblings, I popped out before my mother even made it to the delivery room.

Both of my parents were teachers. My father came from Mid Wales and my mother from Kent. They met at teaching college. Both my sister and brother were born in Kent, but by the time I came along the family was living in Somerset. My father used to teach Agriculture at a local specialist farming school and my mother gave up full time teaching to raise us kids.

My first house was a new build on an nice estate in a large village. I wasn't very old when we left that house but my earliest memories come from there. I remember the 'big' snow we had, must have been winter 76/77. I remember that my father had to dig out the path and that the drifts were huge. Of course they probably weren't, it's just that I was so small. I also remember the path to the front door. You had to climb a few steps, and it was lined with rose bushes. I fell off that path one day into the roses, I can clearly remember running into the house crying, while my sister tried to pluck out thorns from the backs of my legs!

My father's family in Wales and mother's family still in Kent, we didn't get to see our grandparents that much, so we adopted the couple that lived next door. They were a lovely couple who took on the adoption as readily as us. I can remember Mr W teasing us regularly, he used to use the handle of his walking stick to catch our ankles as we passed him.

One day my mother was talking to Mrs W over the fence outside the back door. (I always love this image of neighbours chatting over the fence, it's not always so easy to find good neighbours anymore, although I have been lucky). I think I was about 7 months old. Mother had placed me in my baby seat on the table and hadn't meant to leave me there, but obviously got distracted. Impatient as I was, I began to jiggle in my seat. I managed to jiggle the chair right off the table and to land on my face on the corner of the storage heater. The result of this was that I earned my first scar. I had a gash across the bridge of my nose which had to be stitched and later developed two beautiful black eyes. I have wondered over the years whether I could bring it up in an arguement, but have decided that my mother probably payed enough. She tells of the horrified looks she got when people would peer into the pram to see the 'beautiful' baby!

We left this house the spring after I turned four. We moved to a very big place that was a boarding house for the school were my dad worked. It was just round the corner from our first house, so wasn't very far to go. I clearly remember my father carrying our swing down the road over his shoulders!