SATURDAY night’s all right for fighting, as Elton John once said. Let’s get a little action in.
It’s seven o’clock and I wanna rock, wanna get a belly full of beer.
Or on the hand, maybe talk about crochet and soft furnishings, holiday plans and gardening. Whatever happened to our Saturday nights? They used to be so much fun.
We spent last Saturday evening with some friends whom we love dearly. We have known them for a very long time. Our children have grown up together and moved out to start their own lives.
We have gone on holidays together, run races together, fallen off bicycles together and got a little drunk together now and again.
Now we are gradually growing old together, and our Saturday nights are not what they were.
Once we went out dancing, in among the bright lights of Paignton, rubbing shoulders with the beautiful people, the jet set, the Paignton Playboys and their glamourous companions.
We were in with the in crowd, and we went where the in crowd went. We were as cool as Dobie Gray in velvet pants on Soul Train.
We would walk into our favourite places and we would know nearly everybody in there. There would be nods, waves and glasses raised to and fro.
It was like being Norm in an episode of Cheers, going where everybody knows your name. A little later, the music would be loud and we would dance until we dropped at some seafront bar or other. Those were the days, my friend. We thought they’d never end. But then, gradually, we slowed up a bit, and we didn’t go to town every Saturday night. Then we didn’t go many Saturday nights. Then we didn’t go at all.
Last Saturday night we stayed in, ate well and drank sparingly. We talked about forthcoming holidays, and where we might go to spend them. We talked about suites and armchairs, and how we might protect them from clawing cats.
Then the new Unwins seeds catalogue came out, packed with pictures of plants you can buy to grow in your own garden.
“Unwins!” I exclaimed. “Deep joy! Seedy-bold in the cattle-y-bilo!” But it turned out it wasn’t that particular Unwin at all, which was disappointing for me, and baffling for the rest of the people in the room, who had no idea what I was on about.
It was a Saturday evening quite unlike old times, but maybe all the better for that.
The following morning, clear-headed and bright-eyed thanks to a night at home with a small cider and the Unwins catalogue, I pulled on the magical golden jersey of Torquay United to play for the Gulls’ walking football team in a tournament.
We won our first game, vanquishing the league leaders and reigning champions. We only lost our second when the freakishly strong wind blew the ball into our net as it ran loose from an excellent save by our goalkeeper. Maybe a quiet Saturday night in isn’t such a bad idea after all, and Sunday morning football is better with a clear head.
This article first appeared in the Torquay Herald Express on 13.03.2019
Flim-Flam and Ballyhoo 