Sunday January 25, 1976

3rd Sunday after Epiphany. After a restless night I eventually get up at 11 o'clock. John lays cowering in bed and I feel miserable for him. The whole thing seems like a dream - and I expect to wake up from it any moment. To make matters worse I have a hangover and my nervous system in general just can't take much more.

John looks at the situation objectively. One regret is that he may well have to dispose of his car.

It snows for most of the day and it's bitterly cold. Carole and I go for a long walk through Hawksworth and we are near to hysterics after the events of the weekend.

Coming back to our place I pass what seems like the longest afternoon I have ever experienced. Carole and I frantically whispering. The television seemed to be devoted to Mothercare advertisements and references to marriage and children.

After tea Carole, Mum, Sue & Peter and I watch the film 'The Italian Job' and at 9.30 I take Carole down for her bus. I chase home in freezing conditions and play cards in the dining room with Sue & Pete.

John and Maria come and sit with Mum. I hope and pray that they will tell her before 'bedtime'. Lynn and Dave come in at 10 o'clock and our card game comes to a sudden end when Dave says that John & Maria have told Mum the news. Dad comes in ten minutes later and we all sit down with a bottle of whisky. Mum & Dad take the news like angels. Shocked and speechless.

At 12 o'clock John takes Maria home with the task of breaking the news to the Macdonalds. I shall report on that event in tomorrow's entry.

-==-

Saturday January 24, 1976

I am in a state of great shock and acute excitement. Carole left at 10 o'clock before I got up and I didn't stir until 12.

John went off to see Andy at the Station on Henshaw Lane and I did nothing at all until lunchtime.

Dave L rang and I was surprised to hear he's home for the weekend. God knows what he'll be doing tonight because Linda hasn't invited him to her 21st.

Carole rings at 2.30, or 3 o'clock and John and I go round to Maria's. Richard Wellock and a friend are there supping tea and Carole is looking shifty, and I wonder what the Hell is wrong. Richard and friend go and Carole and I are left alone listening to the Santana LP. Mr & Mrs Mac go out and John and Maria are sitting in the dining room.

Carole looked at me and said: "We didn't go shopping to Leeds this morning, you know." I replied "what did you do then?" And she said: "It's something to do with Maria." I felt my knees knocking together. The truth rushed over me like a waterfall. She is pregnant. John's going to be a daddy in August, and I am going to be an uncle. I cannot describe the emotion of it all. Happiness mixed with a reserved sense of doom. He will be 20 in September and Maria will be 18 in July. What Mum will say I just cannot imagine.

At the Yorkshire Rose for Linda's 21st John and Maria announce that they are getting engaged next Saturday. Chris and a few others soon find out that she's pregnant, and Peter M is upset that John won't be able to go on holiday with us in July. Get drunk, and go back afterwards to Maria's until 2.30. They're telling her parents tomorrow and so I'll make myself scarce before the announcement.

And to think that last Wednesday I was joking with Maria about her being pregnant and now it's all true.

-==-

Friday January 23, 1976

My financial situation isn't very good at the moment and we go to the Hare & Hounds with light-weight wallets and purses. (Carole isn't in a better monetary state either).

Peter M stormed out of the Hare after Chris told him he was going back out with Christine. I was chuffed to hear from Chris that I am responsible for getting them back together. Christine says she'll kill Pete if he doesn't stop acting so childishly, but I keep telling her that the poor lad is completely besotted.

Have no funds to go to a disco and have to fork out £2 for a camera for Linda's 21st tomorrow.

Carole and Maria are going to Leeds tomorrow morning so I'll be able to have a few hours extra in bed.

We come back to our place and watch a film and then sit talking until 3am. Lynn sat with us for ages chatting about her job. (She handed her notice in tonight, and her boss brought her home). I tell her she should go on the stage or screen. She'd make a brilliant actress. We all have a good laugh really.

-==-

Thursday January 22, 1976

Booked my Spring holiday for May 3-10th. Carole and I, with Chris and Christine, are going to Worcester, all being well, and I can hardly wait to have yet another rave-up in Sacha's with all those cheap shorts.

Go to the Mecca in Bradford with Carole and her Mum & Dad on the Highroyds loony bin staff annual piss up. See Shelley Masterson with her husband Clive. Also see Barbara who isn't with Shelley & they seem to have fallen out. I hate the place and don't particularly like Mrs Phillips (she's rough). However, Carole and I have a good time which is spent rotating around the building sipping gin and orange which is abominably priced.

Home at 1.30 and leap straight into bed.

-==-

Wednesday January 21, 1976

To the Hare & Hounds with Carole, John, Maria, Chris and Christine. Now that the two Cs are going out again it means that the whole of the 'happy family' are paired off with few exceptions.

For some reason Carole and I forget the squabbling and we get on like in olden times. Have the usual passionate scene at the bus stop and trot off home.

See the late current affairs programme 'Tonight'. A revolting old judge is blubbering away saying that most murders are 'accidental' and that no man really wants to kill another man. This loony has obviously sat in court with his eyes shut for the past 60 years, because even I know otherwise.

-==-

Tuesday January 20, 1976

I ignored the alarm clock this morning and got up in a panic at 8.15. John drove me into Guiseley, and I managed, by some stroke of heavenly providence, to catch the 8.20 33 bus.

Do the indexing with Sarah all morning then complete the list of top christian names for 1975. I devoured piles of sandwiches for luncheon, and then showed Eileen how to file cuttings. So all in all, it's an industrious little day at the YP.

The weather is shocking at the moment. People are being crushed in freak winds and gales. The weather has all gone to cock in the past few years and I can forsee the day, not too far ahead, when Royal Ascot week in June is cancelled because of snow, and when temperatures reach 90F on Christmas Day.

I'm worried about the Carole affair. I would hate to hurt her in any way, but feel she is too dependent on me. I loathe responsibility of any kind and feel horror struck by the way she relies upon me for everything. I don't want to cut off our relationship completely, but wish I could have more freedom and time to go out seducing other nubile wenches. God! I am only 20. I don't want to be stuck with one woman at my time of life! Aaarrghh! Yes, I know I'm a hard hearted, vain, self-seeking swine, but at least I admit it. Lots of you would be ten times better off if you'd only accept your own faults and vices once every so often.

Go with Mum and Dad to the Commercial - and John of course. We have a goodf night. I wish we could go out in a family group more often than we do. Dad likes us to go out with him.

-==-

Monday January 19, 1976

I'll be glad when Wednesday is over and done with and the 40,000th edition of the Yorkshire Post is out of the way. Sydney Burton and I have been buggering about with the old files now for what seems like months.

The 40,000th edition is on Wednesday which is the day before the 75th anniversary of Queen Victoria's demise, and the day after the 40th anniversary of the death of George V. It's a pity really that King George couldn't have hung on for an extra day, or on the other hand it's a shame that Queen Victoria didn't die a day earlier.

From 3pm until 5 I helped Sarah go through the YP birth columns for 1975 to discover the most popular christian names. James and Elizabeth are in the lead at the moment and I'm surprised really. Elizabeth doesn't seem particularly popular to me at all.

Kathleen says that she's been to the Henry Jenkins pub many years ago and remarks how nice it is and that it's a typical country pub.

Later: Carole rings me to say she thinks I want to finish with her and that I'm just being 'nasty' to make her finish with me first. Being a typical coward I cannot end it and say nothing when she keeps asking me if I want to stop seeing her. I inform her that I soon become bored and that I'm a restless, roving soul. She understands and concludes: "Oh, I am relieved that it's all settled and worked out for the best". Nothing is settled or worked out at all, as far as I can see.

-==-