The End of History?

It’s a cold Tuesday morning and I’m hanging around in Colchester with an hour to spare before I can get a bus to the small village of Great Wenham, where I'm due to collect a car to deliver to Peterborough.

I’ve walked up to the castle, on the edge of the town centre, and am looking around the grounds.

Colchester castle dates back to the eleventh century and boasts the largest Norman keep in the country, not so much because of the ambition of the architects but because it was built around an even older building – the Roman temple of Claudius.





The castle was originally four stories high, but the top two are long gone now, not due to the ravages of time or warfare, but due to the actions of a certain John Wheeler, a local businessman who purchased the place from the Crown in 1629 with the sole intention of demolishing it to sell the rubble to local builders. However by the time the upper two stories had been knocked down he had concluded that he would not make a profit from the enterprise after all and abandoned it.

The absence of the top half of the castle did not prevent the Royalists from holing up there for a twelve week siege during the civil war, in 1648. A small obelisk now marks the spot where their generals were executed following their surrender to the Parliamentarians.





Three years earlier, Matthew Hopkins, the Witchfinder General himself, had also concluded that there was enough of the building left for him to make use of as a prison in which to hold and interrogate suspected witches. Anyone who has seen the classic 1968 film starring Vincent Price, then in his fifties, might be surprised to learn that Hopkins was only twenty five when he began his witch hunting career. He died just two years later in uncertain circumstances, by which time he and his partner John Stearne had been responsible for the deaths of twenty three women. In a strange echo of modern times, Hopkins' interrogations were hampered by the fact that torture was unlawful, meaning that he had to resort to such tactics as sleep deprivation and the 'swimming test' which involved determining whether the suspect would sink or float in holy water.

The castle was acquired by the local council in the 1930s and went through various restoration and repair projects to arrive at its present state. Now that it is considered part of our national heritage and worthy of preservation, it's easy to think that this must place a full stop at the end of its history, but who knows? Maybe sooner or later someone else with big ideas will get hold of it again for better or worse.

The Age When Life Begins?

It's just after nine in the morning and I'm sat in a dealership in Sheffield doing some paperwork while I wait for someone from sales to check a car in for me.

Last week I wrote about being stuck at Colchester station and not minding because so many other people were stuck there too. Yesterday I found myself there again. I had dropped a car off in Southend on Sea and had to make my way to a compound at an old airfield near the village of Great Wenham, about ten miles from Colchester. Basically this involved a train from Southend to Colchester and then a bus ride. I had asked the office to give me something towards the £13 train fare. Such requests are prone to unpredictable results. Often you will get half the fare, sometimes you will get all of it, and occasionally you will get nothing but an accusation of greed or even blackmail thrown back at you. I was therefore surprised when they immediately offered me the whole fare.

I arrived at Colchester station and then set off to walk into town for the bus, putting my train ticket in the barrier at the station exit and watching it disappear. I vaguely regretted this as it would be one less ticket to include in my tax return at the end of January. I never for one moment remembered that I would also need it to claim the fare back from the office, even though they had only agreed to do this about an hour ago.

At various times throughout the rest of the day I would remember that I was due this fare back and would feel rather happy for a few moments.

It is only this morning while I'm sat in this dealership in Sheffield, tidying up my paperwork, that it has occurred to me that I won't be able to claim the fare back. I have known all along that I didn't have the ticket and also known that I would need it, but have never until now combined these two facts to produce a conclusion.

The problem with all of this is that I turn forty next week and am finding it hard not to see such cerebral lapses as part of an inevitable mental decline.

My next collection is only half a mile from here and I set off to walk. This part of Sheffield seems to be mainly populated by university students, mostly young women full of casually dressed confidence. I walk past a couple locked in a tight embrace and kissing with what seems to me to be a deliberate noisiness. It's only nine thirty in the morning for fuck's sake. I am getting old.

Delays and Good Deeds

It's just after ten in the morning and I'm at Colchester station along with a lot of other people who did not think they would still be here at this time. There is a major signaling problem in the region and there are currently no trains departing from any of the six platforms. Strangers have started talking to each other, bemoaning the delay and passing on scraps of information gleaned from beleaguered station staff.

 

An old lady is on the phone to a relative, arranging to be picked up, and asks me for advice about where we actually are. We are at Colchester station, although this simple statement of fact could be misleading as there is also a Colchester Town station which is more central but less useful as there are fewer direct trains from there to most other destinations. I help her to resolve the confusion and she seems happy enough.

 

There have been no raised voices or unbecoming outbursts. If anything the atmosphere feels more relaxed and jovial than normal. If just one or two services had been disrupted then things might have been different, but because we are all in the same boat it is impossible to feel that it is 'just your luck'

 

I had been sitting on a train which I was told would probably eventually be leaving for Ipswich, halfway to my intended destination of Diss. But now apparently it is certainly eventually going somewhere else and I have come to sit at the far end of the platform, alone except for a young guy with a mountain bike.

 

A smartly dressed young woman wanders down looking around her in a faintly confused way.

'If you're looking for the ladies it's back that way,' the young guy tells her and then directs her to an alcove at the other end of the platform. She thanks him and goes back the way she came.

 

A couple of minutes later a more casually dressed, middle aged woman appears. She looks around, gives the door to the disabled toilets a half-hearted push and finds it locked. The young guy steps into the breach again and directs her back. I get the impression that this may be his regular good deed of the day.

 

There are now one or two sluggish departures taking place and the young guy disappears towards a train bound for Harwich. Inevitably, a couple of minutes after he has gone another lady in search of the ladies walks down towards me, looks at the disabled toilets and then looks around in puzzlement. Unfortunately, apart from something to do with an alcove I can't remember any of the guy's directions, which I think shows a commendable lack of interest in such things on my part, but is no help to this latest victim of some misleading sign somewhere. I stay silent and she gives up and goes back up the platform.

 

A few minutes later a train to Diss finally arrives and I'm on my way, over an hour late but somehow not unhappy at all about it.