Country Life

To commence our journey I think it’s fitting we should start off where I live, in the village of Billingborough. However it’s difficult to give you a feel of the place without first giving you it’s setting, and what a setting it is. Lincolnshire is at times a beautiful and enchanting place to live. Catch the county in the morning when the air is crisp and the birds out and it’s easy to understand why aesthetically it’s one of England’s hidden gems. It’s lack of house, hill or high-rise allows for uninterrupted views across the fens, without any distractions the mix of hues in the vista can be freely appreciated. Using Dulux as a guide (which is always fun) I think a mix of Natural Hessian, Putting Green and a cross between Striking Cyan and Mineral Mist for the sky can all be visible out of my window as I write this. I would be doing my county a disservice as well if I forgot to mention it’s inhabitants, though more at ease with fertiliser and pesticide than frappuccinos and parties they are a pleasant bunch, always ready with a helping hand and a kind smile and never short on conversation on either control of maize blight or the hunting ban (my comments about the barbaric nature of killing for sport were greeted with stony silence at the local and led to a locked door that night for fear of a Straw Dogs-style incident). However, it is completely indisputable that for the duration of a young boy’s teenage years, life in Lincolnshire is fucking shit. Now I have many opinions (as well  you know, my handsome, popular, regular readers) and my first intention for the opening to this column was to talk about Lincolnshire, and how it's unspoiled holistic lifestyle made me the man I am today. Then I realised it would only be about 250 words long, mainly compromising of different colours describing the views. But the profanities crept in, sorry dear reader but the idyllic setting of my formative years was neatly surmised by my neighbour of many years John Hall, (who may I say sports the most incredible moustache I have ever seen on a man) when he said there were only two other Halls in all of Lincolnshire “ Bugger ‘all and feck ‘all”. So hold on, here comes the vitriol.....

When talk of the county revolves around the extension to a small corner-shop in Grantham, a town twenty miles away vilified by the Crap Towns book because “the most exciting thing to come out of Grantham is the A1”, you know that life is slowly passing you by. Now I know it’s quite a common trend in our lovely British humour to disparage the places where we live or lived, but seriously, the lack of, well anything of merit or anything to write about at all that would not drive you to put down this book out of sheer apathy does lead one to a “come friendly bombs and fall on Lincolnshire” rage. I mean let’s be honest, I’m a man of both simple pleasures and mindedness, I don’t want a Starbucks or a local vintage clothing shop, Billingborough’s lack of pretension was one of the few things I enjoyed, I wanted a slide, a half decent chinese and somewhere I could buy fags. What I actually got was grief from what appeared to be the cast of Deliverance. And I don’t mean Jon Voight or Burt Reynolds. It would probably be quite nice to live in a village with those two, sitting in the pub with them hearing tales of Mission Impossible and whatever the hell Burt Reynolds has been in. 

During my formative, hormonal, fluff-covered-chin years the village’s lack of amenities or transport links to Bourne (a nearby town with a large Sainsburys I liked to frequent, an insane metropolis for me) meant that I spent most of my time in my typical male teenager room, all darkness and strange posters. But I don’t think it’s affected me too much, just let me turn down my Smiths record, my microwave meal for one is almost ready. But I hear you cry for tales of Billingborough! Well here you are dear reader. 

Billingborough has a population of nearly exactly 1000, and has done for as long as I can remember. This is probably due to the fact that no one leaves and no one enters. My house being on the crossroads and overlooking the main stretch of road allowed me to view everyday people doing what I could only wish to do, drive on past. It was of brief consolation that the cars driving past would most likely be going to either Sleaford or Grantham, nearby towns not renowned for the genetic variety of it’s inhabitants, if you know what I mean. If not let me try to clear it up by saying Sleaford and Spalding are two big, happy families. Literally. 

My bedroom window also allowed me a perfect view of the  local pub, The George and Dragon and through the pane of glass I could see every night the stumbling, slack-jawed inhabitants of the village drink themselves to oblivion merely to forget they were fortunate enough to live in Billingborough. Tempting though this was, cynical inner monologues were my drug of choice. It was not uncommon to view this blogger as a young boy strolling the streets of the village, imagining himself as an Alex Delarge figure, plotting his teenage takeover of the world, targeting the co-op first, while in reality merely mumbling to himself and oiling his crossbow, without the necessary bolts after them being confiscated by his well-meaning parents ( mum, if you’re reading this- shooting you in the neck was an accident, I swear) (and if it wasn’t an accident then maybe you shouldn’t have taken away my Playstation controller, eh? ). Billingborough was the perfect setting for all your humble narrator’s criminal mastermind tendencies and fantasies, I was king of the town, I ruled this joint..... until I came home one day to see my the few friends I had in the village swiftly exiting my garage with my bike, you little shits. Who’s laughing now though Dennis Stevens? Me, while I sip that lovely middle class smoothie that we all love these days whilst tapping away at the new Mac, or you, serving time at her Majesty’s pleasure, and I don’t mean invited to the royal wedding. More long teenage brooding and bitterer internal ramblings turned to jottings. But don’t worry dear readers, I was no Manson in the making. It actually turns out that on certain websites cynical, outrage-filled blogs are actually devoured by the readers, would you credit it?