Today is the day when millions of students get their GSCE exam results. For some, it will be a life defining day. Restaurants will be full of families celebrating and bedrooms will be full of children crying. It is fair to say that I massively underachieved. There were mitigations. I was an undiagnosed dyslexic which practically means I read at about 2/3rds the speed that people with a non dyslexic brain do. In a timed exam situation, that was a massive disadvantage. I have heard ignorant people saying that it is unfair on 'normal kids' for dyslexics etc to have more time. I think that is ridiculous. In fact I think the concept of timed exams is ridiculous full stop. Exams are meant to be a test of intelligence. In truth, they are more a test of ability to cope with pressure and stress. As I was undiagnosed, when I did things like English exams, I could never understand why everyone finished before me. I'd score higher in the questions I answered, but not complete papers. I got nine O Levels eventually. Of those, seven were grade C and 2 were grade B. The grade B's were in decoration and design and RE. When I learned I was dyslexic and that people now get longer, I do wonder what I'd get now? But it was what it was. Although nine sounds impressive, that was in two attempts.
I wanted to go to University at the time. Not because I was interested in the topic, but because I wanted the Uni social life. My sister Caroline went to Westfield college and had a blast. They had a cheap bar with bands on. I now recognise that I was doing it for all the wrong reasons. When I got appalling A level results, I was not upset. I went out with some mates to watch a gig at Dingwalls, met a Swedish girl and invited myself to Stockholm for six months. It was the best thing I ever did. Having lived in another country, not in an expat environment, I realised that the UK is not the centre of the world for most of its population. They view us as a bit of an oddity. The Swedes thought us incredibly socially backward. The most terrible thing was that after being there for a couple of months and getting to understand how their society worked, I realised that they were right.
You may wonder what particularly I saw. Firstly they had a grown up attitude to sex and sex education. Girls were taught rather useful things such as "boys can become very unpredictable when they get sexually activated". They were properly taught about contraception, STD's and also about the anatomy and process of sex. This did not make them promiscuous, it made them well equipped to make good decisions. There was no social stigma around girls taking condoms on a night out. The attitude was practical and pragmatic. If a guy wants sex and you are not taking the pill, make him put a condom on.
I recall sex education lessons at FCHS, which was a Catholic school. We were told almost nothing. Condoms were banned by the Church. so we were told that contraception was evil. It was quite ridiculous. I was given the third degree by the headmaster for handing out leaflets about contraception in a religious debate about the subject.
My headmaster at FCHS informed me that I would never amount to anything. He told me that people with my attitude end up sleeping in the gutter. You may think that would be devastating, I took it in my stride, because I thought he was an idiot. Now I am coming up to my 64th birthday, I can honestly say that he was wrong. Of course it may all go wrong now, we can't see the future, but I have achieved all of the things I wanted in life. If I dropped dead tomorrow and my life flashed before my eyes, I'd see three kids who are wonderful and have done well. I'd see a 31 year marriage, I'd see a world famous music studio built from nothing. I'd see a band that had been heard by millions of people and done numerous well received gigs. I'd see financial security for the family. I'd see a blog that has had over eleven and a half million views. To quote Frank Sinatra "regrets, I've had a few, but then again, too few to mention".
So that day, back in 1978, when I went up to get my results and had the shock of seeing my failure written large on the wall, was nothing more than a temporary setback. If your children do not get the grades they wanted, it is not the end, it just means that they are taking a different fork in the road to the one you wanted. Who knows. It may lead to The Promised Land and the one you wanted for them, may have just been to a life of miserable drudgery, living someone else's dream.
Why not come and celebrate my birthday with me on Sunday. If you do, please stop and have a chat. Click on the image for more details.
The False Dots next Gig
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