Yesterday we saw some wonderful sights in North West London. It was #VintageBusDay. I didn't know this until I saw an immaculately decked out 240 Routemaster bus in Mill Hill Broadway station. I felt a real buzz of excitement and much to the embarrassment of my son, who was with me, started to take pictures, which I posted on Instagram
My son was bemused by my excitement. I explained that I used to get the 240 to school at St Vincents on the Ridgeway and they used these buses. I then realised that, although he went to St Vincents, he never took the bus. I recall the excitement, when the old, clapped out Routemasters were replaced with shiny new buses, that were square and had automatic doors. I seemed like the future had arrived. The excitement didn't last. I soon felt nostalgic for the old buses, with their open platforms and their bus conductors. I did a google and the date was 16th January 1971. I'd have been eight years old. I vividly recall the last time I ever rode a Routemaster on a regular route, rather than a heritage day. It was the day of the 7/7 bombings. I was doing some work at Debenhams head office on Oxford St. As the horror of the bombings unfolded, I found I was stranded. I ended up working to Swiss Cottage, then took a 13 bus to Golders Green. This was still being worked by a Routemaster. I then got a 240 home. I felt a pang of guilt, as I genuinely enjoyed that journey.
When I see a Routemaster now, I think of the 7/7 bombing. Had that not happened, I would think of St Vincents, but it was a vivid day. On the 240 bus, I bumped into an old school mate from Orange Hill. I'd not seen him for years. What both he and I didn't know at the time, was that his sister had been on one of the bombed tube trains and she'd lost her legs. We had a good old chit chat, in blissful ignorance. A week later, someone said to me "Have you heard about Grant's sister". I was deeply shocked.
My initial joy at seeing the Routemaster stirred up all of these feelings. The past is a strange place. We tend to remember what we want to remember. Yesterday was Mothers day and on Saturday I wrote about how it is a difficult day for me. Nostalgia is a very dangerous thing. When we think of the 60's and the 70's, it is nice to recall the Routemasters, the flair footballers such as Stan Bowles, Rodney Marsh and George Best, James Bond's DB6. It is really easy to buy into the idea that everything was wonderful then and it's all gone wrong now. The truth is far more difficult. It really wasn't so wonderful. The cancer my mother in 1970 was one that killed everyone who had it. She was unique in surviving a total gastrectomy in 1970. Her surgeon, Mr Phillip King, told her in 1984, that she was the only person on the planet, who had the operation then, that was still alive. Now there are treatments and people live. Given the choice between a pretty bus and my Mum, I know which I'd choose.
As this decade progresses, it become more like a version of the 1970's by the day. In 1974 Labour won an election to replace a failing Tory government, that had lost the plot. The Middle East was in turmoil, with a war starting the year before. There was a cold war in the East with us all scared about Soviet expansion. The UK economy was in a mess, after an energy crisis. Racism and anti immigrant hostility was on the rise, following Idi Amin's expulsion of Kenyan Indians. The parallels are almost uncanny.
I suspect that in 1973/4, as we had three day week and the lights going out, the idea that anyone may look back on the 70's with fond nostalgia, would seen insane. That is the trouble with the past though, you can never quite escape it. In fact, no matter how awful it really was, it seems we don't really want to, even if we could.
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