大象传媒

ONE LITTLE PIGGY

This story is not a fairy story for children.

It is written to give one a mental picture of a situation that to my mind needs to be addressed so that children can grow up to be normal and loving and not turn into a Jekyll and Hyde character.
I like to think I am normal and loving.

I am not an authority on bringing up children but my Wife Joyce is, since she has raised five and they are a credit to her.
But from what I experienced as a child I would like to hope it would not happen to some other youngster.

I was born in the front room of a house on the corner of Brigg Rd opposite the George Hotel and near the Wheat Sheaf pub.
While still an infant and like a newly built computer I had a brain, but as yet it was not programmed, and since it had not been set up nothing registered, in other words I remember nothing about that particular house since my most urgent activities were centred on sucking on a teat and falling asleep.

I was also unaware when we moved to a place called Thornton Abbey in Lincolnshire.
It was in the Farm Labourer鈥檚 cottage that nestled in front of a fruit orchard about a quarter of a mile from Thornton Abbey Railway Station I became aware of the green hedges around the house and the cat, and animals in the field, and the pond across the road, the heat of the sun and the wind in my face.

In other words I was now programming my own brain and remembering things and storing them, and I don't care if you say, "Bull" but I can remember feeding from a bottle among other things.
Later I began to get teeth and got another whack across the head for biting the hole in the teat that had become blocked due to the powdered milk not being mixed properly.

The hole in the teat would be so small or the powder that made up the milk was not properly mixed and a small lump of dried milk would block the hole so I would bite it to break it up.
Sometimes the teat on the bottle would split, and the next yuck would cause me to gag.
I would gasp for breath as I almost drowned, but once I recovered it now did not make my mouth so sore sucking and getting nowhere.
But my mother was awake, and although my Father could more or less down a pint without swallowing it wasn't long before she realised I was a chip off the old block, but even with a vacuum cleaner stuck in me gob there was a no way could I empty a warm bottle of milk with the standard issue teat on it that quick.
Thus a new teat was fitted onto the bottle and I was back to square one.

As I got older I was put in a cot and my elder sister was in another cot in the same room.
One day my Mum put a book in my cot, why? I couldn't even read yet.
As soon as the door closed I got bored just looking at it so I tore out all the pages and they were very thin pages, a Bible I think, and on seeing the pages all over the floor someone who had just entered the room whacked me across the head and I was screamed at, "Naughty boy."
"Well what else did they expect since I knew it was not for eating, and since there were no more pages to tear out I didn't know what to do with the cover so I threw it at my Sister.
She had been standing gurgling in her cot, but now she was crying.

Someone came into the room and my sister said between sobs, "Bla bla bibibbla yuk sob bibla" so that someone who listened and translated all that rubbish, then picked up the book cover, and I got another whack across the nut.
It could not have been my Mum because she never spoke in Arabic.

As time dragged on I got more teeth, and little books with coloured pictures in them depicting cows, horses, rabbits etc, and later I got a book with, 鈥淭he Three Little Pigs鈥� in it, and although I could not read it my Mother did read it to me, and I was enchanted, and that book was always under my pillow.

My mother would read stories of Mother Rabbit and her offspring and soon I was a Mother Rabbit fan as well, and as I got older I would climb through the back fence into a field and play with little rabbits, I found that if one laid still and have lots of shush then baby rabbits will come to one and they are a lot of fun.
One day a stoat got one of the baby rabbits and its cries were pitiful, but I was afraid of the stoat so there was nothing I could do.

I was growing up in a world of flowers in the garden, and blue skies with fleecy clouds, and green fields sprinkled with buttercups and daisies.
I would lie down and animals would come to me and skylarks way up in the sky would be singing their hearts out and it was a wonderful world.

A bit later in the piece I overheard my Dad telling my Mum I was the best liar he had ever come across.

Being isolated it was sometimes a bit of a novelty to see someone we did not know. The Postman and the Farmer were about the only two people our dog never barked at as they passed by our gate so we lived in our own little world.

I was maybe four years old and I had been in the field playing chasing with the rabbits.
I would chase them then they would chase me and we had us a right old time, when I noticed my Father coming up the lane with a bundle in his arms and when he got indoors he gave the bundle to Mum and she put this tiny piglet into a blanket in a basket near the fire, and Mum stayed up all night feeding it from a baby bottle once every hour, and Mum saved it's life.

As soon as I clapped eyes on that little pig (it was one out of my book or so I thought) so it was up to me to make sure it was safe and I looked after it because I had a horrible feeling of the Stoat getting into the house and getting the little pig, so I was always making sure the door to outside was shut.
That little pig grew a bit bigger and we became the best of friends, it would chase me round the back garden then I would chase it and sometimes when I collapsed with laughing at its antics it would run over to me and lay down beside me with a happy squeal.

One day the Farmer was passing in his pony and trap, and he pulled up and got out of the trap and walking through our five barred gate to the back garden he doffed his cap to my Mum who was in the garden doing a bit of weeding, then he walked over to the pig sty and had a look at Doris (the pig)

Just then my Dad came out of the house and on seeing the Farmer said " What d'yu think tu Doris then Mr Daley,?" and the Farmer smiled and said " I think you have a very industrious Wife Barker"
My Dad said "Ah meant 't pig," and turning and pointing to Mum weeding in the garden, 鈥淭hat's me Missus Annie鈥� he grinned

The Farmer turned and doffed his cap to me Mum and smiled, "I do beg y' pardon Maam" he warbled"
We would go down the hedgerows in summer and the pig would forage and I would sit on a log and wait, then the pig would look up and I would get up and run and the pig would chase me all the way back home.

But each year the pig got bigger and soon it was too big to run round after me.
But I would still rub behind the ears and she would squeal with delight.

A bloke from the village was passing on the way to the railway station one day and seeing Dad in the garden enquired "'ow's 't pig Charlie" and Dad answered "Cum in an' aye a luk"(Come in and have a look).

The bloke from the village gasped on seeing Doris and he asked, "Is that saem wrecklin' as yu gor off John Daley?"
Dad stuck his thumbs in the armholes of his waist coat and rocked on his heels with a satisfied smirk on his face and warbled, "Aye, an ah鈥檒 tell thee summat else, ah ent bin feedin 'er nowt else but swill an' a bit o' meal."
"Mind yu," he added, "Mah Missus gor 'er goin' tu start wi鈥�, an' mebbies an odd Guinness Stout noo an鈥� aggin!

"So what du yu reckon she wud weigh in at then?" asked our village friend, and my Dad looked at Doris then after awhile he ventured, "Thick end o' twenty stone ah shouldn't wunder app'n?"
"As much as that?" mused our visitor.

Then one day Dad took the pig for a walk down to the Farm and the next day he brought her back and told me to not let her out again into the garden.
鈥淪he 鈥榓s got tu stay in her sty from now on鈥� was all I could glean from my Father.
Later that year as I wandered past the sty one day I discovered the sty was a hive of activity.
Little pigs were running and squealing everywhere.

The sow had a litter of piglets and I was told not to go into the sty, " she may bite you " I was told.
I thought she wouldn't, but not wanting a thick ear for disobedience I always stood outside and reached in to rub her back and she loved it.
I became aware that something was different when my Mum said, "You will have to learn to leave the pig alone a bit more Thomas, she is not little any more and she can't be here forever."
It was like being dowsed with icy water, life without Doris? Dad was going to sell her?
And I pondered this for a long time, but every day I went to the pigsty and Doris was still there so I didn't worry anymore and forgot what my Mum had said.

Then one Saturday I was in the back garden and I saw a motor van pull up outside our back gate.
A man got out and he walked into our back gate and I ran in to tell my Mum but she said, " It's alright your Dad knows him."

Being curious I watched him as he unloaded what looked like a small table with a pair of handles at each end, also an oblong wooden bathtub.

鈥淎h thought I, they are going to give Doris a bath鈥�

Placing these items on the garden the van man went into the barn and secured a rope and pulley from the cross-beam.

Then he went round to the pig sty and putting a rope round Doris's nose so she could not bite and grabbing hold of the tail he was steering her toward the barn.
Doris was squealing her head off as my Dad showed up.
I thought, 鈥淕ood! now my dad would rip the blokes arm off and beat him to death with it.鈥�

I experienced my first real surprise when Dad actually grinned at the bloke and Dad helped to get the now squealing struggling pig into the barn and standing behind her so she could not back up he helped the bloke tied the rope to a beam.
The van bloke then went out to the back of his van and donned a blue and white butchers apron and a leather belt with some knives in it.
Grabbing what looked like a pickaxe with a short spike on one side and a heavy hammerhead on the other side, he came back into the barn.

Then he put one leg over the pig's neck and bringing both legs together so now the pig could not move her head sideways.
The pig was still struggling and I was crying and my Dad was shouting at my Mum "Get that bloody kid away from 'ere".
Mum came over and tried to drag me away but I evaded her and she was suddenly caught up by this murderous drama.
She stood with her arm round me as if to shield me as the man lifted the hammer cum pick on high.

It was paused for a second then it came hurtling down and with a sickening thud four inches of steel spike entered the pigs head between the eyes, and the legs of the pig instantly splayed out, and she was dead.
This all happened so quickly.

When it sank in what had happened I was rooted to the spot as I watched the Butcher make a slit in the pig鈥檚 throat and the blood gushed out from the body, and I noticed this was caught in a bucket so nothing was wasted.
But suddenly I was too busy being sick to see what else was happening.

I remember the Butcher shouting at Dad to get me away from the scene and my Mum with her arm round me fending off my Dad because he had raced across to us with a gleaming sharp knife in his hand and a wild look in his eyes.

The last I saw of Doris was a lifeless almost white body on the short table and the butcher had hold of one front leg moving it back and forth to get all the blood from the body.
I then became aware of my Mother holding my hand in front of the fire in the kitchen and saying something like it has to happen to all pigs there is nothing we can do about it.
Then I saw the back door of the house open and my Father stood there like Frankenstein鈥檚 Monster.
I snatched my hand away and ran to the front door and outside and across the road and got down in the rushes that were growing out of the pond.
I felt like I had been betrayed by my Mother, she knew how I felt about animals yet here was I belonging to a group that killed them, and she had let this happen.

From my hiding place I could see my Father now stopped at the front gate and he was looking up and down the lane then he was joined by my Mum who asked my Dad if he could see me.

鈥淟ittle bugger鈥檚 probably run off tu hide in Thornton Abbey, but 鈥榚鈥檒l be 鈥榦me as soon as 鈥榚 gets 鈥榰ngry, app鈥檔?鈥�

Then a nute decided to climb out of the smelly mud and up my leg and I was out of that pond so fast that both Mum and Dad were in tears of laughter as they tried to flick the nute from my leg.

I would go round to the now empty sty, all the piglets had been sold.
Smart man my Dad, he could always get another weakling (the weakest piglet in the litter which usually died) for free from the Farmer's pigs.
I began to learn to live with my newly acquired information.

But to add insult to injury my Dad came home one evening and informed my Mum that a rabbit was hanging in the barn and he would skin it tomorrow.
"An' if'n ah catch yu in't barn yung' un ah'll skin yu alive, gor it" "ans'er mi' w'en ah鈥檓 talkin' tu yuz, dammit".
"A quiet yes Dad" from me, and he would disappear, probably to the pub in the village.

Two days later we sat down to dinner and guess what rabbit pie, with potatoes, green peas, gravy.
I sat at the table and looked at the severed leg that had once been on an animal running wild and free.
"You eat it, cos yu get nothin else till yu do" said my Dad.
Mum was upset "I'll make him a rice pudding"
"Naw yu don't, 'e don't eat that 'e don't eat nowt".
So for the next two days I made my mind up I would wait my Dad out, but my Mum spoilt it by giving me biscuits when Dad was at work.

I began to think that what the man and my Dad had done had caused an upset in nature because the leaves were all turning red and yellow and brown and some trees in our orchard were dying until Mum reassured me, "No, it happens every year" but where was the sky lark now and the little rabbits were no where to be seen and it was getting cold, the buttercups and daisies had all gone and it was like a different world, as if nature was bitter at what my Dad had done and was going to slowly do something about it. Then it began to snow and the pond was covered with ice.

I got to be five years old and the sun came out again.
Lots of little rabbits began to run around.
But now they would not come and play, as if they knew I belonged to the group that killed them, and I felt very bitter about that, but I was taken to school and it was time to grow up a bit more.

Tom Barker Born 23 May 1921

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