Life and Laughing: My Story (11 page)

Steve was young, more
Point Break
than
Donnie Darko.
He was an aspiring painter in the artistic sense but was painting in the painter/decorator sense to make ends meet. He grew up in Brixton with its predominantly West Indian community. He spoke in Jive as a party trick. His father was an electrician and his mother a dental nurse. On his first day of school he wore shorts, not knowing that the ‘all boys should wear shorts’ rule was ignored by every other boy at the school. This trouser-length faux pas led to him being ridiculed and locked all day in the cupboard that housed the fuse boxes and electrical meters. When Steve finally made it home, his father asked, ‘How was your first day at school?’

‘Much like your day at work, Dad, except I didn’t have a torch,’ he replied. The following day, now wearing trousers, he approached the largest of the bullies who had locked him up and punched him in the mouth, knocking several teeth out.

The father of his now front-toothless victim squared up to Steve’s father at the end of school. ‘Hey, your kid has knocked my kid’s teeth out.’

‘What do you want me to do about it? I’m an electrician,’ was Steve’s father’s now legendary response. ‘You want my wife for that. She’ll book you in for an appointment with the dentist.’

For all the punching in the stomach and ‘history of violence’ on his first day at school, Steve was and is the gentlest man I have ever met. He likes stamp-collecting and bird-watching and is extraordinarily passive and sweet-natured. Lucy and I liked him immediately. You might have expected the opposite reaction. Here was a man breaking up my family. But I didn’t see it that way. My parents were so unsuited to each other. It was now warfare. The last thing I wanted was for them to be together. How can two people who hate each other make a happy home?

Lucy and me hanging out with Patrick Swayze (Steve) on a summer’s day, reading magazines and killing ants.

Our Golders Green house was built in the 1930s. It required some work, but Steve was determined to do it all himself, not just to save money but also because his new girlfriend had a history of sleeping with contracted builders. It was detached with four bedrooms, a small kitchen, small living room, dining room and one bathroom. It was perfect for a young Jewish family. The main drawback was that none of us were Jewish. My mother’s father was Jewish (remember Laszlo, the Hungarian scientist whose sister’s son was Uncle Peter, the guy who gassed himself in the face?), but one Jewish relative is not enough to make you particularly welcome in the neighbourhood.

Although the house was a good size for the money, He-Man builder Steve could easily do any work necessary, and though it was only about two miles from our old Hampstead house, it was like moving abroad. I felt a bit like Harrison Ford in
Witness
. Golders Green is properly Orthodox Jewish. Everyone has skullcaps, long hair with side-curls, all black clothing and Volvos. Volvos are very popular with Jewish people; they refuse to buy German cars (with good reason) so BMWs, Mercedes, Audis, Volkswagens and Porsches are all out of the question. There are of course many other good-quality cars that aren’t German, but everybody in Golders Green seems to go for the Swedish Volvo. The Volvo, of course, is famed for being the safest and strongest vehicle on the road, so if they saw a Nazi, they could run him over with minimal risk to themselves.

I don’t think we did ourselves many favours when we first arrived in my mother’s new BMW 3-Series with Kraftwerk playing on the stereo. Adjacent to our new home was some outside space, a park that my mother christened ‘Dog Shit Park’. She told the neighbours she’d christened it ‘Dog Shit Park’, but they just slammed the door: ‘We don’t believe in Christ.’ The council wasn’t as stringent with dog fouling in those days. In the mid-eighties most of the dogs didn’t even have collars, as all the punks were wearing them.

Golders Green’s high street was an excellent shopping parade, if you’re kosher. There are shops and bakeries that not only seem to have been there since the beginning of time, but have the same people in them. Grodzinski’s was a coffee shop that had the same collection of old Jewish ladies, in the same seats, sipping the same coffee, every time I walked past. The high street seems to be in some kind of a time warp. Chains of shops would go out of business elsewhere but remain open in Golders Green. I think today there are still a C&A, Wimpy, Cecil Gee, Woolworths and Our Price.

The best thing about Golders Green, and the reason I still go back, is the I. Warman-Freed chemist. Most chemists keep regular business hours. Boots, for example, is usually open from 8.30 a.m. to 6 p.m. So you have to fall ill, or require any form of medication or remedy, between these hours. If you have a cold sore and want to adhere to the advert that tells you to buy Zovirax ‘at the first sign of tingling’, you can’t outside certain times. In fact between 6 p.m. and 8.30 a.m., every ailment known to man must be treated with Nurofen from the petrol station or a visit to Casualty. It’s a wonder this situation is tolerated. Well, there is one group of people who would never tolerate such a state of affairs. Jews. Which is why smack-bang in the middle of Golders Green Road is I. Warman-Freed, the all-night chemist. I don’t know who I. Warman-Freed was, but he certainly understood the neuroses of Jewish people. You know when the
Harry Potter
books are released and people of all ages queue around the block? Well, the I. Warman-Freed pharmacy counter is like that twenty-four hours a day.

During the week, I lived in Golders Green in what felt like an FBI witness relocation ‘safe house’. On the weekends Lucy and I would stay with our dad in his temporary accommodation. Strangely, it’s from this point on that my memories of my father are much stronger. He was obviously very busy with work prior to the divorce, but now in his ‘weekend dad’ capacity, he made the most of our time together. Being apart from his kids was heartbreaking for him and he desperately wanted to make us feel we had a new home with him as well as in Israel – sorry, Golders Green. Seemingly within minutes of his separation from my mother, there was a new lady in his life.

While my mother was being romanced in plaster of Paris by Steve in scenes not dissimilar to the film
Ghost
, my father had met a twenty-seven-year-old Floridian sweetheart during his frequent visits to America. I’m not aware of the details; all I remember is that Lucy and I went to visit him in his rented cottage, and there she was, Holly Hughes.

The best way accurately to describe Holly is that she was ‘American’. She had rosy cheeks and wore leggings with baggy T-shirts. She was bubbly and confident and in love with my dad. It was extraordinary, after some home renovations and a business trip, I suddenly had two mums and two dads. Holly had been working in the music business and from what I remember had been very successful.

She brought American culture into my life for the first time. I say ‘culture’; I mean ‘food’. Holly introduced us children to a standard of eating that would have had Jamie Oliver pressing charges. ‘Jiffy Pop’ was a highlight; this was basically a saucepan-shaped package that you heated on the hob until it created a big aluminium (a word she couldn’t pronounce) balloon filled with popcorn. ‘Sloppy Joes’ were a lowlight; these were hamburger buns covered in a sort of super-sweet Bolognese sauce. I don’t know who ‘Sloppy Joe’ was, but he was almost certainly clinically obese, and so would Lucy and I have been if our dad had won custody. In general, Lucy and I loved Holly’s weekend cooking, and her hot chocolate is the best I’ve ever tasted.

This split lifestyle that Lucy and I were leading had some major perks. My dad was definitely trying to make up for his enforced absence by spoiling us. He bought us top-of-the-range BMXs to explore the Hertfordshire countryside. My metallic blue Raleigh Burner was the love of my life thus far. Lucy and I were kitted out with all the latest cycling accessories: helmets, gloves, knee and elbow pads, flashing lights and sirens. We looked like something from outer space. I actually think some of the local farmers reported alien sightings.

My dad was certainly flush with cash at this point, and apart from our lavish divorce-inspired gifts he purchased himself a gorgeous silver BMW 635 CSI. I don’t know what the ‘CSI’ stood for, but it was top of the range and had something to do with making it go faster – either that or the previous owner was murdered in it. The major excitement about his new car was that it had a phone in it. Nowadays, everyone has a phone on them all the time. But in 1984 it was tremendously state of the art. People saw car phones as the future of technology (the Carphone Warehouse did, but they now sell as many car phones as Blockbuster Video sells videos).

My dad’s car phone was the envy of all my friends, and all his friends for that matter. It was long and sleek and sat proudly next to the handbrake. Unfortunately, it was also about the same size as the handbrake, which led to dangerous mishaps. When the phone rang, he would pick up the handbrake by mistake, sending the car into a spin. Or he would stop on a hill, reach for the handbrake, but pick up the phone by mistake and roll into the car behind. The phone itself barely had a signal, and when he got one the conversation would only last long enough for him to say he was in the car. ‘Hi, I’m in the car, I’m on the car pho– Hello?’ It was basically a device for informing people he was driving.

My sister and I loved his BMW 6-Series. On a Friday afternoon, Daddy would pick us up from school in his magnificent sports saloon. We would hurtle up the M1 motorway at law-breaking speeds. Lucy and I would pick cars ahead of us to overtake while I would be shouting out our speed, ‘116, 117 … 120 miles an hour!’ It’s only looking back that I realize just how dangerous this was, not to mention highly illegal. I know it sounds strange, but our dad was using the car to bond with us. He was desperate. He had lost his kids for five days of the week, and he had to make up ground, at 120 miles per hour. He had to cram a lot into his two days and wanted to make us happy. So if that involved expensive presents and treating the motorway like a Grand Prix track, so be it.

My father and me in his BMW 635 CSI. As much as I loved his car, notice my subtle hints for an upgrade.

The BMW 6-Series happened to be my mum’s dream car. She had a 3-Series, but every time we drove past a 6-Series, she would state her intent: ‘I love that car, I want one.’ She likes cars, my mum. In general, she’s a pretty good driver, despite the lack of seat belt and occasional magazine-reading. Where her driving falls down, however, is at the set of traffic lights on the Finchley Road at the junction with West End Lane. Her misunderstanding of the filter light system resulted in three collisions in the very same place.

The insurance company kept saying to her, ‘You’ve already told us about this accident.’

To which she would shamefully reply, ‘I’m sorry, I’ve done it again.’ Unfortunately, this junction was on the school run. Lucy and I would have to brace for impact twice a day.

Even though things were tight financially and Steve was searching for a more substantial job, when my mother received some money from her late father’s estate, she decided to blow it on a BMW 6-Series. The problem was that she only had £7,000 to spend. My dad’s 6-Series had cost closer to £25,000. Thanks to
Autotrader
or
Loot
or something of that ilk, we found one for £6,995. It was a light blue 633i with plenty of miles on the clock and fewer extras than my BMX Raleigh Burner, but it was a 6-Series (although it may have been two 3-Series welded together). It was perfect. We spent the £5 change on petrol and went on one of those ‘new car drives’ where you aren’t actually going anywhere, just cruising around. Unfortunately, because we lived in London, we got stuck in roadworks for an hour and a half and reached a top speed of 7 mph. Typical.

The sensible decision was taken not to tell my grandmother about the 6-Series. Her reaction would not have been: ‘Good vor you, luvely car, fuel injection, wery classy, you deserve, mast get burglar gassing device, very populer in Hungaaary.’ It would more likely have been: ‘You blow money on ztupid car, you vasters, I will cut you out of my vill.’ She tended to use her money as a weapon, and threatened to cut us out of her ‘vill’ about every thirty to forty minutes. ‘Michael, come end give yur grenny a hug, or I vill cut you out of my vill.’ ‘These kerritz are burned, Kati, I vill cut you out of my vill.’