Sunday July 5^th 1975

It is  Sunday, July 5^th, 1975. I am 9 years old, and in the garden with Dad, Jane and Jeff. It’s a warm day. We have been there  all day. Perhaps it was the first Sunday of the school holidays, which were 8 weeks long.

I see Mum coming excitedly to the top of the garden from the house. She is wearing flowing clothes, possible a kaftan-style thing, probably self made, and is beaming as she says: “Arthur Ashe has won Wimbledon!!”.  Mum was not a massive sports fan, and even though  everyone followed the Wimbledon championships then, It was unusual for her to be so enthused by it, which shows the significance of the event, Arthur Ashe becoming the first black man to ever win Wimbledon.  He had also been a massive underdog in the final, playing Jimmy Connors, the clear favourite.  Mum explained the significance of Ashes victory to us and I took that in.

Over the next few years I gradually watched a bit more of Wimbledon; this was , I would say, a glorious era for tennis, with Bjorn Borg, Connors, Nastatse etc. A few years later, McEnroe came on the scene. They still used the small wooden rackets, that did not have the power of modern rackets, so there was more scope for subtle, skilful rallies.

Other anniversaries:

Mum was very excited by the Arthur Ashe result, as she always was when relaying news of major world events.

 I faintly recall her telling us about the death of Elvis Presley  on August 16, 1977, without really knowing who Elvis was.

 I remember vividly the morning of Tuesday December 9, 1980; John Lennon had been shot the previous night. Mum came into my room, to wake me as usual at 8am, and told me the news. I was indifferent to the news; I thought Mum was overreacting in some way.

To Mum, having got married, moved abroad and had three children during the era of the Beatles , the death of Lennon must have been momentous, huge. The story was all over the news that day. We learnt that Lennon was shot on the pavement by a lone gunman, some kind of nutter.  For me, completely self absorbed and not particularly happy at that time, life just moved on, unchanging.