Life with Mister Porter

‘We’re having a bundle, 3A1 against 3A2 at break time.’

‘What?’

‘A bundle? You know, a fight, us against 3A2. It’ll be a laugh.’

I knew what a bundle was; I just couldn’t believe what I was hearing. Me in a bundle? Not bloody likely. I had as many mates in 3A2 as I had in my own class. I didn’t want to fight them… or anybody else.

The more I heard the more worrying it got and it didn’t need two guesses to work out who was behind the idea. It was alright for Brian Lack and Raymond Wright; nobody was going to give them a dead leg or a fat lip. And nobody was going to get the better of big Richard Pascall. Trevor Hickson could look after himself but the rest of us were vulnerable. 3A2 had some handy lads and if things got out of hand and people got a bit carried away, someone could get hurt and that someone could just be me. Well, I wasn’t getting duffed up for anybody. Not if I could help it.

Break time came and break time went, and I survived, just. As expected, Goliath avoided Goliath, and the Davids on both sides got a good pummelling. Nothing too nasty but the brutality of it was best witnessed from a safe distance, all the same.

After getting a war correspondent's view of the conflict I wrote an essay about it, giving tough sounding nicknames to the combatants such as Knuckles Hickson and Scar Face Waterman. It was fun to write and it brought much laughter too, when Mister Porter had me stand up and read it to the class. Though I enjoyed my moment in the spotlight, I felt a pang of guilt for letting it be known that that Scar Face Waterman had ended up in tears. Sorry Martin.

In another essay, about playing football with the lads on Eastcourt Green, I added Pete Fill’s surname to differentiate between him and another Pete. I was happy with that…until it came back marked with the following correction.

What?! If Mister Porter thinks I can’t spell Phil, he must think I’m a right numbskull.

Though it stung my pride, I realised, after some thought, there'd have been no misunderstanding if I’d worded it better.

When talking about ambition Mister Porter asked us what our aspirations were. Our answers were predictable, if unrealistic. Then someone turned the question on Mister Porter.

‘Me? I’d be happy doing what I’m doing – teaching – on two thousand a year.’

Wow!

£2000 a year was big money, so big that I gave up trying to work out how much a week it was, in my head.

Another day… as me and the rest of the tail-enders trooped into our form classroom for an English lesson, Keith Greenfield, a bright lad with a clever, if slightly odd sense of humour, was already seated on the front row and engaged in a chat with Mister Porter.

‘What was that?’ asked Mister Porter.

‘Peasmould Gruntfuttock,’ said a smiling Keith.

‘P-p what?’ asked Mister Porter, like he wasn’t sure he’d heard correctly.

‘Peasmould… Peasmould Gruntfuttock. He’s a character.’

‘I see,’ said our clearly baffled teacher, before he retreated.

Beyond an assumption that Peasmould Gruntfuttock was a character in a story he’d written, I had no idea what Keith was talking about, either.

(Years later I discovered Peasmould Gruntfuttock was a character from radio’s Round the Horne.)

Mister Porter was a good bloke. Not strict and not soft. If the class transgressed, the class got punished, and out came the sheets of foolscap, with an order to write a full paged essay. The worst of the lot was an essay on Responsibility.

‘And I don’t want a list of examples.’

I was stumped.

Responsibility is… no, I can’t use that, it’s an example. Responsibility is… no, that’s an example. Responsibility is… bloody hell, I can’t use that either. That’s an example too.

Ten minutes later, having got no further than the title, I set off scribbling the biggest load of rubbish I’d ever written.

With a bit of luck he won’t read it anyway.

I liked Mister Porter. He was fair, even handed, and straight down the middle in the nurturing of his pupils. He was easy to respond to and I largely enjoyed his lessons.

But then…

‘Take a copy and pass the rest over your shoulder to the person sitting behind you. That’s it… keep them going… pass them down the classroom. Right, has everyone got one?’

Oh no!