JOURNEYS TO SCHOOL IN CORNWALL & BIRMINGHAM, MANY YEARS & MANY MILES APART...

Journeys To School In Cornwall & Birmingham, Many Years & Many Miles Apart...

I gazed at Mawgan Porth’s sunlit morning beach

And watched blue waves spew white spray,

As they turned lazily, trespassing nearer to reach

The dry sand and dunes on another school day…

But then the school ‘bus edged carefully downhill

From Trenance,

Slipped idly across the sea-front,

Quite enhanced

By the weather’s glorious surprise,

Then crawled the curve uphill

To advance

Towards a school in Newquay, I surmise… 

I gazed at Birmingham’s vast council estates

And watched similar homes rattle by through glass,

As commuters busied and hurried to their fates

On public transport, uncomfortably packed, alas…

But then my public ‘bus onto a viaduct’s incline 

Slowly lurched,

Elevated over a grim canal and rails,

Then perched

At a stop’s tedious delay,

Before making the grim decline,

Besmirched

By the gas works and its smells and disarray…

Pete Ray

I stood and watched as an empty coach threaded and snaked its way through Mawgan Porth on a bright May morning, returning soon afterwards with school pupils aboard. 

I felt wonder at the views those kids would be able to appreciate on their special ‘school run’ on the coast road through Watergate Bay and Porth towards Newquay.

I then thought back to my bus journey to school many years ago in Birmingham, first on the 55 ‘bus, then on the ‘Inner Circle’ number 8 which slid from ‘The Gate’ towards Aston, where my school, King Edward’s Grammar School was situated near the Ansells Brewery, the HP Sauce factory, Aston Villa’s soccer ground and the fine 17th century home of Sir Thomas Holte, Aston Hall…

The 8 ‘bus lifted itself over Saltley Viaduct which arced over railway lines, a canal and the gas works, before rising from Nechells Place past two enormous and vile gas holders towards Nechells and then Aston Cross…

This was certainly not Cornwall…