Returning to Littleborough after a break of nearly thirty years, I hope nothing’s changed. But inevitably, it has.
Like many folk in their seventh decade, I’m haunted by the spectre of how good things used to be. I see today’s world through older eyes and these pages contain some nostalgia and the impressions of a chap battling to blend with a modern world.
One thing it is for sure, it’s light-hearted and my daft take on a place I love. Rather than get ratty, I poke fun at things.
It takes me a while, but I realize the past mustn’t dominate. Rather it must don a pair of slippers, settle into a comfy armchair and watch our future unfold. Life must be more than merely ‘making the most of it’. We have to create a new now in a place we’re happy to live, both geographically and emotionally.
This little book is dedicated to the memories of times gone by and for tomorrow.
My dog looking down on Littleborough from the top of the Pennine moors
A couple of snippets from the book ........
When we left Lancashire it was midget gems and skipping ropes; now it’s nitrous oxide and vapes. From the latter, fruity nebulae float around like fluffy clouds. I recently passed a glass bus shelter engulfed in a sweet-smelling fog. From within I heard a hacking cough. Peering out of the gloom, a ghostly man who’d taken to the vape as part of his health drive.
Gone are hopscotch grids, telephone boxes and banks, all made virtually redundant by mobile phones. Gone also is somewhere to park, the gentleman’s outfitters and the fishmonger. Instead, we have cafés, nail bars and beauty parlours - both human and dog. Did our old dog really need a shampoo and set? Or did we just chuck him in a lodge.
But, while I dream of things historical, one nagging little difficulty has just surfaced in the present. The alarm has gone off on a bodily function. The diminishing efficiency of my ageing waterworks has inconveniently coincided with the decline of public toilets. A public inconvenience indeed.