The Ned Wood Archive

Don’t think that I’m a tower of strength

Don’t Lean too much on me

The Brogues

When Annie left, she took all of my Genesis albums and most of my heart. 

She was crazy about Gabriel.  Completely and utterly wrapped up with him.  Talked about him all the time.  Peter Gabriel this, Peter Gabriel that.  Well that’s how we met.  And then later she went off at a tangent.  Decided that all of his songs contained some sort of message and so she set about trying to decipher them.  Of course I had all of the albums then.  Not that I’d admit it now.  Actually, not that I’d admit it then, not to folk like Bernie and Sniff.  I had the reissue of the first one they did with Jonathan King before they decided on their direction.  I had the early ones with the pink labels from before they got famous.  I had the ones everyone else at school had from when they were trendy.  Trespass, Foxtrot, The Lamb Lies Down on Broadway.  The lot.  And I lent them all to her so she could listen to the words and work out what they meant.  Well that was at the beginning.  And when we split up, getting them back seemed way down my priorities, so I never did get them back.  Good job I’ve never felt the urge to listen to Return of the Giant Hogweed really.

I was living in digs then.  She was staying in a house with Viv and a couple of friends.  But we’d often meet up and go up to Glen to see her brother or just hang out like we used to.  

It was lunchtime.  We’d met up outside the Geology building.  We started to walk up to Glen.  Then when we got to the maths building she told me it was over.  I think I realised she was right, that it was hopeless, but at the same time the whole of my body seemed to drain away.  I was left empty.  Suddenly I was a hollow shell with nowhere to go, nothing to do.  It was cold and windy like it always is at the end of November.  Winter was coming.  1977 was dying.  I stood there and all I could say was from that Jam song “I’ll get by in time”.  I couldn’t move and I don’t think she could.

“I’ll get by in time.”

“Will you stop saying that,” she shouted.  She was crying.

“I wasn’t talking to you,” I thought.  There was nothing to say.  I turned and walked off in the opposite direction, towards Highfield Avenue thinking that I might find something to distract me, something to fill the time, something to fill the gaping canyon inside of me.  They call that path Lovers’ Walk. Where star-crossed lovers go to walk away from each other. I spent the whole afternoon just walking up and down the Avenue, across the common.  I couldn’t go back to my digs, they were always too cold.  I couldn’t see anyone, talk to anyone.  

She was right.  It was over.  I’d done everything I could for her, but I couldn’t help her.  I couldn’t change her.  All of those times that I’d told her how beautiful she was, how wonderful she was, how amazing she was.  All of those times, she’d thought I was lying.  She just couldn’t let herself believe me.  I’d got so much from her.  I’d had such fun.  She’d given me such confidence.  She’d help me grow up.  And I couldn’t give her the one thing she needed.

I found out she spent the whole afternoon looking for me.  She went to see Olly who was on my course.  I don’t know why – I didn’t think she knew him.  They went down to see Sonia in her place down town.  They looked around all the places I’d hang out, like the coffee bar or Virgin records.  Eventually when I got back to my digs there was a message waiting for me.  I ran back up to Glen, but it wasn’t the same anymore.  She was desperately trying to give it another chance and I was going along because I couldn’t do anything else. 

The next few days were hell.  We thought we should hang out together pretty much because that’s what we’d done so intensely for the previous six months.  She’d started smoking again, which made it like when we first met.  And that made it even harder.  Eventually she found the courage to stop the charade.  Just a couple of days later.  She just said, “This is madness.  It’ll never work”.  She was right, again. 

And that was it.  That was the last I ever saw of her.  I tried to get on with my life – you know, start going to lectures again, pay attention to my course, but I couldn’t so I went home before the end of term.  I went home to the old dears to try and find something to fill my days.  It was a long hard Christmas.  Even when we beat Man United 4 nil, it was hard.  Even when Dusty took me to the Ramones, it was hard.  We both sat in silence, grieving.  She’s just split up with her man, but we couldn’t share our grief so we couldn’t help each other.  After the holidays, I threw myself at my work to try and get over it.  As you do.  Strange that, isn’t it.  For maybe two months it seemed like my heart was empty.  Not just my heart, but my whole body.  It felt that she’d taken the biggest part of me away.  But, in time, I did get by.

And now, whenever I think if her, I can think of nothing but the joy she gave me.  It seems that she gave me my heart rather than took it away.  It seems like she’s still in there somewhere.  All of those other beautiful creatures, Victoria, Sonia, Elsa, Dusty, Sharon, Helen, and Mary, wonderful though they were, were nothing compared to Annie.  Annie touched my heart & opened it up.