CockSparrow
Really Experienced
- Joined
- Jul 4, 2022
- Posts
- 272
When I was growing up, my mother had an unmarried friend who we’ll call Jill. That was not her real name, but you never know who reads these things. Jill was an archaeologist. However, her real passion was jazz.
Jill lived in a small cottage with a rather large garden. And, as a kid, I used to help her out. Mowing the lawns. Trimming the hedges. And doing other bits and pieces where I could do no real harm. And, at the end of most of our work sessions, Jill would make a pot of tea and introduce me to another of her favourite jazz artists. She was a big fan of Miles Davis and John Coltrane and Gerry Mulligan and Cannonball Adderley and many of the younger players who followed them.
I think that I must have been about ten or eleven when the local swing club organised a two-day jazz festival with a number of big-name out-of-town players. Jill took me along to the Saturday afternoon session. It was the first proper jazz concert that I ever attended.
Then, when I was about 15, Jill took me along to one of the swing club’s Sunday night sessions. I remember that was pretty good too. It was all very ‘grown up’. And Jill and I got to sit at a table right in front of the bandstand.
But then Jill moved up to London. And I bought my first saxophone. The two things weren’t in any way connected; but that’s just the way they happened.
When I was 19, I talked my way into a junior copywriting job at an advertising agency, and I too moved to London. I got myself a flat not far from Smithfield Market. One of the first people to call me after I moved in was Jill. She thought that I might like a visit. I invited her to come for supper.
I think I probably made chicken burgers with avocado, cheese, and chilli and tomato relish. I think I was going through a bit of a mock-Mexican phase. Jill brought a couple of bottles of wine, and a couple of albums (Mulligan Meets Monk and Cannonball Adderley’s Nippon Soul) as house-warming gifts. We drank quite a bit of the wine, listened to the albums, and somehow ended up on my bed. We didn’t actually ‘do it’ that night. But we came pretty close.
A few days later, Jill phoned to tell me that the university was sending her to head up a project out in Spain. ‘I feel a bit like a footballer,’ she told me. ‘Except footballers have rather higher transfer fees.’ And she laughed.
For the best part of twenty years, Jill and I exchanged letters, at first by snail mail and later by email. And then she said that she was returning to London.
She invited me to go and have supper with her at her flat in Bloomsbury.
When I saw her again, I almost didn’t recognise her. She must have been approaching 70. But it was quite an old 70. ‘I’m dying,’ she told me. ‘Apparently. But I thought that we should have some supper and listen to some of the old favourites while I still can. And then perhaps we can finish what we started (as Gladys Knight might have said) when you made me supper in that little flat over by Smithfield Market. Only if you want to, of course.’
Jill and I got together several more times after that. And, on days when I didn’t see her, I made a point of phoning her. And then one morning when I called her she said that she might have ‘played her last gig’. That afternoon, she went for what had become her customary nap and she didn’t wake up.
Jill lived in a small cottage with a rather large garden. And, as a kid, I used to help her out. Mowing the lawns. Trimming the hedges. And doing other bits and pieces where I could do no real harm. And, at the end of most of our work sessions, Jill would make a pot of tea and introduce me to another of her favourite jazz artists. She was a big fan of Miles Davis and John Coltrane and Gerry Mulligan and Cannonball Adderley and many of the younger players who followed them.
I think that I must have been about ten or eleven when the local swing club organised a two-day jazz festival with a number of big-name out-of-town players. Jill took me along to the Saturday afternoon session. It was the first proper jazz concert that I ever attended.
Then, when I was about 15, Jill took me along to one of the swing club’s Sunday night sessions. I remember that was pretty good too. It was all very ‘grown up’. And Jill and I got to sit at a table right in front of the bandstand.
But then Jill moved up to London. And I bought my first saxophone. The two things weren’t in any way connected; but that’s just the way they happened.
When I was 19, I talked my way into a junior copywriting job at an advertising agency, and I too moved to London. I got myself a flat not far from Smithfield Market. One of the first people to call me after I moved in was Jill. She thought that I might like a visit. I invited her to come for supper.
I think I probably made chicken burgers with avocado, cheese, and chilli and tomato relish. I think I was going through a bit of a mock-Mexican phase. Jill brought a couple of bottles of wine, and a couple of albums (Mulligan Meets Monk and Cannonball Adderley’s Nippon Soul) as house-warming gifts. We drank quite a bit of the wine, listened to the albums, and somehow ended up on my bed. We didn’t actually ‘do it’ that night. But we came pretty close.
A few days later, Jill phoned to tell me that the university was sending her to head up a project out in Spain. ‘I feel a bit like a footballer,’ she told me. ‘Except footballers have rather higher transfer fees.’ And she laughed.
For the best part of twenty years, Jill and I exchanged letters, at first by snail mail and later by email. And then she said that she was returning to London.
She invited me to go and have supper with her at her flat in Bloomsbury.
When I saw her again, I almost didn’t recognise her. She must have been approaching 70. But it was quite an old 70. ‘I’m dying,’ she told me. ‘Apparently. But I thought that we should have some supper and listen to some of the old favourites while I still can. And then perhaps we can finish what we started (as Gladys Knight might have said) when you made me supper in that little flat over by Smithfield Market. Only if you want to, of course.’
Jill and I got together several more times after that. And, on days when I didn’t see her, I made a point of phoning her. And then one morning when I called her she said that she might have ‘played her last gig’. That afternoon, she went for what had become her customary nap and she didn’t wake up.
Now I'll also show my support for mature ladies and the above story,I was taught by an mature bored married lady and I thank her for likely saving me from being married 2-3 x and6bastard children I'd still be paying for. Once I was shown how real and good it could be,those lil tight asses had no magical powers over me anymore. And I've never seen virgin I ve thought about that and I'll let others break em in. 
