Home Sweet Home

I am sat typing this while bouncing along at 125mph on my way back from Newcastle to home.

This has led to some confusion, with Mum and Dad referring to North Shields as ‘home’ and me referring to my flat as ‘home’. I guess in different senses we are both right. North Shields maybe where I am from, was born and grew up, and is where Mum and Dad are and where my sister will get married.

But my flat feels like my home – it is my space with my stuff and has stuff where I want it, and stuff I want – powerful shower, my books, my clothes etc….

Anyway this got me thinking about how I feel about North Shields. It’s a town on the banks of the River Tyne, just up from the mouth of the river, technically the boundary into Tynemouth (the village at the river mouth) is about 150yards from mum & dad’s, across a sports field. It used to have a huge fishing port, light industry and of course shipbuilding and servicing. Now we are left with an outlet shopping centre, retail parks and a few fishing boats, and most people commute up to Newcastle or other bits of the Tyne & wear conurbation for work. In that way, Newcastle is more like Glasgow than Edinburgh ever will be, maybe this is why I liked Edinburgh so much – it was so different to back home.

The best bit about North Shields is technically not in North Shields, but runs from Tynemouth to Whitley Bay – the next town up the coast, and location of many ‘hotels’ and caravans where in years past, Scottish people went for holidays. Now it is a weekend drinking resort.

Anyway, the best feature is the North Sea, and the beaches. I always like to go down to the coast when I am home. It’s not at all peaceful, but the crashing waves and the way that

as the tide comes in, it erases all the traces of what has happened on the beach since the last tide. Furthermore, to confuse matters, although I went to primary school in North Shields, my GCSE's were done in Cullercoats and A-levels in Whitley Bay - so a progressive movement up the east coast to Edinburgh seemed obvious....

Looking out the window, as the train now pulls out of Berwick, I can seethe same azure blue sea, and the lovely blue sky, and fields of corn or grain looking all nice and yellow. It really is the kind of day that you would love to spend just sat on the beach, as it is quite warm……..anyone want to sit on the beach all afternoon?

Apologies to those of you who are still living in North Tyneside, fo0r painting such a nice rosy picture of the dog’s toilet (beach) and drink fuelled violence (Whitley bay at night) and depressing town centre (North Shields); but sometimes I guess, you can take the boy out of North Shields, but you can’t take North Shields out the boy.