BACK TO NEWSLETTER 2001 CONTENTS
Odds & Ends 2001
My Chum Mr Beeby
I was rather touched to read that David Beeby had left
Clayesmore - more to the point it brought home just how many years ago it all
was that I spent my time there.
I knew David before Clayesmore, he was in fact my housemaster at Greshams and
having been asked to leave Greshams the year before my 'O' level exams (remember
them?), for smoking one too many cigarettes behind the bike sheds and generally
being a brat, I was lucky to find a school that would willingly take me in. This
was in fact very much to David's credit that he could, despite knowing my rather
insubordinate past, offer me a place at Clayesmore. Only years later did I
realise my gratitude had never been fully extended to him and perhaps now is as
good a time as any.
I remember my year at Clayesmore very well, although names and many faces have
vanished from my memory, I still have some photographs of the teams I was a part
of (the year the 1st XI hockey beat the OC's with ease and I couldn't understand
why everybody was SO pleased..) I remember the atmosphere of the school being so
much more at ease than my previous school, I remember fondly the friendships I
made and some who I stayed in touch with until a few years later, Jeni Toksvig
and Neg "Cabbage". All through my year at Clayesmore I felt David's
presence, perhaps more so than many of my fellow students, in that I knew he
knew, what a mess I had made for myself before and that he never ripped up in my
past - I felt a strange allegiance, so when fellow students asked me what his
nick-name used to be or stories from the old school (where I was normally quite
the story-teller), I played it down.
As many others who drop into these Old boys and girls pages, why Old?, why not Former or retired or even Dispatched Clayesmorians, I'm sure many of us look back at images of a strange world where life was calm, even easy and yet so much water has flowed under the bridge, I'm thankful that my memories are fond ones, I think even just recounting that I once was fit and could easily run a mile is pleasure enough. I was a hockey player, in fact I was one of Mr.Beeby's hockey players - his favoured manoeuvre would be down the flank, pull back and scoop the ball into the D - a manoeuvre I favoured, until it was outlawed, as a coach at the Oslo Landhockey club. Since then, well, I don't play hockey anymore, I just watch it on telly - and I have finally managed to quit smoking (smoking and working in advertising was as sure as the firing squad) - and finally I've found a job and place where I think I can be for many years to come. So Mr Beeby, or any other Dispatched Clayesmorian for that matter, if you ever plan on rough shooting grouse, hunting moose, stalking stags or trying your luck with salmon or trout in Norwegian mountains, I would be more than happy to take care of the arrangements, all you have to do is find a route from England to Norway.
His nick-name was Chum and to me, he was.
Marek Tachezy (Taxi)(86-88)
Manor
Marked- og Produktutvikling.
Jakt, Fiske og Friluftsliv
Director of Marketing & Product development for Hunting, Fishing and the
outdoors Norwegian State Forestry Commision Kontor 74 21 30 00 Direkte:
74 21 30 57 mobil: 481 57 744 ISDN privat: 74 28 47 37 mobil privat: 992 30 308
email: marek.tachezy@statskog.no
www.statskog.no
BACK TO NEWSLETTER 2001 CONTENTS