GOING BACK

 

The Chief Librarian was a genial man in tweeds and with a quasi military bearing. I had met professional Yorkshiremen before but his political opinions transcended Bernard Ingham-style bluffness. I once overheard a conversation in his inner sanctum where he claimed a town the size of Peterborough landed on the British mainland every calendar year, or was it a month?

Rumour had it that he was a member of the Town's Anglo-Saxon Society, a mixture of Kipling and Spike Milligan. The photo technician's room was regularly bedecked with drying photographs of enactment of old English practices involving proud warriors and demure damsels in simulated landscapes.

The issue of political bias came to a head when a student complained that among the helpful brochures from paint companies and art societies, was found a pile of leaflets dedicated to "Send 'Em Home!"

After my first class of the day I wandered into the library. "Good Morning Dr. Mullen...." he sidled up to me. "I meant to ask you, had you thought of going back?"

I glanced at the wall clock. "But I've only just got in."

"No No" he was clearly irritated "I mean Ireland!"

No I hadn't. My surname came from the single grandparent who came from Sligo and I had visited Dublin once on my tenth birthday.The question has become more pressing however after Brexxit and I am still considering.