Colin makes a point

Fri.09.06.06. Having had a reasonably successful but long day on Thursday it was quite late when I arrived at Westmead. Outside the garage was a pile of aluminium engine components from the car. The bell housing for the gearbox, the thermostat cover and the split gear knob mounting. Slightly confused, I questioned Chris as to why they were there. He too, was equally puzzled since this was the collection of parts that had been allocated to ‘Toby’ to polish. I suspected they had been dumped as a form of retribution connected somehow to the altercation from the previous night in the Oak, between ‘Toby’ and Katie. I assumed that their silly spat of ‘fan on, fan off’ had been resolved, neither party claiming victory or eating humble pie in defeat. But unbeknownst to me, on the way home Chris had suggested to ‘Lofty’, in between his violent rantings, that he had been without doubt the victim of ‘self inflicted wounds’, embarrassing not just himself but the rest of the gathering, but in Colin’s eyes this was a statement that stunk of ‘know your place’, which patently incensed him all the more. Colin has harboured an innate dislike of Philip Santus but especially everything that he represents, wealth, success, the biggest house in Wigan (Salty Towers), a big fuck off Merc, arrogance, a vacuous sense of humour, a contempt of anything ‘smoking’, a sparse knowledge of rugby league and, more importantly, a ‘club’ that most ‘Toby’s, Loftys, Psychos and Colins’ can never join. It was as likely that the root his actual anger emanated a little earlier in the previous evening. Colin hadn’t been invited to join Philip’s gang on their annual weekend break to Keswick. Not long before ‘fan-gate’ Philip had been dishing out the itinery of his next jolly to the selected, invited guests. This trip, which has been organised by Philip for the last twenty years consistently involves a group of bearded patronising, moronic Jocks made up equally by an amount of English ‘wanabees’. It has evolved into a re-union as opposed to a ‘suck it and see’ weekend. There is a great deal of booze guzzled, food gobbled, songs sung incredibly badly, normally by quaint ‘Scottish folk’, pipers piping and effusive bucket loads of back slapping. The only gratuitous feature is Philip’s room and board. As the delegates waded through their sheets of ‘do’s and don’ts’ the buzz of the activity further excluded totally isolating Colin, who during the proceedings struggled to display an air of indifference. It was only a short time later that Danny and Katie arrived to feel the full wrath of Colin’s temper. “Don’t switch that fuckin’ fan on!” the rest his history. Chris, having reinforced Colin’s feeling of exclusion, stating that he had made a right twat of himself was subsequently accused of “supporting the bastard Santus”.

We both guess that the gesture of the abandoned parts is Colin’s simple, honest reaction to omission, of not really belonging, being ostracised, betrayed and, possibly, being genuinely embarrassed. I suppose people deal with rejection their own way.

The heat has beaten us today, 27 degrees, consequently we have done very little work to the Burlington, we have taken the windscreen and brackets to Cyrils’ to be mended and polished.