The Seaside Wedding

Way back in the 1980’s when disco was king, a friend of mine was getting married to a young man whose family lived by the seaside. Not having much family herself, and this being her second wedding, she decided to have the wedding in his home town with a group of RAF friends in attendance. I don’t totally remember but we must have had the Friday off because I remember driving up a near deserted motorway on a sunny afternoon in several cars packed with people and luggage. There was an air of anticipation and a determination to have a good time.

The wedding itself was booked at a nearby register office but there were no other big plans, we would just have the women start at one end of the prom, the guys from the other end, and meet in the middle at a nightclub. All drive over to the register office for the main event the next day and then stop off for a pub meal afterwards, then we would come back and go to the funfair, a Chinese meal, and a few drinks before bedtime. All very laid back and unstuffy.

As a group we had taken over a guest house a couple of streets behind the promenade. When we arrived we quickly parked up and booked in. My room was on the ground floor and seemed to be very similar to the barrack block one I had in camp, a small single with a window at street level, this was pre convenience, so the bathroom was a shared affair out on the main corridor and a few doors down. I didn’t really investigate much, just made a quick change and dived out for the Hen do. We had a heck of a night and I remember having a wicked hangover the next day,

The wedding was simple but lovely and we stopped part way back for a good old fashioned “meal in a basket”. When we arrived at the pub we were a large group looking for seats together on a Saturday lunch time, so a bit conspicuous with our best clothes and joyous voices. The Landlord looked us over and asked what we were up to, upon hearing that it was a wedding party with very little money who just wanted some chicken and chips he said we would have a bit of a wait because there were so many of us but he would see what he could do. Just as people were starting to grumble about waiting so long we were called up for our food, that lovely man took the happy couple to a function room where they had quickly laid out settings, table decorations and our meals. Nothing amazing but it absolutely made the day, such kindness was, and is, always welcome.

We returned to the seafront and rode on the funfair in our Sunday best, we ate candy floss, paddled and played the slots. Then we ate and drank and just generally enjoyed life for the evening. I confess I was rather inebriated. Returning to my room at some silly hour of the night I crashed out stark naked on the bed. It was pitch black when I woke up needing to pee, so I slung on my short, barely covers the bum, dressing gown/wrap, and headed out to the bathroom letting my door gently close behind me. I did what needed to be done and returned to my room only to discover that I had forgotten to take the key and it was a Yale lock, so now I was locked out of the room in the wee small hours.

Standing in that corridor, a little blurry headed, I had the thought that I could go round the side of the building and climb in through the window. Not being terribly bright at that moment, I hadn’t factored in the fact that the front door would also automatically lock behind me and I would be out on the street in nothing but that tiny wrap covering my extremities.  So, there I was outside, wearing not a lot, but it would all be OK because I could just go round the side and climb in, couldn’t I ?

That would be a No then…..

What a heart-dropping moment, to find iron railings leading to stairs down to a lower ground entrance to a basement flat. I could see the sash window for my room but it was about 4ft away across a void.

The landlady had tried to make the side of the building look pretty by fixing a gutter across the wall and planting flowers all the way across. Now, in a sober state I would never, ever, have tried this but I splayed my feet pointing outward and edged along the wall using that tiny gutter as a lifeline with a drop below me that could probably break my legs. Flatted against the wall I truly destroyed her careful planting as I managed to reach the window, and carefully pushed it upwards…..

The landlady, to protect the guests, had put in nails to stop the window opening more than a few inches. I could have cried, but kept trying to think this through, I could get my head through by turning it sideways, reaching my arms through and trying to reach the abandoned keys from the bedside table inside. At full stretch I couldn’t quite reach, so I slid myself forward as much as I could, then raised my legs to reach the other side of the drop, pressing my feet against the railings to get some purchase and pushed my upper torso through the gap. I reached the keys! Only at this point did it occur to me that my boobs only go one way, I’ve said before that I am well endowed, having squeezed through I couldn’t get them back out again, not without ripping them off.

This is when I heard the cough from behind me…. “I assume you are breaking in and not out?” I bet I am still an after-dinner speech for that policeman; he very kindly pushed my feet so I could slide through that small window gap. Oh the view he must have had. I then provided ID from inside the room to prove what was going on, and told him the whole sorry story, suddenly remarkably sober. The next morning at breakfast I received a round of applause, apparently I’d made a fair bit of noise and the rotten sods who could have come down and helped had watched from windows because it was funny. To be honest I would have done the same back then.  Of course I forgave, and I was the butt of a few jokes for a while and thank heavens the landlady didn’t seem to notice the footprints in her flower bed guttering.