The Best of Times, The Worst of Times

I sometimes think when I am particularly depressed that the incident of December 1976 and the severe thrashings my Father used to give me were all due to my sexual activities.

My punishments were frequent when I was in my teens.



I know my Father was punishing me for wrong doing, although sometimes it was in no way justified, what I mean is some sort of divine punishment. If God was looking down on me, was he trying to get his message across by showing me that I would come to physical pain, a hell on earth, if I didn't stop my personal self abuse?

It is these sort of thought that can lead me onto a downward spiral and I start to think that it may be to late to absolve myself.
Some time has passed now since I told my secret and the world has not ended. I feel better for getting it off my chest!

If I try and think of a time when I was happy during my childhood, it would certainly be when I was away from my Father, at Scout camp. It may have only been for a week in the Summer but it gave me a sense of freedom. A weight was definitely lifted from my shoulders during those times.

I was happy in the scouts.






We had few holidays when I was a child. I can recall going away twice.

The first time was before my Mother passed away. My Father had rented a static caravan in Devon near Oakhampton. This was in about 1967.

It was very basic with no running water and was situated in a meadow behind a large old Farmhouse with the pig sty at one end and trees and fields at the other.

I was about six at the time and my Brother and I would roam the fields and woods exploring together. Occasional family trips to the beach at Bude would occur and if lucky we would have an Ice cream.

I have mixed memories of that that holiday, some good ones because of the happy time I spent with my Brother, of sunny beaches and salt water. My Mother was still well as far as I could remember but it was to be our last holiday as a family.

I have a distinct memory of being chased around the field by my Father because I had angered him over something. Being small, he easily caught me and I was dragged screaming back to the caravan for punishment. I also remember standing outside a supermarket and a man came out and asked me, politely, not to lean against the glass window. As soon as he was gone, I received a swift back hander from my Father which took me by surprise and knocked me to the floor, presumably because he had been embarrassed in front of the store manager.

Even in those days I would masturbate and I would go off alone and swing in a gate or other convenient post, rubbing my groin up against the wood for pleasure.

Once, my Brother coming across me suddenly asked me what I was doing and I embarrassedly told him I was just 'swinging'. A few days later I found him doing exactly the same thing in the same spot. Whether it worked for him of not I don't know, he didn't tell me for sure, but I suspect he knew there was something more to my 'swinging'.

Aside from my Scout camps, which I was not allowed to go to every year for lack of funds, that was our last Holiday, until I was in my mid teens.

My Father had decided that he wanted to go away for a week. My Brother by that time was in the Navy and as there was no way I would be left alone at home, I had to go with him, much to my reluctance as we were not getting on at all by this stage.

Surprisingly, he left me to my own devices for the whole week whilst he did his thing. Again, he had hired a caravan for the week near Tintagel in Cornwall. This one was on an actual campsite of about fifty static vans and there was a shop and social club along with toilet and shower blocks.

The only rules were I had to be in bed for ten o clock at night and I was not to get into any trouble. However, trouble has seemed to follow me throughout my life whatever I do!

My Father even gave me some money to buy some food and I lived for the week on Cornish pasties and orangeade with a box of rice crispies for breakfast.

My Father's aim for that week was to chat up as many women as he could and spend his evenings with them in the social club. I don't know if he ever got his leg over, hopefully not as he was very strict about matters like sex before marriage and was always trying to catch me out for masturbating, so it would have made him something of a hypocrite!

I spent most of my time walking into Tintagel or exploring the beach and the cliffs

It was on one of my rambles that I found a small cave in a secluded cove. There at the back was the first condom I had ever seen, used of course, but I picked it up and examined it closely. The thought of some young couple coming there specifically to have sex was a big turn on and I ended up having a wank alone there several times that week.

I went back to the cave almost every day and sometimes later in the evening to see if I could catch anyone at it.

One time the cave was filled with some lads, older than me having a lark. I was very wary of groups of youths in those days, not having a great deal of self confidence as I was regularly bullied at school and something of a loner, so I crept away silently. They emerged from the cave as I was walking back up the path and on seeing me, started calling. I don’t know if they wanted me to come back or if they were jeering at me. I must have looked very un-cool in my nylon shirt, shorts and sandals anyway. I just looked back and didn't respond. Fortunately they didn't follow me.

The campsite toilets were clean enough, but that didn't stop the walls being written on with lewd comments  and usually drawings of some large penis or female genitalia. There would be suggestions of wanting to meet at a a certain time for sex and whole paragraphs of dirty stories. Some of this was quite a turn on for me and I would lock the cubicle door and stand reading then with my penis in my hand, wanking.

Most of this graffitti was cleaned away soon after it was written, but one afternoon I visited the toilets and walked into a cubicle where someone had had a wank and cum all over the toilet seat and floor. I quickly relieved myself and on leaving the cubicle, practically bumped into the man who was coming in to clean. As I was walking back up the roadway, I looked back to see him standing in the doorway scowling at me. I assume he thought it had been me that had made such a mess, but it wasn't. I just got the blame!

This kind of toilet literature has been a fascination for me ever since and as I have spent quite a lot of time hanging around public toilets. I have had plenty of opportunity to read it. I have even added to it sometimes with suggestions of my own and it has been a great source of stimulus for me as well.

That week I met a girl on the beach one day, her name was Natalie and we got chatting about things. She was on holiday with her parents and younger sister and staying in the same campsite. We spent sometime chatting about this and that under the watchful gaze of her Father as she was about the same age as me and had a very developed chest as I recall!

We became friends for a few days and I even took her to see the cave I had found where she kissed me full on the mouth which was quite a surprise!

She made no judgements about my clothes or hair and when I told her about the regimes I was living under with my Father, she was even sympathetic and understanding.

I thought she may be up for it, especially as she told me I was to come to her caravan in the evening as her Parents would be going to the social club and leaving her and her sister in to go to bed by themselves.

I still had a couple of hours before I was supposed to be in bed as It was only eight o clock when I made my over to her caravan.

She said her sister was in bed and we sat down and chatted for a bit, keeping quiet so as not to disturb the sleeper. She had a bottle of lemonade into which she had tipped some of her Father’s whiskey and topped his bottle up with some water so he wouldn’t notice.

Even now I am never sure how someone who drinks whiskey cannot notice when it has been watered down!

This was not the best combination of drinks to be sure, but it was alcohol and we didn’t care!

After lots of chatting she got back into kissing me and I spent a lot of time feeling under her top. This snogging went on for some time and developed further into some heavy petting. The whole thing came to a head when her little sister appeared on the scene and wanted to know what we were doing. She insisted Natalie was not allowed to have boys in the caravan and that if she didn't get rid of me straight away, she would tell her Dad.

Of course Natalie protested and tried to get her to go back to bed but she was having none of it. When little sis also saw we were drinking alcohol she went into a right strop and Natalie suggested I leave as she was making so much noise, it would surely get someone who was passing to knock on the door.

I left with a boner straining to get out of my trousers and fearing the Natalie's Dad would surely be round as soon as he was told of the situation. After all he had seen me at the beach for the last couple of days, so I would be the main culprit.

As I lay in bed I could think of nothing else but that knock at the door, but it never came, so whether she managed to clam her sister, I never found out as I spent the next day avoiding the beach and Natalie and the following day was Saturday and my Father and I went home. I never saw her again but have often wondered what my first time with her would have been like.

Paying for My Sins

I have had to think long and hard about this post. I am currently having some councelling about my depression and that is part of the reason I started this blog. I was told it would be a good idea to write down some of my life and clear the air.

I have never told anyone about this incident before I told my Councellor who was very un-critical about the whole thing. My Brother doesn't know and neither do any of my friends or work colleagues. I have thought it was always better to keep it a secret. Also, thinking back, I wonder if I ever gave any consent for the actions which took place at that time or if it was in some way, my fault. It all happened a long time ago and I was in some ways lacking in confidence and quite naïve, not about sex as such, but about where it might lead maybe? Also I don't want to sensationalise the incident or cover the text with illustrations to trivialise the whole thing. There have been some new molestation stories in the news today and I don't want to trivialise anybody else's pain.
I had previously had sex with an older man, but this incident was very different.

This naivety got me into trouble around Christmas 1976. My Brother was stationed at Plymouth and asked me if I thought my Father would let me go down and stay with him for a few days. As our relationship was very poor by then, I think my Father was glad to see the back of me and agreed quite easily.

I had no money and certainly couldn't ask for any. As soon as the School holidays started, I packed my rucksack and started off hitching. It was cold but dry and things didn't start very well and I had to walk most of the way to the motorway which took me several hours.

I got a lift from a family going to Wales  almost as far as the M5 but by this time it was dark and getting late and I stood for sometime at the services getting colder. I only had a raincoat for warmth! Eventually a lorry pulled over and asked me where I was going and he seemed to be going in the same direction so I got in. I wasn't really sure where I was going having only just glanced at a map to see where Plymouth was.

I was cold and tired and his cab was inviting. The driver was a big, balding bloke with a beard and he asked me lots of questions about where I was from. I think he assumed I was a sailor as I was headed to Plymouth. He said he could take me most of the way. He seemed pleasant enough. After an hour or so, the conversation waned and I began to nod my head, feeling drowsy with the motion of the Lorry. He suggested I climb into the sleeping compartment at the back of the cab which I thanked him for. There was his bed at the back with a rather grubby sleeping bag and pillow, but by that time I didn't care. The cab was warm and cosy compared to outside. I took off my shoes and lay on top of his sleeping bag.

The next thing I knew, he was on top of me, pulling my trousers and pants down. I don't know how long I had been asleep but the lorry had stopped and there was just the light from the cab to see by. I asked him what he was doing and he said something like “You have to pay for your fare!” I can't remember as it was a long time ago and I never recorded any details in my diary.

I struggled with him as much as I could but it is not easy with something like twenty stone of man on top of you in a confined space. There was something in me that said I should be doing as this man says, maybe because of having to do exactly as I was told at home all the time. maybe because I thought it would be easier giving him what he wanted. I just don't know.

When I wouldn't stop struggling, he produced a flick knife and held it to my throat telling me that If I didn't stop he would slit my throat. I never thought of shouting and I honestly believed he would have cut me.

I maybe just assumed that we were miles from any where, which we were, unknown to me at the time.
I will never forget the look in his eyes.

He raped me three times.

 

When he was done he threw me out of the lorry.

It was freezing cold and I had to find my shoes which he had hurled as far into the darkness as he could. While I was asleep he must have gone through my rucksack and taken the few sandwiches and my torch I had, presumably looking for money. It was pitch black and I had no idea where I was. I couldn't see any lights. I had to climb a fence to find my shoes which were in a field. All I had on was a vest, a thin nylon shirt and a  raincoat which I tore climbing the fence on the wire. On top of all this I was petrified he would come back for me. I also thought I was bleeding from my rectum which added to my distress.

After what seemed like a long time, I found my shoes. I couldn't feel my feet  and my socks were soaking but I began following the road in the direction I thought he had driven. Why? Because I reasoned the he was heading towards Plymouth and that  was where I wanted to go.

At some time during the night, it may have been early morning I saw the lights of a car coming towards me and hid in the hedge, just in case it was his lorry. I eventually came to a village and spent the rest of the night in a bus shelter. I think it was somewhere in Somerset.

In the morning a local Farmer, up early, saw me and took pity on me and gave me some warm tea from his flask. I asked him the way to the Motorway, discovering we were about ten miles away. I had no alternative but to walk, no way of phoning my Brother and I certainly couldn't go home. I was frightened of accepting another lift from a lorry driver but again, I had no alternative as no-one else seemed to stop for me.

I eventually got to Plymouth late that evening, hungry, tired and weepy. I think the shock had finally got to me.

When Luke saw the state of me, he wanted to know what had happened. I couldn't tell him or anyone despite the fact we were very close in those days.

I was very glad to find that I hadn't lost any blood at all and in fact it was probably that man's semen. I felt ashamed with myself and whilst having a hot bath, I suddenly started crying my eyes out prompting Luke to ask me gain what was wrong.

Since that day, I have often seen men that resemble the guy who picked me up. I have no idea what he would look like now, even if he is still alive, but I have a little fear in the bottom of my stomach whenever I see someone like him in the street or driving a lorry. My main emotion at the time was guilt, I thought I had done something wrong. Later I became very angry and now I have put it down to  a bad experience.

The final blow came when I got back home and my Father on discovering I had torn my raincoat, thrashed me severely. But there it is, my guilty secret for what it is worth. It all happened a long time ago.