Back to the USSR

This rather flattering photo is purely to remind Weaver of who she used to get hot and bothered about in those far-off days of her clammy adolescence. The modern day choice for the Sheriff of Nottingham is Alan Rickman (the professor of Defence Against The Dark Arts who we could never decide was evil or not, right up until the last minute), and a bloody good choice it was too.

Which seamlessly brings me on to the subject of first 'loves'.

Long before I used to fantasise about the unattainable Hayley Mills in 'Pollyanna' (yes, I am mildly ashamed to say that I really did, but I was about 12 at the time and she was about 13), I remember what must have been my first serious lusting spree with a girl who was introduced to me as 'Poppet'.

We could have been no older than 4, because the meeting took place in a back-yard of the area which we moved away from just before I was 5. I took one look at her brown little legs, arms and pretty face (I remember every detail even now), then grabbed her hand and took her away from the prying eyes of both our parents, leading her behind a wall of corrugated iron, where I proceeded to plant kisses on her giggling face.

The wall seemed to me at the time to be immensely high, but in reality it could only have been about four or five feet. I became aware of muffled laughter, and looked up to see four, huge, grinning faces looking down on us. I also still remember the anger I felt at this intrusion into my privacy, and how it had scuppered my plans for the gorgeous Poppet, even though those plans were not yet formulated into anything but a sort of unknown and instinctive, almost innocent carnality.

About two years later, I was in the school playground when a (to me) stunningly beautiful girl ran past me with a skipping-rope in her hand. Without thinking, I reached out and gave her backside a playful slap. In my defence, you have to remember that I was  - like her - about 6 or 7 years old.

Slightly shocked and amused, she stopped and turned to face me.

"What's your name?" I asked.

"May Ring", she answered.

"Will you be my girlfriend?"

"Alright then", she quickly responded, and ran off to join up with her friends.

I don't think I ever spoke to her again, but I went home and proudly told my sisters that I now had a girlfriend. They never let me forget it.

May Ring, are you still out there, hiding behind the name of the man you eventually married, like I hide behind the name of Stephenson? I have never forgotten you - mainly thanks to my sisters asking after you for the next 40 years.

A little later, an Australian Aboriginal girl turned up in our class, half-way through term. She was a real rarity - especially in those days - and once again I fell in some sort of love. Sadly, it was not reciprocated. She was so fit and Tomboyish that she was verging on scary, but I have always enjoyed the challenge of 'scary' women. It all ended for me when she marched up to me one day and said, "Stephenson - you stink." I can take a hint.

I have to admit (sorry May) that I have also never forgotten the exotic, 14 year-old Russian girl that was briefly at our school, but - I guess - was either sent away again because her father was a Soviet Diplomat, or because she was too much of a liability to the male teachers when she posed provocatively over desks as they tried to help her with her homework. Her English was very poor, but there are some things which you don't need the language for.

The age of innocence was over, but I'm not sure it ever really existed in the first place.