June 25, 1978. My brother and myself are walking along the seafront in Bridlington back to the small holiday apartment in which we are staying for the week. I rescue a chip (my own) from a puddle and eat it, an action that I will be reminded of for some years to come.
Seven thousand miles away in Buenos Aires, Argentina are winning in the World Cup final, the ticker tape falling, confetti on the pitch, Mario Kempes and all that.
We get back to the flat for extra time. I am mesmerised at a world I have never seen before and wonder: 1982, 1986, 1990, 1994, 1998, 2002, 2006, 2010, 2014, 2018, 2022, 2026… how many World Cups before I die?
Twelve if I reach the age of 60 seems a decent long-term, if insubstantial, ambition. Time will never stretch that far, even the year 2000 seems an impossibility.
And now? Age 58, that 2026 World Cup is on the horizon.
They (I don’t know who they are) say your life flashes in front of you before you die. I used to think about that (obviously I still do) a lot and worry as memories raced across my mind.
It seemed unlikely, but now I realise that “flashes” is a word relative to the timespan you are considering.
I can’t sleep for it – a constant loop of pictures of the house we lived in when I was born, primary school incidents, onto secondary schools, friends I no longer know, sport, music, favourite television programmes, Christmases, New Years, sixth form, my degree, nights out, people I haven’t thought about in decades, starting work, moving to Devon, discovering new places, trips abroad, up to Bolton, then over to Rotherham, family members no longer here, winter stealing some in what should only have been the autumn of their lives, minor incidents that no-one else will remember, past partners, decisions (good and bad) made, what could have been, what was and never was, the end of my time in journalism, the end of our time in the family home of 47 years… the end of… the end of… everything?
Not quite. The reel has stuck once more on that evening of June 25 1978 – the pull of the amusements being a bigger draw than the World Cup final, the 50p each (plus chip money) we were sent out with, the loss of the money, the walk back (we must have still been on friendly terms), the sea bashing the defences, my retrieval and consumption of the chip, my brother’s spotting of the action, the ensuing ridicule, the arrival back at the apartment, the drama of extra time, the ticker tape, the confetti, Kempes, the word Argentina (a word this country would soon unnecessarily go to war with) … a place I didn’t know, a different world with different lives. Footballers receiving the adulation of millions while I lost 50p and rescued a chip.
What makes that night stand out above so many others? Perhaps it was an awakening to something bigger, or just awareness that football means more than amusement arcades and chips. It can lay down a real marker in your life and sometimes all three can combine (Blackpool away) to make for a great day out.
The contrast of the images of myself reaching down to the puddle (I used to move stones off the road too, but I can see the point in that - they wouldn’t get run over. Why save a chip from drowning only to eat it?) and the noise erupting from a frenzied crowd in the Estadio Monumental as the confetti drifts across the Buenos Aires skies to mark the marriage of ‘super’ Mario Kempes to the history of Argentina was not lost on me, even as a ten-year-old. Worlds apart – 7,000 miles apart.
Eleven world cups later, so much has changed (I don’t eat chips in the street these days) and so much has stayed the same.
In 2025 I splashed paint on the canvas, but not all of it stuck. Bits did though, and that’s something. Isn’t it?
We’re all doing it, only the world doesn’t see what most of us create. We’re not all Mario, his every brushstroke worshipped in the Estadio Monumental.
2026 – and what’s left? One World Cup if I live to the same age as my father – and there’s no guarantee. There are no guarantees of anything. Not really.
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