28th July 2012
Hi Elizabeth,
My name is Cheryl, I was friends with your mum a very long time ago back when we were teenagers. I have 3 young children currently aged 11, 9 and 5 (soon). I live in Doncaster, not too far from where me and your mum used to hang out. I don't remember how we became friends. It was one of those friendships that sort of just happened.
We were both a bit of a misfit with school, we both wore long black, or tie dyed skirts with loads of tassles, black tshirts and our big heavy leather biker jackets and our doc martens, whilst most of the others wore ripped jeans and tracksuit tops. Your mum would have her crazy big hair tied back, I had really badly dyed hair, usually with my scalp or forehead matching my hair dye. We spent many an afternoon just wandering around or listening to music in one of our bedrooms. We loved guns and roses and our friend Daz would make us mix tapes of all our favourite stuff. (tapes in case you don't know were what we had before cd's existed :) ) We had some mutual friends, Azz, Russ, Daz, Frostie, she has maybe mentioned them? they were good lads (most of the time) and we often spent time sat having a laugh with them.
There's so many stories I could tell you, some I probably shouldn't hehehe! There are some that stand out more than others. But every memory I have is one that will stay with me forever, your mum was one of the first true friends I had, she didn't care that I was fat, she didn't care that I didn't know how a friendship should work. She had all the time in the world for me, probably because we were both misfits.
We had gone to a festival with her dad, Glyn and Emma (I think), we were skint and had spent our last few quid on fags (don't ever smoke, its gross and I'm glad I've quit :) ) so we were hanging around the beer tent hoping someone would buy us a drink, but no one would, so we chatted up the bar man, who very kindly would let the pints overflow and was catching it, pouring it into pint glasses and letting us have it. Thinking about it now it was probably really gross, but we managed a couple of pints of cider for free :) at the same festival we were invited to join a small party, we laughed loads that night, we talked loads too, both of us were terrible at choosing decent boyfriends and we would listen to the other moan about men, there were many times where we provided a shoulder to cry on for each other. We ended up with a rather drunk bunch of people, a demijohn of scrumpy cider was passed around for us all to drink, from the same straw! again really quite gross, but fun at the time. We laid under the stars and talked for ages. Then tried sneaking back into the tent, but we were caught, oops !!! we were a little underage to be getting drunk :)
Me and your mum wore black all year round and always had our biker jackets with us, it was a boiling hot summer holidays and we were bored, now bearing in mind this was pre mobile phones and parents only let us make one or two calls if we were lucky. We had called some friends and organised to meet them in the next village, but what we had failed to do was make sure we had bus money, turns out we didn't, but we weren't allowed to make another call, so rather than standing our friends up we decided to walk. We started off in our docmartens and biker jackets, the jackets soon came off, the long skirts were soon rolled up and the tshirts tied in a knot at the front. Then the boots came off, we'd only walked half a mile or so and were sweltering, we fastened the shoelaces and hung the boots around our necks. we managed another half mile or so and stopped to watch some men resurfacing the road, at first this was fun, but then we realised the lovely smooth road we had been walking on was now awful new rough road, we thought about cutting accross the fields, but decided we ran the risk of getting lost, so we stuck to the road. We had to put the boots back on and started to try hitching a ride, which back in 1993 (ish) was a fairly safe thing to do, we walked another mile with no one stopping, then a lovely old guy stopped and offered us a lift, we gladly jumped in the car, but what made us laugh the most was that we were less than a 1 minute drive from the village hahaha! Our flipping friends didn't turn up! So we found a pay phone and reversed the charges on her dad and asked him to come and pick us up.
We spent many a day sat down by the canal watching the ducks and boats, or on the bench at the street junction, hoping to get beeped at by lads, we would listen to music, we would try and sneak out for a crafty fag, usually getting caught, because it was a small village, everyone knew who Naomi was, so would tell her parents if they saw her smoking or drinking :) I remember there being 2 stair cases in her house, one being a spiral metal staircase. Strange the things you remember when looking back. I actually took my kids there a few years ago, to show them where I used to hang out. (I'd be happy to do the same with you if you ever want to.)
Me and Naomi had some huge arguments, and we were as stubborn as each other, but we would always make up quickly. Unfortunately we lost touch once I settled into a relationship, only contacting each other again on Facebook last year. We planned on meeting up, but then she didn't come online for ages. Then I got the awful news from Emma, that she passed away yesterday. I did cry loads and also contacted as many of our old friends as I could. I know I have never met you, but I wanted to share my memories of your mum, she was a wonderful person and I loved her dearly. A true friend and bloody crazy.
Most of my memories have alcohol in them, me and your mum didn't know any other way of being social, I wish I could go back and tell those girls that alcohol really isn't an answer to our problems, and to cherish every second you have with your friends, the ones you truly love.
I don't know if you are going to read this now or wait till you are older, but please keep it, I want you to make sure you remember that your mum was loved, there are a lot of people who wanted to come to the funeral, but can't due to family and work commitments. But I will be there and will love your mum forever.
If you ever want to know about her teenage years then feel free to contact me on facebook or phone 07...
All my Love
Cheryl
xxxx
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