Losing My Virginity

I also noticed that people who would never dream of spending as much as 40 shillings on a meal wouldn’t hesitate to spend 40 shillings buying the latest Bob Dylan album

to wield the axe.

Hearing others’ stories made me realise how lucky I was in my relationship with my own parents. They had never judged me, and always supported me, always praised the good things rather than criticised the bad things: I had no qualms about admitting my problems, worries and failures. Our work was to try to help out those who were in trouble but with nowhere to turn

We never had any money; we were incredibly busy; but we were a close-knit team. We worked together because it was fun, because we felt that what we were doing was important, and because we had great lives together

I have always thought rules were there to be broken, and Stowe had as many rules and regulations as the army – many of them, it seemed to Jonny Gems and me, completely anachronistic and pointless.

for five years

I finally found a girl who was reputed to go the whole way, and at one party we slipped upstairs into a remote bedroom. I was amazed when she let me push up her skirt and take off her knickers. As we began to make love, she started to moan and groan. She was clearly having a very erotic time. I was pretty pleased by how well I must be performing since she was panting and tossing her head from side to side as she fought to control her breathing. I put up a great show and finally came with equally impressive gusto, roaring and shouting and huffing and puffing. Then I rolled off her. To my astonishment she carried on panting, apparently having what I took to be ecstatic multiple orgasms. Just as I was beginning to feel a little bemused and somewhat redundant, I finally realised that she was panting for a reason.

I can still remember the humiliation I felt

1978–1980
12 ‘Success

We all have a piss bottle in our beds due to it being too cold to get out in the night.