Gareth's Anthem
This was the first time I had sneered at my National Anthem. ‘Local Boy in the Photograph,’ through my discreet earphones, seemed far more appropriate under the circumstances.

I’d changed.

I’d normally blast out a tuneless version of the rousing tune, singing lyrics I didn’t understand, like the patriot I always thought I was. Watching the mouths of the congregation, as their passion and pride rose to spine-tingling heights, I secretly turned up the volume of the Stereophonics wailing in my ears – guilt free.

The ‘Phonics’ was Gareth’s favourite band. We’d been to see them in Cardiff and at the Liberty when Stuart Cable was still with them. Never felt self-conscious about it either; even though we were in our forties at the time and were therefore the targets for the inevitable plastic bottle of piss launched, Leighton Rees style, at our heads. No one knew then how prophetic the lyrics would be. Not even I knew Gareth was so troubled, not until the night before his clothes were found alongside the track.

Learning the anthem phonetically, before we could talk properly, seemed natural to us all at Ynys Bach County Primary School. It didn’t matter that I was in the English speakers class because my granddad hailed from Hereford. My best mate Gareth was in the Welsh class that seemed to radiate a golden glow for those of us forbidden to enter. But the portly and bearded Mrs Phillips was never my imagined vision of one of the heavenly hordes. I confess that I struggled with my exclusion from that class. I felt my rightful place should be alongside Gareth in one of those little golden glowing chairs. My dad spoke fluent Welsh but my mam hadn’t learnt – due to the Hereford connection. So some of us were taught through the medium of English whilst the others, in that exalted wood panelled room, learned everything through Welsh.

How could you learn English through the medium of Welsh?

All of us had to learn the anthem.

For a seemingly tricky piece of oral gymnastics, it wasn’t that hard to learn. The tune was a good ‘un and suited a damn good blast of the tonsils.

“It’s your heritage,” Mrs Harris would scream at those of us who ‘failed to engage.’ Mrs Harris had been around so long she had begun to resemble the aging architecture of a time with very different values. She had even taught my mam, she really was part of the foundations of the old school. Like Mrs Phillips in the Welsh class, Mrs Harris had a pretty good goatee too – what was it with older women back then? She was another formidable character, so tall, proud and straight – I’m convinced she had a rod inserted through her arse to maintain that lofty poise. It just wasn’t natural. But she treated me well, even lending me her tweed overcoat on that occasion the class fell about pissing themselves when I had a malfunction of an entirely different bodily function. I was only four at the time – come on!

Only Gareth hadn’t laughed.

At that far distant time I had no idea of how my native tongue had been surgically removed from my soul before I was even born. But then, as a child, why should it even matter? It’s only with the passing of time, of aging and maturing into the agitated and deeply disillusioned self of the now that I realise my ignorance was helping to keep the language buried, surrendering generations of heritage to pacify a nation which had no regard for my own and nothing in common with us other than living on the same mass of land.

Trumpton and Pogles Wood seemed far more important to me as a child.

Then there was the Sunday morning chapel service - entirely in Welsh. It was like sitting through a François Truffaut movie – knowing it was supposed to be worth the effort but failing to engage with the characters in any meaningful way. It was not a place for me. At home I would even check for those three little digits that I believed must surely be branded onto my scalp somewhere below my basin cut.

Engaging with the vicious rants of the preacher was something I refused to do. Love in my home didn’t come in outburst of furious anger. There were moments of blessed relief. Gareth was a character I had engaged with. It hadn’t been difficult. He was the one who made chapel bearable, the all-rounder, the one who could drop the smelliest farts without breaking into a smile and even raise the hymnbook off his lap - without hands - whenever he sat next to the gorgeous Sian. Gareth was fun and we just got along.  

After leaving school we both went our own way but somehow ended up working in the police service of South Wales. Gareth was passionate about the job, taking a particular interest in the welfare and safety of children. I had no inkling then of why he was so engaged with that notoriously troubled area of investigation.

We met up from time to time, a cup of coffee at Seggadelli’s, an occasional pint down the Swan, until I began to suspect that my lifetime friend seemed to find more comfort and understanding in his pint of Brains than in my company. I knew Gareth better than anyone but even I didn’t know what he had endured. No clue as to what had formed the character I loved like a brother? How could events so foul mould a character so beautiful? I’ve since learned that this sort of thing was common in the isolated valleys of the country I loved so dearly, a common, national love ignorant of the failings and shortcomings, blind to the Sunday smile masking the Saturday leer, yet still a love that was celebrated with that rousing anthem.

The polished box of flesh and bones slipped slowly from view as more words were tenderly uttered by the black robed figure that had never known my friend. 

I never went on to learn Welsh. I still claim to be able to understand most of what’s said but plucking one word from a dozen doesn’t always give me enough pieces of the puzzle to form the complete picture.

I’d listened to the service for Gareth and managed to keep control. My stiff upper lip not once revealing the terrible sense of loss that ate at my insides.

Not understanding Welsh had its advantages sometimes.

updated by @nigel-williams: 02/13/16 12:27:42AM