IT'S BACK TO THE FUTURE

Les welcomes the albeit brief return of Algebra Cadabra last month

In the February Edition of our Village Pump I advocated the return of the algebra page and lo and behold, come the March Edition, there it was thanks to Mr. David Smith.

If I have my facts right, something which is not always the case, I believe David Smith has a Daughter by the name of Chloe Smith who I read has been selected as a Conservative Candidate in Norwich. Now who is to say what the future may hold for this young Lady? Are we in fact talking about a future Prime Minister? Yes, early days I agree, but let's assume this materialise. What is my point?

That at long last we will have had in this part of the world someone with at least connections with our area who will have "made the grade". If we go back to when I was a young man, yes it's violin time again, I didn't have aspirations to be a Member of Parliament, football was all I thought about. However, at the risk Mt Editor of a number of your readers descending in to uncontrollable laughter, I am prepared to say that on the football front I did in fact possess a degree of talent.

That being so you could now ask how come that I only played football at village level? Well I'm sticking to this even if no one else agrees; it wasn't lack of talent that held me back but lack of Opportunity. I don't accept that in this part of the world, and I don't care what subject you have in mind, that there is a dearth of talent. But there is a lack of Opportunity.

Staying with football I seem to have read that if you went down a coal mine in the North of England you would come up again with two or three Bobby Chariton's. Well there doesn't appear to be many coal mines around Stoke Ferry, or Wereham; we don't even have any in Methwold, one or two Literary Geniuses yes, but no coal mines.

What we do have is a number of farms, and if you can up North find footballers in coal mines you should be able to find them on our farms. The difference is that up North they look for talent; in this part of the world we don't. That has to be the explanation because I will not accept talent, in whatever field you have in mind, is thin on the ground in this part of the world. I won't accept that.

Now if we accept just a part of what I have said contains some logic, even so it's irrelevant because that was the past; the big question is what is the difference between the past and the present? And there isn't any. So if anyone thinks the day will come when our area produces a David Beckham or the likes of Ian Botham, well it's never going to happen, because we just don't address the issue. We spend far too much time criticising our young folk when we should be out there giving them the opportunity which I maintain wasn't around in my day.

We can only hope therefore that one day, our own, if we are allowed to call her that, Chloe Smith, will fly the flag on our behalf, because if she doesn't no one else will. Talent appears to be at a premium in this part of the world, but don't you ever believe it.

Methwold

Les Lawrence