Words are like seeds. Plant them in a line and they give you prose. Plant them in disarray and they give you poetry

I was thrilled to be back in the UK after the Connecticut College for Women debacle, it was a Sejour of less than three months in New Haven. My experience of the United States in 1966, remind me of being beaten with a culture stick. The few fond memories I have were thanks to my room-mate Peggy whose hospitality at her home in New York allowed me to visit Manhattan and Greenwich Village and see a double bill of The Fugs and Lawrence Ferlinghetti perform. I was listening to Bob Dylan, Donovan, Frank Zappa and The Rolling Stones, Tim Buckley and Janis Joplin. The difference between the Hip and desirable forward- thinking political and social voices was reflected in the lack of Civil Rights for BLACK IS BEAUTIFUL AMERICANS. 

The mid -1960s continued the fight for Civil Rights as the teaching of Martin Luther King impacted the world. Then the emergence of the Black Panthers and Malcolm X and their international appeal and amazing talent collided with the contribution of Black American artists and sports champions with Muhammad Ali delighting his fans with his quick wits and joyous repartee.

From September to December, I suffered through it and by Thanksgiving I realized that there was nothing I wanted from that school and not one teacher whose name I remembered. My love affair with a girl was challenging and testy but great for sexual experience without the fear of getting pregnant. 

She took me to meet her parents and her friends one weekend. Her friends all drank beer and smoked pot and were passionate about trying to persuade me to do the same. There is nothing that raises my hackles faster than someone trying to persuade me to lose control or behave badly. I do not respond well to being coerced into behavior of which I disapprove.  By Thanksgiving my affair caused both of us to be detained in the medical wing of the college. It soon became obvious that I needed to escape and quickly. The student with whom I had a dalliance was not so lucky and endured 4 years of psychiatric treatment

I felt alienated and whereas scholarship and learning were always my happy place; compared to St. George’s, the East Coast College experience was a nightmare. There was no time for Current Events and neither the radio or the television reporting in the mid-1960s gave one, any idea as to what was happening in the rest of the world. I felt confused and unable to gather myself together. Fortunately, my father had reminded me not to buy in to the American passion for Psychiatry, Cults or other Group Stupidity. 

My Mother was concerned and caring but rigid in her disappointment that I had let her and my father down by not succeeding and therefore showing my appreciation to the company for their financial support for my education. 

Once I returned to Cyprus, after a couple of months, when I knew I had a place at Kingston Poly, my optimism returned.  I was not aware until I returned to London, that disapproval for the Vietnam war was international and protests were held all over the world. American foreign policy was analyzed, questioned and then dismissed. I assumed and probably mistakenly, that the thugs in politics wanted to keep the money for the military by always having, an ongoing war. That is another strange thing about living abroad, one has a far more balanced view of the world than when one’s values are primarily based on accumulation of wealth, keeping up with the Jones and people running in packs either at Country clubs, or following sports or the faux patriotism and false pride of believing that America was superior to any other country. Human beings are a proud species and wanting to be First or Number One is understandable but not necessarily a way to enjoy peace and tranquility amongst nations.

Arriving in London to attend Kingston Polytechnic was exactly what I wanted to do. Mom and Dad figured that I had better stay at the women’s hostel for the first year at least. The Women’s Hostel was another hot, local political issue. The Hostel was an old Victorian house that had undergone a complete overhaul and the council had to take the flak as everyone commented on how much it had cost to refurbish a residence that only housed 21 female students. 

Kingston -upon-Thames is a market town with wonderful access to the Thames. Kingston Poly was brought in as a part of the Red Brick university advanced education expansion.  My first couple of months, Kingston was hard work. We had plenty of homework, reading and social activities to orient the new students and allow everyone to get to meet each other!

I met a guy from Doncaster who was doing his Masters in Marketing and Economics and he was very interesting; one of the first Yorkshiremen I had met. We went out for a while and drove to Doncaster to meet his parents and his grandmother who gifted him the Austin Healey 3000 that carried us up to Yorkshire at least once a month. But soon a chance encounter in the Student’s Union bar with GM changed that relationship. For those of you that have read Free Spirit or Backstage Passes, I told the story of having sex for the first time on my 18^th birthday. Bill had bought me two pairs of earrings. Both pairs were costume jewelry but he was astute as to what I would like: flashy; one pair was long dangly faux emeralds and the other pair was diamante.

The most extraordinary part of my 18th birthday was meeting Gary. Gary was a real attractive, confident dude. Turns out he was president of the Student Union.  I was very taken with Marketing and I had just completed a six-week retailing internship, at a store called Bentall’s in Kingston as part of the college curriculum. I really enjoyed it and in the same year I was cast as ‘Hal’ in, ‘Oh What a Lovely War.’ Gary Morton was in touch with a thriving Student Union Political agenda concerning grants and free speech. After talking in the Student Union Bar for several evenings Gary asked if he could borrow my writing skills and get me to draft some press releases about the occupation of The London School of Economics Union with particular reference to the support provided by Kingston Poly. 

I said I would love to do that. Before I knew it, when I delivered the press releases, he asked me if I would like to come and watch the Kingston Poly Sculling team practice. I had no idea that I would be so startled. Gary was built and powerful! But mostly smart and energetic, enthusiastic and hard-working. I felt like I was becoming more aware of what I expected and wanted in a friend or lover. Bill who was a wonderful friend and introduction to the North of England, Doncaster in Yorkshire, was now in the rear-view mirror.

Gary found a cottage in Hampton Wick and we fell in lust and love.  I adored his brother and his parents and then my Mom arrived from Cyprus and we spent a wonderful holiday together and then I felt that he was about to ask me something serious and I knew that I would be useless as a Labor politico’s wife. Gary knew it and I knew it. I guess some folks attend university or technical college to find a partner, I had no interest in doing that and was only interested in what I could learn and how much work I could do with Calvin, Lou Reisner and Mercury Records. I had a premonition that this ambition and plan for working in England would get me into trouble but I didn’t care.

I attended several meetings with the Mercury folks from Chicago and I was able to use my ability to market, to get Irving Greene and the A&R man to sign a folk singer who Calvin was certain would be a big star and who wrote his own material and he was called David Bowie. This artist had a band called Feathers, a trio with Hutch, Hermione and David and we saw them at the Round House.  Lou Reizner had been outflanked by Calvin’s and my efforts and his initial refusal to sign David for a single; became an album deal after I had met several times with the guys from Chicago and Mercury home office.

Lou Reisner had to find a new way to try and control me but he was doing very well. Lou was smart and musically savvy; a master’s from Chicago’s University of Music confirmed his abilities and smarts. Lou had with, brilliant strategic planning signed Rod Stewart to a solo deal with Mercury, in a way paving the future division of the Rod and The Small Faces.  So, Lou, back to controlling me, did this by asking me to help market a band called the ‘Eyes of Blue,’ and then to be the Mercury liaison for Lou’s Buddy Miles album which was recorded at Trident. Buddy and I had the same sense of humor and I was able to look after him and keep studio production running smoothly. I was proving my worth.

Back to Kingston Polytechnic, somehow, I had passed my first year and was able to keep the studying and the working with Calvin and Mercury records happening. By 1968, I knew that I had to keep my attendance up or I would not be able to sit my exams for this 2 year Higher National Diploma – HND. But I was already sure that I wanted to work either in films or the Record Business where I was able to see my work appreciated. I realized that my first desire to act and direct had to take place after I had written the thoughts that were in my mind and occupying research space.  All this razzled my brain. After three to four months of trying to get caught up I realized I needed a job. I did not want to spend my dad’s money without paying my dues. Paying my dues meant succeeding at college and not frittering away his stipend for me for my education. I had a semi boyfriend from Lebanon and I confided in him that I needed a job because it looked like I was not going to be allowed to take my exams as I was short on college and lecture attendance. John was a godsend and suggested running the evening desk at his Uncle’s hotel in Queensgate.

I went and booked folks into the hotel for a couple of weeks and then John’s uncle suggested moving from Queensgate to the Nomad Travel Club in Paddington.  I did that for a while until one morning as I came downstairs to start the 11.00 am opening up routine, I saw a body in the street and had to call the police and confer with John’s uncle as to what was the protocol for handling something like this. Good job I did! Because within a week the band from Mexico City had a near fatality when one of the band jumped out of the window from the top floor and thankfully did not kill himself but more or less bounced off the roof of a parked car! He was seriously injured but lived to play again.

I was moving forward without the benefit of my parent’s support.  I was sure I could make this all happen: working for Mercury Records and being Calvin Mark Lee’s assistant. My optimism and truthfulness were misinterpreted by a certain Daily Mirror journalist called Mary Finnigan. Enough said. It so happened that she was Bowie’s landlady and was convinced of her own power and sway over David because they had set up the Beckenham Arts Lab to provide cash flow for her and David at The Three Tuns, a pub in Beckenham with a large back room where the shows and performances of the Arts Lab took place. I knew nothing about this and Finnigan was blissfully ignorant of what I had already accomplished with the Mercury Records hierarchy concerning David’s record deal.

I went out to dinner with Calvin and David at the Dumpling Inn in Soho.  We discussed bisexuality: Calvin, David and I decided we were all three bisexuals. David and I ended the night together. About a week or two later, I received a phone call from David asking me to come to Beckenham and look after him as he was feeling unwell. I got on the train in Victoria and half an hour later was in Beckenham and walked up to David’s address. Beckenham was a treat for me after the big city experience of London. There were shady streets lined with trees and it was very charming. David and I spent a day listening to his music and talking and I soon got the picture that his landlady was a journalist who had gone to prison for drug offences. Upon her return, I found out that she would stop at nothing, including drugging me and abusing me sexually with David as her co-conspirator, to keep him on the leash she required to feel important. David was in a win-lose situation. She was the roof over his head and the turnkey to his weekly money he earned at the Beckenham Arts Lab.

My brain kicked into overtime and a started to unscramble the mess he was in with his living situation and business prospects.  I realized I could unscramble it but I certainly couldn’t spend another day under her roof, I was frightened she would kill me after her treatment of me. I respected her talent as a writer though it was Daily Mirror tainted and she called it journalism. Fortunately, I was offered a room in a house in Blackheath. The house had two couples who shared the place, two dudes and their girlfriends. The dudes were (Whispering) Bob Harris the Dee Jay and Tony Elliott who founded Time Out in August 1968. Both were movers and shapers

Suddenly an opportunity presented itself. David was due to go to the Maltese song Festival and then on to part2 in Monsummano Terme in Italy. He was dreading it; I figured out a way to go there and keep him company so he didn’t have to deal with his manager Ken Pitt on his own and I could escape the landlady.

My time at Kingston Poly was officially over. I ignored being unable to take my exams and plunged straight into my new career in the Record Business.