My dream was dashed but I still feel like that little boy
NIGEL WAKEFORD was a clever child who passed his 11-plus and became the first boy in his family to go to grammar school.
His was a happy childhood with his three siblings and parents. ‘My dad married at 18 and was working class. He did lots of different things, and ended up doing admin for a bus company,’ recalls Nigel. ‘But if he had ten bob in his pocket he’d take us out on the weekend.’ There were sailing trips, horseriding and countryside jaunts.
Aged 11, Nigel dreamed of being a soldier. Visualising life at 25 he wrote: ‘I do not spend much time at home because I travel a lot abroad. At the moment I have a job as corpral (sic) in the army. There is a lot of drill and hard work in it but we do have some pleasure time we go to the pictures and have dances.’
Sadly, Nigel’s dreams of joining the Armed Forces were not to be.
Leaving school at 16, he did attempt to join the RAF. ‘I went to the recruitment office in Brighton and did all the exams. I was told I had one of the best English comprehension test papers they’d ever had, but then I went for the medical and failed because I had a minor eye defect, a “lazy” eye.’
Naturally optimistic, he is not regretful but feels he missed out on a ‘career’. While clever enough to get his English and Maths O- levels a year early, he spent much of his working life in different jobs, before becoming a carpenter. Now semi-retired, but looking for a part-time job, he is mortgage free and enjoying life near Lewes, East Sussex, with his wife Caroline, a civil servant. His hobby is classic cars — and he’s been an MG Owners Club member for 35 years. ‘I’d be a rich man if it wasn’t for cars and bikes,’ he jokes. ‘I still feel much younger than I am, I’ve never lost that. Mentally I’m still 12.’