The London Water Closet

Colditz!

Just in case you did not know, I went to a slightly posh public (i.e. private) school called Lord Wandsworth College. 
Little Lord Wandsworth 
Had a college in Hants.
He had silken trousers
And marble pants.
Actually, going to LWC was a pretty horrible experience. The food was awful, as school food usually is, I hated competitive sport (and there was plenty of that) and the college was out in the countryside, miles from anywhere. 
First, there was Junior House, aka Colditz. The BBC series of The Colditz Story was on TV at more or less the time when I was an inmate at J.H., so the two are inextricably linked in my memory.
So why am I writing about it? Why was I so pleased to join the WhatsApp group for the LWC class of '77? (Yes, 1977. That is when I finally left the august portal of Lord W.) The Lower and Upper Sixth were not quite so dreadful, I suppose, and at last I could indulge my mental curiosity with the academic subjects that I found interesting: History and Latin. Unfortunately, I also had to do a third subject and chose English Literature, when I think that I ought to have done French "A" level instead. 

What a dreadful photo of me with my mouth open! This was taken in the Lower Sixth "cubes", which were "study bedrooms" that were little more than prefab sheds. In my memory, the time at LWC mostly consisted of boredom, grey and rather wet afternoons when I was waiting for something to happen and nothing ever did. I suppose that I must have done quite a lot of studying, although really it was because there was nothing else to do. Weekends were particularly long and dreary. I hated going to the chapel service on Sunday mornings, as it was long, dull and (of course) compulsory. 
Yes, it was quite interesting to get messages from people I have not seen or spoken to for so long, my contemporaries and fellow-sufferers. Yes, I am planning to go to the 50th anniversary reunion next year.
 

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