31 Postcodes - Poem 9

 

Calle Salud

 

Rooftop Madrid,

so crazy hot.

Not used to the heights,

I wilt like salad.

 

“¿Gin-tonic?” the question

and never a person

to snub hedonism,

I’m in like “cheers!”

 

“¡Salud! ¡Salud!”

We toast till breakfast.

A few bad decisions,

what’s that, between friends?

 

A roasts some peppers,

goes full integral.

The rest do not.

We choose to rot.

RF 2021

Video/audio for this one here.

In 1985, aged 18, I went to live in Madrid for a year. In those days I don’t remember the phrase ‘gap year’ (in the UK we said ‘year out’ more then, I think). I had been offered a university place to study Spanish (originally with French) but I deferred for a year because I wanted to spend some time in Madrid which was, at that time, pretty much my idea of heaven. Up till then I’d only lived in England but after a couple of trips to Madrid on my own (to visit a friend) I’d loved it so much that I could hardly consider any possibility beyond living there. I loved the ways of socialising, the food, the drink, the language, everything really. Most of all, I think, I loved it because it wasn’t England (north or south). It was an exciting time in Spain (and Madrid in particular) as people were still concentrating hard on enjoying the new post-Franco freedoms.

The first place I stayed in Madrid was the friend’s flat right in the very centre of the city. She was half Spanish, living with an older boyfriend and they seemed so sophisticated (Their own flat! She ate vegetables – out of choice! They had evenings out discussing politics!). I wasn’t there very long – just a part of the summer – in their tiny spare room till I found a flat share of my own. It was where I started my Madrid year though so I thought I’d include it. Without their generosity (taking the badly behaved English girl out with them everywhere they went) it would have been much harder to settle in and start the year off well.

This poem is part of the annual Fun A Day Dundee project where participants try to do something creative every day for the month of January. You don't have to be in Dundee to take part and there are other Fun A Day projects around the world. People post as much of their work online as they want to (largely on Instagram but it can be elsewhere too). This year I am posting a whole poem a day (one poem for each of the 31 addresses I have lived at, covering the period 1967-2021). Videos/photos of the poems show the places remembered in the poems but were mostly taken from recent Google Street View. The videos are on my Instagram, maybe elsewhere too. Use the hashtag #fadd2021 on social media to see other people's online contributions.