Love is a Gobstopper and a bag of hot Chestnuts

Years ago, street markets thrived in suburban areas of London. They were a time-honoured institution of bustling, ruddy-cheeked stallholders, displaying their wares, with an open-friendliness and pride in their goods that seemed to flourish more easily in those days.

As you entered a market, often from a drab, almost static street, the world would suddenly come alive with colour and noise. Stalls of every description, with rickety frames, leaned in towards the middle of the road temptingly, where the shoppers thronged through, eyes wavering from side to side as they tried to take in, and possibly resist some, if not all, that was on offer en route: books sweets, toys, even fruit and veg. The latter two items of course, being highly resistable – that is – to a five year old boy like myself.

On one particular day that stands out in my mind, mum stopped at the wool stall as usual. I watched her fondle the balls of wool almost reverently and every now and then turned my focus onto the sweets stall, about ten stalls ahead on the opposite side of the road. The gobstoppers and liquorice allsorts were calling, ‘Eat me, eat me’ and whilst mum engaged in her holy wool ritual, I managed to slip away unnoticed.

As I headed towards the sweeties, I felt slightly guilty and looked back towards mum – but as a mountain of wool tumbled and consumed her and other ‘knitty’ ladies in a deluge of clacking anticipation, I managed to suppress that guilt and walked on.

But I was waylaid by the eel stall: it was as alive and wriggling as its contents.  It lured me aside from my intended destination to view the bowls of silvery-black knotted things, writhing in a futile effort to nowhere. Their destination was as black and bitter as mine was colourful and sweet. Hands delved in the bowls and grabbed the things, then chop, chop, chop.  In seconds their squirming ceased. At some point my blood lust ceased also and as some time had passed, I started to walk back towards the wool stall, but mum had gone! I looked into the crowd but it had increased. Foody smells wafted and I wondered if she had gone for lunch!  A five-year-old’s logic often lingers in very imaginative story books.

And then I saw her. Not mum but a girl possibly the same age as myself. She had brown, curly hair that tendrilled around her ears, blue eyes – and she was wearing a white and pink flowery dress. I wondered if she was cold, as it was now the end of Autumn. For a moment we just stared at one another and I thought she looked slightly sad, which was in keeping with the time of year, all fallen leaves and old people dying – but then she smiled and a piece of summer came back.  

“Come with me” she said, “your mum has been looking for you.”

How did she know I was lost? Anyhow I decided to follow her, but first she reached into her pocket and gave me a gobstopper. It was a ‘Wow’ moment. Blue, huge and shiny. Mum would never let me have them – said I’d choke on one. I reckon I dribbled at the mere sight of it, which wasn’t exactly good manners but the girl appeared not to notice.

And then we walked for a few minutes. It was getting colder now, though my friend still appeared to to be unaffected by it. In just one hour Autumn had fled and winter had seeped into the market through gaps at the side of stalls: it found its way to the imaginatively named ‘ Hot Chestnut Man’ who was, of course, selling hot chestnuts and we found him too! My new friend and guide reached into her pocket, paid the man and then presented me with a bag of those delicious nuts, after taking just a few for herself and putting them in the pocket of her dress. Was I in a market or was I in heaven? Mum always said she couldn’t afford such things.

I thanked her and she smiled again. Bluebirds swooped from the sky and alighted on the tops of the stalls, singing beautifully despite the cold. Funny thing was, nobody else appeared to notice them. I felt my heart go sort of melty and warm, even warmer than the hot chestnuts I was tucking into.

Then before I knew it, I saw mum running towards me, through the diminishing lunchtime crowd and when she reached me she gathered me up in her arms, where I was cushioned by a shopping bag full of wool. My little friend, I noticed, had gone.  

At home, mum said I had imagined the little girl, especially as she had been wearing a dress in such chilly weather.  But the next day on my way to school, I found the hot chestnut bag in my jacket pocket, with just one chestnut left.

I have kept that chestnut now for over fifty years, still in its bag and stored in the bottom of my wardrobe in a box where I keep precious memories. But even if I no longer had the small remnant of that day, the time replays itself when I revisit the market, as busy and friendly as ever. Sadly there is no longer a ‘Hot Chestnut Man’ but if I find a sweet stall that still sells gobstoppers, I will buy one and suck it for hours...