My Top Embarrassing Parent Moment At Keele, 30 September 1982

Dad, what were you thinking?

I suspect that many people have been embarrassed by their parents when the old-‘uns visit the young-‘uns at university. This particular memory stands out in my mind.

My parents didn’t drop me off or visit me much at Keele. This drop off, for the start of my P2 (third) year, was organised around what was supposed to be a short break for them in the Lake District.

But Mum had injured (it turned out, broken) her foot around that time, so they postponed their trip but dad brought me up to Keele anyway.

On their only previous visit to Keele, I hadn’t shown them around much, so I agreed to show dad around the union and stuff before he returned to London.

While wandering across the main car park, dad and I ran into a friend of mine from FY, Katie (aka Catherine or even, as she is now known, Cathy), whom I hadn’t yet seen since arriving back.

In traditional Keele student-friend fashion, Cathy and I greeted each other warmly, exchanged a few bants about our respective summers and agreed it would be good to catch up properly soon.

Within a few moments of Cathy going her separate way, dad exclaimed, in a stentorian voice:

gosh, that was a beezer girl you were chatting with just then.

I was pretty sure that Cathy would still have been in earshot, given the shortness of the interval and the uncharacteristic loudness of dad’s voice at that moment. So that’s the sort of thing that happens when you release dad from mum’s clutches for even one day.

Collins Dictionary defines the adjective “beezer” as “excellent, most attractive”; some other sources date the adjective to the 1950s, although I’d guess my dad acquired that archaic adjective as a young man (late 1930s or 1940s).

Cathy was (and assuredly still is, forty years on) a beezer girl. I didn’t remember her second name when I first wrote this up, but I did recall that she was from Leicester and I remember her going out with another friend of mine, Rana Sen, for some time…quite possibly still at that time. She is (forty years on) known as Cathy Butcher.

I never found out at the time whether or not Cathy heard my dad’s outburst and therefore have no idea whether she was amused, offended or totally oblivious to this tiny but memorable event. It certainly didn’t seem to upset our casual friendship, which was sustained throughout Cathy’s/our time at Keele.

If this short piece does find its way to you, forty years on, Cathy – I hope you are well and thriving and…

…sorry about dad. You know what they can be like.

Postscript: I have subsequently been reintroduced to Cathy who is (forty years on) a Facebook Friend and claims no recollection of the dad outburst. Phew.