Changing tastes

Every six months or so, just as the last notes of the dawn chorus were fading, mum would pack my little sister and I into the car for the bi-annual Shopping Trip. Essential supplies were needed - after all, Maidstone was at least 17 miles away from home so it was better to be safe than sorry. Crisps? Check. Extra coats? Check. Warm overly strong overly orange orange squash in a plastic bottle? Check. Oven off? Door locked? Check Check Check and Check again.

Eventually we'd get under way and pitch up half an hour later in the multi-storey car park. We were always the first there. My sister and I spent the hour or so until the shops opened fidgeting in the car munching crisps and watching the windows steam up. Mum would always be desperate for the loo and would head off like a starting pistol straight into the ladies at British Home Stores as the town centre clock chimed nine. Then the Shopping Trip proper would begin, the three of us traipsing from shop to shop attempting to put on shoes that were too narrow, me looking with longing fascination at fashionable 'lady' clothes and fancy underwear whilst trying on polyester dresses in green and brown that scratched about the neck.

Sometime after we'd picked up the requisite number of multi-packs of white waist high pants, we'd head back into BHS and straight for the cafe. Mum always had a mug of milky coffee with cod in batter, chips and bright green bullet peas. My little sister usually chose something involving ham and crisps. After our lunch (although we'd have called it dinner then), we'd move on to help mum look for clothes, usually in Evans, usually involving checked pastels, usually including elasticated waist bands. Then we'd browse a bit in the delightfully fragrant world of the posh department store Army and Navy, where we'd spray each other with perfume and try out lipsticks on the backs of our hands. Then the long trudge back to the car, grasping plastic bags and light-headed from the bombardment of scents, and start the journey home accompanied by the smell of slightly stale crisps. Once back, we'd open our plastic bags and show each other our purchases with great delight, holding each item up in turn to be admired, trying our new clothes and shoes on and twirling round as the cat looked on with round green eyes whilst singeing her fur on the gas fire. Full of tiredness after the thrilling day, we'd gradually creep off to bed early and fall asleep dreaming of the beautiful new things we'd bought. Our Shopping Trips really were the most wonderful days.

One day, when I was about twelve or thirteen, a bold move like no other came to pass. Instead of the usual milky coffees and such at the BHS cafe, mum suggested we went to the exotic new American restaurant she'd heard that had just opened in the High Street. My sister and I bubbled with excitement - how grown up that sounded! We could hardly contain ourselves as we approached. Are we there yet? Are we there yet? And suddenly, there we were outside the doorstep of the closest thing to heaven we had ever seen. In giant yellow illuminated letters, the restaurant announced its presence loud and proud: McDonald's.

It was as if it had been beamed from another planet entirely. Instead of the pastel blue and plastic pine upholstery of the BHS cafe, the tables were red and green, the chairs armless and fixed to the floor. There were posters on the walls and toilets that you didn't need a lift to get to. The three of us shuffled up to the counter to look at the menu and then carried our heaped tray, full of polystyrene containers, awe-struck over to one of the red tables by the window. We sat down.

"Wait a minute", said mum, "they haven't given us our knives and forks. And there's no plates. I'll go and ask." And so she did, leaving my sister and I at the table to peep inside the boxes.

A few minutes later, mum came back with a face like thunder. "I can't believe it. They said there are no knives and forks, and no plates either! What are we supposed to do?"

We managed best we could, eating our food straight from the boxes with our fingers, silently trying to consider whether we liked the hamburgers, the gherkins and the miniature pieces of diced onion or not. When we'd finished, we stood up and walked back out into the High Street. "I don't think I like that place very much", said mum, "no knives and forks! I ask you."

***

I had a McDonald's for my lunch today. Nearly thirty years on, it is of course an every day sight in towns and motorway service stations and shopping centres throughout the country. Mum likes it now, especially the chicken nuggets which she always dips into a pot of garlic and herb sauce. Even my grown up little sister's three year old daughter recognises it, calling it by the delightful nursery-rhyme name of Old McDonald's.

As I tucked into my Big Tasty Burger, it might not have felt quite so exotic as it did on that very first visit all those years ago but it will always remind me of some very precious times with my mum and my little sister and our wonderful Shopping Trips.