David Charters: Rebels never grow old

May 27 2008 by David Charters, Liverpool Daily Post

"CAN we?" asked our 12-year-old son, his eyes following the question across the lounge until they met my own eyes - peeping damply over the rim of a newspaper from the armchair, in which my world- weary body puckered like a slowly deflating porpoise.

"Can we?" he repeated, as I corrected my posture with a sharp intake of air, while flapping the ears, which admirers have likened to toby-jug handles. 

"Can we," he said finally, gathering enough puff for a final assault on the sentence - "cross the Alps, following the exact route taken by Hannibal in 218 BC?"

Did he think I could remember it from my own childhood experiences, like a day-trip to Rhyl.

"I'll just dust down the old sandals and off we'll jolly well go," seemed to be the answer he was expecting.

Instead, though, I demurred, while the index finger on my left hand located the outcrop of biscuit crumbs, which had settled in a cavity on a molar still clinging perkily to the upper gum.

"We should remember that Mum might prefer flying to Paris or Prague," I said finally, dabbing the crumbs on to a handkerchief. "I think you'll find that the route chosen by Hannibal and his elephants by- passed most of the popular attractions, such as branches of Next, jewellers, chocolate fountains and exotic perfumeries."

At that moment, my wife shimmied into the room. "I heard that," she said, brightly. "I suppose you think it is funny scoffing at a helpless girl. Perhaps, though, we could come to an understanding. You boys follow in the footsteps of Hannibal, while I have a treat of my own."

With that, she perched demurely on our quite-new sofa, spread a pack of credit cards into a fan on the table and began poking the pocket- calculator - an angelic smile floating across the turquoise of her lovely eyes.

Had she already forgotten about how Hannibal crossed the Alps to crush the mighty Roman army in a series of brilliant victories?
 Hannibal, the noblest Carthaginian of them all, had been my boyhood hero, the brave soldier from North Africa. He's still my hero, the greatest general of antiquity, and the man who taught me that a defeated people can rise with pride and courage against their oppressors.

Many years ago, with my old friend, Brian, I walked Alpine mountain passes, similar to those trod by Hannibal.

On a sultry night, I had mentioned this to our son, who, like me, reads everything he can about Hannibal. "We must march on Rome together one day," he said.

And so, with a handshake, we pledged to do that, when I am free from work and he has left school. It's our ambition.

Anyway, a couple of weeks ago, the daughter of another old friend sent me an invitation to his 60th birthday. I had shared a flat with this fine man, called Bomber Pete, and other hippies, midnight ramblers, poets, wine- drinkers, philosophers, bus- missers and moon-gazers in the late 1960s. It is said that we washed our socks once a week, but people exaggerate such things for the sake of diplomacy. 

Although I have not seen him for 40 years, those days have been the inspiration for a recurring dream. The scene is a soulless, chrome kitchen, floored with Tuscan tiles and fitted with cupboards of Scandinavian wood, beneath strip-lighting. A tightly- muscled couple, a gym-sheen on their faces, sit straight at the table, spooning a low-fibre cereal into their shining mouths, while the digitally tuned radio hums out the financial news. Their teenage son's blazers and schoolbags hang on the chairs.

Suddenly, the whole house trembles and guitar music thunders from the floor above. The mother reaches for her designer- mop and raps its handle against the ceiling. Bang! Bang! Bang!

"Switch that bloody record- player off," she bellows, glaring at her husband. "You'll have to speak to him. I try, but he just ignores me. He's out of control! I can't stand it any longer!"

The father shakes his head in despair. "OK, darling, you win. I'll have a word with him."

He walks up the stairs and knocks on the door. "Dad," he says, "Dad, please turn it down, for me - otherwise it will be the Autumn Shades old people's home for you. Now you don't want that."

Whenever this dream comes to me, I find myself before the full-length mirror, smiling, as I strum my air-guitar. Rebels never grow old.

 If you want to walk across the Alps with your son, you have to stay young. "Could I follow you in the new car?" asked my wife, mysteriously.

* LISTEN to David Charters on his picture podcast at www.liverpooldailypost.co.uk