Wetherby

Wetherby has seemed to me, in the last few decades, to be a town that time forgot - even if it is now considered a perfect "commuter" town - and it has lost any mystery in its original threadbare charm by being gradually overwhelmed with too many houses, people and traffic; and the tedium of retirement flats parked all around where the "overly long" alive wait impatiently not to die.

When Wetherby was rough around the edges and had a cattle market and a produce market it was more real than it is now, before I went to high school in 1983, and life was gentler. Only one car to a family - if you were fortunate - now it's too many Range Rovers, Rolexes, boutique, pretentions. Too much Bling and not enough thorough dereliction.

And I've lived here, on and off, since 1976.

There used to be loads of wasteland. Actually when the engine shed was derelict it was mysterious. Over grown gardens. Vacant houses. During the depths of the Cold War and when the UK was officially bankrupt: interest rates through the roof.

It was how I imagine East Berlin was. Somewhere interesting in its abandoned state. For us kids there were so many places to go hunting and adventuring. All the large houses on Deighton Road were overgrown and wild. Especially Stone Dene, North Grove and the old railway engine shed. One was knocked down(Homepaddock House) to make way for retirement apartments in the mid 80s then the rot began to set in. Where Homepaddock House used to sit - with its separate stabling - there is an iron relict which suggests it must've had lodgings at some time quite past, as it was so close to the original station (engine shed); this is all that remains of a paddock with horses munching on grass.