That Other Life

The first run was a dummy. I acted suspiciously, but not so that they'd call the Police or my parents. I watched the strategically placed mirrors - they were the days before store cameras - but, the thing with mirrors you could also watch the watchers. I walked a little too fast towards the exit and, snap!

"Just a minute, son."

I let them pat me down, because I had nothing to hide. Even then, they weren't allowed to do that, but I played the bewildered kid to the hilt. It was a small price to pay for them not calling the Police.

It was a small bookshop and I was a frequent visitor. I was perhaps 12 or 13 and they had lots of neat stuff on planes, ships and history. They were dusty books full of facts and grainy photos - heavily marked down - but often beyond my pocket money.

After much careful planning I worked out the method, then began to slip books out under my clothing. I was never caught and never felt the least guilt, even knowing they were a small, specialist, family business. Each theft I celebrated with a mix of adrenalin and triumph. It was cool fun.

Being the most junior member of a large family, secrecy was a survival skill I learned young. There was a large gap between me and my next sibling, which kind of left me on the outer. I created worlds around myself full of adventure - kept diaries full of stuff and hid them away.

There were pencil sketches of every warship present at the battle of Jutland - that took me nearly two years - there were around 600. There was my organisation of the Italian Air Force of World War Two - the Regia Aeronautica - written in Italian. For the exercise, I taught myself enough Italian to get by. I designed my own mythical air force with squadron insignia, etc, then modeled planes - around 100. I had catalogues of every airship built by Germany from 1900 onwards with all the details, stats and ultimate fate. There were notebooks on the Luftwaffe - I learned German (true) - so I could read the original texts.

I drew pencil sketches of Tsarist Russian warships, Austria-Hungary's 'Szent Istvan' and lists of U-Boats from both World Wars. All this stuff was hidden away. I knew the compression ratio of a Spitfire's engine and the speed of a Fiat G-50 'Frescia.' A teacher told the class I was 'a mine of useless information'. I was stung - I still consider information is never useless - just some is more useful than others.

Most of this information was pinched, nicked, permanently borrowed, five finger discounted and smuggled out of my friendly, and unobservant, local book shop. I went on to greater endeavours of petty larceny, of course, but I look back on those innocent heists with something approaching pride. They were successful and profitable, but I did take from them a certain exaggerated sense of my own cunning. In hindsight, it was low-end thievery, albeit relatively high risk.

From some reason, I didn't inherit any great sense of right and wrong. I had, though, a keen sense of 'consequences.' I learned the value of 'risk assessments.' To keep ahead of technology, however, was increasingly difficult. Thieves, today, just don't seem to care. They allow themselves to be photographed by 15 store cameras while pillaging their local supermarket. These guys are not necessarily stupid, they just don't give a fuck. It wouldn't have done for my day - cops were to be feared and no-one wanted to be locked up in those dreadful children's homes.

One day my brother found my secret cache. It provided him with sufficient fuel to ridicule me in front of anyone he wanted. He also scribbled over some of my notebooks, containing work it had taken me months to compose. He didn't understand, of course, why someone would spend so much time doing something so apparently useless. That he felt he had the right to violate my inner sanctum was neither here or there. I got him back by selling off his Bob Dylan collection and spending the money on more books. Revenge, as they say, is a dish best served cold.

I also fried his electric train set by coupling a 24 volt transformer to it rather than a 6 volt. Yeah, we were a big, happy family who loved each other dearly.

But, knocking down that fence of moral injunctions and taking a walk on the dark side has its down side. Once I tasted deceit, it was extremely difficult to put the barriers back in place. Even in adult life, theft was an option hovering in the background. With the acquisition of expensive habits, that option looked increasingly attractive. Shoplifting was out of the question - it's too risky and better organised as part of a gang. Burglary, mugging, etc, was never an attractive proposition. It's the crime of the desperate - far too risky - and simply not sneaky enough for my nature. Fraud, opportunism - these were my MOs.

Reasonably well planned fraud was my crime of choice for a few years until I plucked a straw too many. Too long pulling the same racket is bordering on stupidity, but a good scam is hard to let go. 'When something works, don't change it' doesn't cut it in the real world. I committed the ultimate sin of carelessness, and wound up in court for the first and only time - barring crazy stunts on motorbikes.

I had a brief association with real criminals - enough to realise they were nothing like me. They didn't think the same thoughts, reason the same way and valued the same things. Am I cured of my bad habits? I'm not sure, but I do know I have the strength to battle my predilections for my own good and those depending on me.

One habit is difficult to give up - that of playing cards close to my chest. Life, unfortunately, has taught me the more you let out there, the more people can skewer you with. Better to keep the arseholes guessing than provide them with ammunition. To talk about myself candidly is a wrench, but it's getting better with time. This past year I've done pretty well, in my humble opinion.