This story begins a long long time ago in a far away place. Or to be more precise, Romford, 18 months ago.
Our hero is a man named Billy. Billy lived a fairly ordinary existence, he went to work, he came home, he had dinner, he went to sleep, he got up and did it all again. Like millions in commuterland that was Billy's life.
More than this, Billy was also lonely, he had few family, even fewer friends and even fewer women. It was the blot on Billy's life. Sitting at home in his small flat when he got home from work, Billy would cook himself a microwave meal for one and settle back to watch repeats of Time Team on the discovery channel.
He said afterwards that he'd never have thought of it himself, that he only tried it because one of his few friends at work mentioned that he had tried it. Either way it makes no difference. All that matters is that one cold and blustery November morning he went down to the local retail park and worked his way through the happy couples already doing their christmas shopping until he had bought himself his new friend.
He took his new friend home in its cardboard box, unpacked it and gave it pride of place next to the television, his new friend had arrived. It was his pathway to the world. He was part of the internet revolution now. Billy had his computer.
Within hours he was on all the dating sites he could find, he'd even decided to take a gamble on the dodgy looking site offering Thai brides. He wasnt't sure about that but he pressed on, desperate to make himself known.
Next day at work, Billy fidgeted nervously all day, itching for the chance to get home and see if his perfect partner had got in touch. At the end of the day he ran in through the door, chucked his little satchel that had his lunch in on hte sofa and switched on his computer full of anticipation.
There was nothing,
And there was nothing for the next five days either.
But early the next week there was a message waiting for Billy...
Hi Billy
My name's Glenda, i saw your profile on the dating site and i wanted to get in touch and say how interesting you sound, the windsurfing in particular sounds amazing. Please email mer back so we can talk about meeting up sometime
Speak soon
Luv
Glenda
x
Well Billy was beside himself with joy. He felf a bit guilty about the windsurfing lie but he'd do some research and swot up so he wouldn't look a complete idiot. He emailed Glenda back that night and she replied almost straight away and this time with a photo. Billy was over the moon that night and slept like a log after his bedtime cocoa.
Well over the next few days the romance blossomed and Billy was smitten. Without really thinking about it they decided to meet up for dinner the following Saturday evening and see how they got on in person.
Afterwards Billy said he wasn't entirely sure what he was expecting but it certainly wasn't what he got. Billy was at the restaurant in good time. He'd taken care to make sure he looked good this evening, The creases in his beige cords were razor sharp and his shirt was dazzling. He felt hot. About two minutes after the agreed time, in walked Glenda.
She was dressed in a flowery number, long and flowing and Billy couldn't help but notice the sunflower in her hair. And she had bare feet, a smile a mile wide, long blonde hair that looked like it hadn't seen a hairdresser in years and a warm embrace for Billy.
Our Billy was confused. On one hand his staid, conservative self was shocked by Glenda's appearence, his other, hidden side, was blinded by her smile.
He was even more shocked when Glenda announced that her name wasn't Glenda at all. Her name was Spirit, the name given to her by Mother Nature whilst she was meditating, hugging s spiritual old oak.
Billy, by nature one of life's sceptics, managed to control the urge to walk out the door. He stayed and had a wonderful evening, the happiest he'd had in a long time. At the end of the evening Billy was delighted when Spirit invited him to her place for dinner the following Saturday.
It only dawned on him later in the week, when he look at the address Spirit had pushed in his hand as they parted. He'd never known a house numbered after the trees in the garden before. Or that was apparently in the middle of a field.
Really the alarm bells should have rung then but Billy was already in too deep. So he followed his directions as instructed and had a very nice evening considering the circumstances.
I mean, he couldn't actually remember ever having had dinner in a wigwam in a field in Essex before, but it turned out well. The others had been nice folks and the funny mushroom starter had been delicious. Not that he could remember much of the evening after that but he knew he'd been very witty in conversation. He'd always remember that...
Anyway we must fast forward our story sim months on to the climax of Spirit and Billy's courtship. Today is the day they get married, or at least married in the Kithoto sense of the word.
Kithoto is the name of the tribe Spirit came from. She and her fellow peace loving, mushroom munchers, lived a simple life in the forest. With their primitive wigwams and not so primitive substances they lived a happy, relaxed, slightly blurred round the edges lifestyle. It was this lifestlye and the accompanying substances, that Billy found himself hooked on after only a few visits.
He'd given up all his worldly possessions and moved into his own wigwam some time ago now and he'd continued to woo Spirit. Not that it was hard, Spirit was very keen on him and he'd grown to understand one of the reasons why over time.
A large number of Kithoto men were serving time and that, and several other, points in time. This all stemed from the Kithoto practice of each man taking several wives. This was seen as one of the key parts of the Kithoto message of love for everyone. And so the men of the tribe embraced this tradition and subsequently found themselves embraced by police officers on the second or third days of their married lives.
Billy would later say how shocked he was by this practice when he first found out about it but over time he had grown used to it and was now a keen follower of all the Kithoto traditions. He was marrying Spirit today, but both he and she knew he'd have other wedding days in the future.
It was to be a traditional service, plenty of trees, birds, singing and nudity and of course the Best Man leading off the reception orgy. A completely orthodox Kithoto ceremony.
Lets go forward again, say another six months.
Spirit has settled into her traditional wife's role and is cleaning out the wigwam and getting the mushrooms ready for supper. Billy is sitting uder his favourite tree meaditating and watching his wife work.
Billy, however, is not terribly happy. He's been under pressure from the tribal elders to find himself his next wife. It's not that he's unhappy with finding another wife, it's just there's no one else in the tribe he'd like to marry.
He looks across at the tree, sighs, kisses it goodbye and climbes down. He goes in through the back door of the wigwam and pulls a large box out of the corner. When i said he gave up all his worldly possessions i lied. All bar one. He had bought his beloved computer with him. Not to use of course, more as a good luck charm. It had sat unused in it's box since the day he'd arrived with the tribe.
Now was the time to use it though. He walked over to the tribe's single electricity point , together with it's single phone line and set the computer up. He knew they wouldn't be happy, the phone was only meant to be ued for ordering pizza and the plug socker for the hairdryer so the men could look their best. But this was an emergency after all.
Billy really needed a second wife.
Go forward another week, what do you see?
Today he'd found a young girl online who sounded ideal. So he'd got in touch. Her name was Roxanne so he started with a line from the Police song of that name. He bet no one had done that before. After that good start he went for the kill, told her outright he was looking for a second wife. She'd been a bit funny after that, but he'd explained. Told her it was illegal the way he was proposing it. He'd have a special contract drawn up to protect her interests if she wanted. Roxanne didn't seem to understand that there'd be no problems. The Kithoto's had love and trust and mushrooms, what else could anyone else need? Still she would come round to his point of view, in the end he'd given up.
The end came very swiftly afer that. Seems that Roxanne reported him to the police. They swooped the following day and by the end of week Billy was joining his felloew Kithoto's inside for a couple of years. Apparently attempted bigamy is a crime in its own right, just a very stupid one.
It didn't matter to him though. Not in the beginning. He had the love of Spirit who had pledged to stand by him and wait for him. He had other Kithoto's around him for company. The two years would pass quickly enough, maybe his mum would even forgive him one day...
And then the mushroom withdrawel symptoms started...
Follow the story in the diaries of Billy the Mushroom Kid.