GROWING UP WITH THE BROWN DIRT COWBOY

Well, maybe not literally, but most definitely spiritually.

If, like me, you are `of a certain age,` then you will enjoy and identify with Bernie Taupin`s `Sketches of a Childhood,` as described in his book, `A Cradle of Haloes.`

You don`t need me to remind you that Taupin is the guy who writes the words for Elton John; and you may assume from that, that he hails from an urban, perhaps mildly sophisticated and worldly upbringing. Not so. Picture instead the huge, flat landscape of Lincolnshire - all fens, farms, vast skies, countless villages, small, intimate market towns - and in this expansive county, a few miles north of Lincoln, Taupin spent his childhood.

The village of Owmby-by-Spital lies among the endless farmland just a couple of miles from the twin hamlets of Newton-by-Toft and Toft-next-Newton (I kid you not - it`s that sort of place.) But the purpose of this ramble is not to dwell so much on the geography but more on the `environment` in which young Taupin did his growing up. It was of the time and of the place, I suppose, when life may have been more simple, less cluttered, less complicated, where everyone knew each other, where the boundaries of life - both geographically and personally - were defined and unstrayed. A close family, good friends, encounters and experiments with what life had to offer; expeditions to the local market town (Market Rasen) where experiences were broadened.

But it was all done in a controlled way - a bit like being on the end of a rope when, all the time the boundaries were adhered to, the rope stayed slack; but an overstep from permissiveness felt the rope tighten....and another lesson learnt.

I identify with all of that - I too had a close, loving family and the privilege of being brought up in a close-knit community and a learning environment with their clearly defined boundaries. It was good to have good mates and we used to meet up in the village centre and pass the time without threatening anyone or being threatened by anything other than our consciences.

Unlike Taupin, however, I did not possess his talent or his desire to become in any way `cosmopolitan,` - "When will I be famous?" was not on my songsheet - and I`m afraid that ambition has been a quality which I have singularly lacked.

I do wonder how often, as he relaxes in his Californian mansion while the royalties keep rolling in, Taupin`s mind returns to the place and time of his youth and those friends and hamlets in the brown dirt landscape which he called home for so long. I think mine would.