Ben Jackson

  • On the road again

    On the road again

    Becoming emotionally attached to a football club is a risky game. They can let you down. They can be mismanaged. They can fail.

    Bolton Wanderers, the football club I’ve supported all my life, nearly failed in 2019. Employees were forced to use food banks because they weren’t paid. The business fell into administration and the club was deducted points, which led to our relegation from League One. It was a devastating fall from grace for a club that once competed in the Premier League and challenged in Europe.

    A lot has happened since that failure. A new owner was found and the club survived. And on Saturday I found myself taking a Tube, train and bus to Crawley to my first Bolton match in too long — not to watch from inside the ground, as Covid restrictions were still in place, but to cheer from the outside with about a dozen fellow Bolton fans, none of whom I knew yet. 

    When Bolton won promotion from League Two on Saturday, we celebrated with the players as they joined us outside at full-time. 

    It’s a risky game but when things go well, it’s a towering feeling.

  • Night walks

    Night walks

    There are people in the distance. For a few seconds I can’t tell which direction they’re walking in — towards me or away. I’m often the first to cross the road to avoid proximity. If we’re going in the same direction and I begin to catch up with them, I’ll slow down. Not necessarily because of Covid; I just don’t want to be seen when I’m on my night walks.

    Every night after work I pound the pavements in my bubble in north London like a flâneur. Work tends to finish around midnight. This is my latest lockdown obsession. 

    Sometimes I change the route, discover a new street, a house for sale, a dead end. I watch the empty Tube train going over the bridge (the Northern line is the loudest). I’m followed by a friendly fox. I pick up the pace when it’s uphill, I slow it down when it gets too hot under my coat. I put my head down when cars approach. I never look at my phone.

    I see the allotments with waiting lists that go on for years. I see the stained glass windows, the front doors, and the houses owned by other people.

  • Card connection

    Card connection

    My latest lockdown obsession is Pokémon cards. I’ve become a collector again, 20 years since I begged my mum for packets of the original set.

    I’ve bought 30 packs from a modern set called Champion’s Path and I plan to open them at Christmas. Each pristine card will be laid on to a soft mat before it is placed carefully in a plastic sleeve and then, finally, a cushioned binder.

    I try to talk to friends about it but they’re not really interested. My girlfriend is just glad I’ve got a hobby.

    Have I gone mad? Maybe. I’m not alone though. Interest in the game — and the value of vintage cards — has shot up during the pandemic. I’m joined by thousands of people when I watch hours of live pack openings on YouTube. Silly money is being spent on Pokémon cards. What else can we spend our money on at the moment?

    And what else can we do with our free time? My previous obsessions were working out, going on long walks, and for a few days, Habbo Hotel, the animated chatroom that had a nostalgia-powered resurgence during the first lockdown.

    There’s more time at the moment, more space to think, to reconnect with ourselves and who we used to be. That could explain it.