My older sister, Amy Jo, and I - we are the first generation of

Host: The morning mist rolled softly through the narrow alleyways of north London, curling around the cracked brick walls and the faded graffiti like a memory refusing to leave. The streetlights were still glowing faintly, though the day had already begun to bleed through — grey, reluctant, honest.

Inside a small café tucked between a barber shop and a charity store, the smell of toast and cheap coffee filled the air. The furniture was mismatched; the walls were papered with old gig posters, peeling from years of steam and stories.

Jack sat at the corner table, cigarette burning slowly between his fingers, staring at a half-finished notebook filled with words that didn’t quite become songs. Jeeny, across from him, was stirring her tea — slow, deliberate — watching him with that patient curiosity that always seemed to catch the truth before he spoke it.

Jeeny: “Pete Doherty once said, ‘My older sister, Amy Jo, and I — we are the first generation of my family to stay on at school and do any exams at all.’”

Host: Jack exhaled a long ribbon of smoke, his grey eyes unfocused but alive.

Jack: “You can almost hear the ache in that. Pride wrapped in apology. Like he’s proud of escaping, but guilty for it.”

Jeeny: “That’s because escape and guilt share a bed. Every first generation who gets out knows the cost.”

Host: The sound of rain began again, gentle against the windowpane. The café felt smaller for it — a cocoon of noise and nostalgia.

Jack: “You ever notice how those who rise first carry the weight of those who stayed behind? It’s like success is never clean — it’s stitched with the threads of everyone who couldn’t go with you.”

Jeeny: “It’s not just guilt, though. It’s grief. For the language you lose, for the way you stop fitting into the place that made you.”

Jack: “You think he was grieving in that quote?”

Jeeny: “No. I think he was remembering. And remembering always comes with a bruise.”

Host: Jack looked down at his notebook again — ink smudged, the page tired and wrinkled from rain or maybe sweat.

Jack: “You know, my dad left school at fourteen. Worked in a steel yard his whole life. When I got into university, he didn’t know what to say. Just stood there and nodded. That nod said everything — pride, confusion, distance.”

Jeeny: “It’s the same nod people give when they’re proud of you but don’t understand the world you’re walking into. It’s love without translation.”

Host: The waitress passed by, refilling their cups. Jack murmured a thank-you, then leaned back, his voice rough with thought.

Jack: “Doherty — he’s a poet pretending to be a rock star. You can tell he carries ghosts. He’s talking about exams, but what he means is escape velocity — that fragile moment where you outrun your inheritance without losing the map of where you came from.”

Jeeny: “You’re romanticizing it.”

Jack: “No. I’m explaining it. Every working-class kid who breaks into education knows that paradox. You get an education, but you lose your belonging. You learn to read the books, but not your father’s silence.”

Host: Jeeny’s gaze softened, her eyes reflecting the lamplight like amber glass.

Jeeny: “Maybe that’s why he writes the way he does — all half-finished beauty and broken rhythm. He’s still trying to bridge those two worlds. The raw and the refined.”

Jack: “The uneducated heart and the educated mind.”

Jeeny: “Exactly. You never stop being both.”

Host: The rain grew heavier, drumming harder now — a soft percussion over the hum of the espresso machine. Jeeny’s voice lowered, becoming almost confessional.

Jeeny: “My mum never finished school either. She raised three of us on the night shift. I remember when I got my degree, she didn’t come to the ceremony. Said she had work. But I think… she just didn’t feel like she belonged there.”

Jack: “And you?”

Jeeny: “I didn’t belong there either. I just pretended better.”

Host: A silence settled — gentle, empathetic, like a pause in an old song.

Jack: “You know what Doherty’s quote really is? It’s not about education. It’s about class. About being the first to open the door, and realizing no one told you how to walk through it.”

Jeeny: “And when you do, you realize the people who raised you can’t follow — not because they don’t want to, but because the room was never built for them.”

Jack: “So you carry them instead.”

Jeeny: “Always.”

Host: Jack lit another cigarette, the flame catching briefly before retreating to smoke.

Jack: “He said, ‘the first generation to stay on at school and do exams.’ That’s not boasting. That’s bewilderment. That’s standing in a world you weren’t meant to reach and wondering if you’ve betrayed the one that raised you.”

Jeeny: “But it’s also hope. It’s proof that the story changes, that knowledge can be inheritance too.”

Jack: “Maybe. But education doesn’t erase struggle. It just makes you fluent in describing it.”

Jeeny: “That’s the poetry of it, Jack. To turn survival into language.”

Host: The rain slowed, leaving streaks of silver on the window. The light outside was softer now, uncertain — like dawn or the end of something.

Jack: “You ever think the first educated generation carries the heaviest loneliness?”

Jeeny: “Yes. Because they become translators — between past and possibility.”

Jack: “And no one ever thanks the translator.”

Jeeny: (smiling faintly) “No one needs to. The translation itself is the legacy.”

Host: Jack leaned back, his expression calm now, the smoke trailing upward like thought turned visible.

Jack: “You know, Doherty never really fit anywhere — not in the classroom, not on the stage, not in the streets. Maybe that’s the price of being first. You carve the path, but never get to rest on it.”

Jeeny: “But someone else will. And that’s the quiet victory — not fame, not comfort, just the knowledge that the next one won’t have to walk alone.”

Host: The camera drifted toward the window, framing their reflections — two faces blurred by rainlight and cigarette haze, both carrying the kind of wisdom born from distance.

The café was emptying out now, chairs scraping, cups clinking, the day preparing to begin again.

Jack: “It’s strange, isn’t it? To think of exams as rebellion.”

Jeeny: “It always is. For some people, rebellion isn’t destruction — it’s learning.”

Host: Outside, the sky began to clear. The last of the rain glistened on the pavement, each puddle catching the faint gleam of light like a promise.

Inside, Jack closed his notebook and smiled — the small, resigned smile of someone who finally understood the weight of inheritance.

And as they stood to leave, Pete Doherty’s truth echoed in the quiet space they left behind — humble, hopeful, and human:

“Sometimes revolution isn’t about tearing the world apart. It’s just two kids, sitting exams for the first time, and rewriting the story of where they came from.”