Childhood Memories.
 

Chatting at lunchtime today there was a stunned silence when I announced that I hadn't lived in a house with a bathroom and indoor toilet until I was 11, or a house with central heating until I was 16. One of the youngsters then said,'But you're not THAT old!' Yes, he is still breathing :D

It got me thinking though, how different things are just 30 years on.

When I was 8 I used to chop wood and lay and light the fires. I could pluck and dress pheasants, pigeons and chickens, and skin and joint a rabbit. I used to eat things that kids today would vomit at................pigs heads, pigs trotters, chittlings, brawn, sheeps hearts and brains. At weekends if I wasn't needed to ride work on the horses I would disappear off all day with the dogs, just running wild. I used to walk 4 miles to school and back, summer and winter, and never thought anything of it.

My bath was a tin tub in the kitchen in front of the Aga, the toilet was outside, and at night I used the 'guzunder' (because it guz under the bed )

My companions were the dogs, the horses, and the stable lads. I could climb any tree, ride any horse, was a dead-shot with a catapault. I was usually covered in horse sh*t, mucky from head to foot and I was a total tomboy. I didn't even know what a television set was!

I suppose to some, it may sound like I had a deprived childhood. I didn't. I was happy, healthy, fit and energetic. Would I swap my childhood for the soft, over-protected, couch-potato lifestyle of so many children today? Not bloody likely!

So how about you? What are your memories of childhood......................and would you have changed yours in any way?

Re: Childhood Memories.
 

That sounds like a great childhood, although I'm slightly worried about your being kept company by stable boys...

For me, I remember a lot of music-related stuff: listening to Marillion in the car on holiday in France, listening to Sade in the car when living in Hong Kong when I was 4. I love music so I think I am very aurally inclined.

As for my childhood, it was pretty good, no consoles and a lot of digging holes and climbing trees.

Re: Childhood Memories.
 

South London in the 1960s. We lived in my grandad's house, it had a huge garden so we (brother and sister) used to climb the trees, give each other wheelbarrow rides, and walk on grandad's lettuces. Ford Anglia... One of the rooms in the house had an ornate fireplace with lions' heads holding up the mantel, so we used to put our fingers in the lions' mouths and pretend that we were being mauled and then shoot the beast. Holidays in Broadstairs, stung by jellyfish...

Re: Childhood Memories.
 

i remember MASSIVE wagon wheels :)

Re: Childhood Memories.
 

Wow, you had meat to eat and a tin bath - luxury, pure luxury.

I try not to remember those harsh days, climbin t'top o'hill in chance of a cast off bread crust :smt089 fightin wi dogs for a bone or two hoping me thruppence would last the winter. if I got stuck up a chimney once I got stuck a hundred times...:D

Re: Childhood Memories.
 

I was a pretty active kid, not exactly sporty but I would always be off with my mate to the local BMX track or off over the fields at the back of our street with their dog.

I remember building a 'tree house' with a rope swing that we were really proud of at the time - in reality the 'house' was a big sheet of wooden fence panel wedged into the branches! My mate lost 3 teeth & broke his arm on the rope swing too... :lol:

When we got a bit older we used to go and hang round in a den that we had made on top of an old slag heap nearby that was covered in trees, daring each other to ride our bikes down the steepest bit we could find & generally messing about, experimenting with cigarettes for the first time & lighting campfires every now & then. A couple of years ago, the same slag heap had to be totally removed & re-lanscaped cos it turned out it was on fire underground the whole time!

Re: Childhood Memories.
 

We never had central heating, ever. And that was in "The North", you know!

We did have the luxury of an indoor khazi but my grandparents didn't. They used to call said item "the "Edgar Allen".

Re: Childhood Memories.
 

I remember doing the fire, Dad would lay it up the night before and one of us boys would have the duty of lighting it first thing, the house was freezing, rush down to the kitchen and light the fire, get it going then back to bed until the room warmed up before helping mum with breakfast and sandwich duty.

One of the other duties we had was to climb in the coal bunker and move all the coal to the hatch end before the coalman delivered ( I remember his horse).

We didn't have a bath, if you got really dirty you had to stand in the sink, we'd go to Nans on Sunday for the weekly bath.

Oh and we'd walk over to epping forest to play in the trees, of course the M25 is in the way now.

Cheers Mark.

Re: Childhood Memories.
 

No-one's mentioned the shoe-box box at the bottom of the swamp by the side of the M6 yet :lol:

Re: Childhood Memories.
 

M6? Luxury!
Nought but shank's pony ont turnpike in my day.
Lived ont bottom of sea and got drowned every day.

Re: Childhood Memories.
 

Right. I had to get up in the morning at ten o'clock at night half an hour before I went to bed, drink a cup of sulphuric acid, work twenty-nine hours a day down mill, and pay mill owner for permission to come to work, and when we got home, our Dad and our mother would kill us and dance about on our graves singing Hallelujah.

8-[ Taxi....

Re: Childhood Memories.
 

Another one without central heating, originally we had an open fire.
We used to hold a sheet of newspaper over the opening to "Draw" the fire. It was a major step up when we got a "Gas Poker" - anyone else remember them?
A special treat was toast or crumpet done by the fire.

The worst aspect was both parents smoking like chimneys, I spent most of my childhood with Asthma or Bronchitus.

After leaving home at 18 I have never had either again!

Re: Childhood Memories.
 

Gas Poker....... you were lucky :D

Certainly remember the "newspaper over the opening" part. All worthwhile at Christmas when we had roast chestnuts :smt026

Re: Childhood Memories.
 

I was going to write a huge amount about my somewhat privileged upbringing in the 60s. But realised that world collapsed for me in the 70s. I came from a wealthy family and lived in a large house, attended private schools etc. So 70s family upheaval left me suddenly attending the local comprehensive and meeting girls for the first time.

I turned out normal. And probably more resilient than most, as I had realised at an early age that the world owes you nothing. You make your own mistakes and live with them.

It doesn’t matter who you are and what you did as a child. For all, it is a time of learning. It forms your character and beliefs. I doubt there are many who can look back at their childhood without remembering it as a happy time.

Re: Childhood Memories.
 

Brings back memories..
We too had no heating, or even hot water for that matter unless we boiled it. I also remember when we had rabbit or pheasant for dinner, having to line up the lead shot on the side of the plate, the one with the most being the winner.

Re: Childhood Memories.
 

I'll never forget that first day at t'pit.
Me an' mi father worked a 72 hour shift, then wi walked home 43 mile through t'snow in us bare feet, huddled inside us clothes med out o' old sacks.
Eventually we trudged over t'hill until wi could see t'street light twinklin' in our village.
Mi father smiled down at mi through t'icicles hangin' off his nose. "Nearly home now lad", he said.
We stumbled into t'house and stood there freezin' cold and tired out, shiverin' and miserable, in front o' t' meagre fire.
Any road, mi mam says "Cheer up, lads. I've got you some nice brown bread and butter for yer tea."
Ee, mi father went crackers. He reached out and gently pulled mi mam towards 'im by t'throat. "You big fat, idle ugly wart", he said. "You gret useless spawny-eyed parrot-faced wazzock." ('E had a way wi words, mi father. He'd bin to college, y'know). "You've been out playin' bingo all afternoon instead o' gettin' some proper snap ready for me an' this lad", he explained to mi poor, little, purple-faced mam.
Then turnin' to me he said "Arthur", (He could never remember mi name), "here's half a crown. Nip down to t'chip 'oyl an' get us a nice piece o' 'addock for us tea. Man cannot live by bread alone."
He were a reyt tater, mi father.
He said as 'ow workin' folk should have some dignity an' pride an' self respect, an' as 'ow they should come home to summat warm an' cheerful.
An' then he threw mi mam on t'fire.
We didn't 'ave no tellies or shoes or bedclothes.
We med us own fun in them days.
Do you know, when I were a lad you could get a tram down into t'town, buy three new suits an' an ovvercoat, four pair o' good boots, go an' see George Formby at t'Palace Theatre, get blind drunk, 'ave some steak an' chips, bunch o' bananas an' three stone o' monkey nuts an' still 'ave change out of a farthing.
We'd lots o' things in them days they 'aven't got today - rickets, diptheria, Hitler and my, we did look well goin' to school wi' no backside in us trousers an' all us little 'eads painted purple because we 'ad ringworm.
They don't know they're born today!!!


Taken from Tony Capstick

Re: Childhood Memories.
 

sitting by grans open fire. getting tartan leg. then having to go to outside loo where there was a huge spider that sat and watched you as you peed