I took my 3 boys with me, and my 4 and 3 year old experienced a new phenomena, which made me sad, that it had taken this long to experience, but also incredibly happy to have grown up in such a time when it was rife...
This phenomena goes by the name of Playing In The Street With Kids!! I know, that simple.
Maybe it's because they've only just got to an age where they're "Safe" to do that (obviously my beady eye was on them constantly!) but most likely, the reason they've not experienced this is because we don't live in a Cul-de-sac.
I don't think I ever realised the beauty of such a thing until i saw my boys running in and out of the grandparent's house, joyfully and confidently mixing with children they didn't know who were now their "new friends!" They even knew their names and shouted "see you next time" as we left that evening. It was lovely.
It reminded me of what a full and happy childhood we had.
I grew up in a time where we got home from school, threw our uniform on the floor, headed out in to the street, returned for food, then headed back out until it was deemed time to come in and go to bed!
We entertained ourselves in such simple and fun ways.
Hours were spent playing "Cut ups"... sounds sinister? Not at all, just a bunch of kids, riding around a (fairly small park) "cutting each other up" and if you had to put your foot down on the floor, you lost a life!
We jumped off swings all day long, hosting our own olympic games, where the winner was the person who jumped the furthest... twigs as markers!
We walked along garden walls... tall ones at that, until we were shouted down by one of the neighbours. No one ever fell off!
I can't look at a breeze block nowadays without seeing arrows chalked on to the floor..."Tracking" This game in particular kept hordes of us amused all day long. amazing really, gangs of kids running around following chalky arrows. No team ever really won, it was a never ending game... or so it seemed!
"Acky 1 2 3..." there's a saying I bet most kids these days don't know, but I reckon if you were a kid of the 80's, they were the sound of summer evenings!
We climbed trees and built dens... We even named a small tree area the "Big Den" ...it seemed huge when we were small and groups of us used to pretend it was our home and spend hours making bedroom and kitchen areas... I remember one friend even did a poo there! It was a great source of amusement, and we all marvelled at the sight of a human poo out in the woods! Until his mum caught wind of it (no pun intended!) and gave him a good rollicking! Although how she could ever prove it has baffled me ever since! I walked past the "Big Den" this weekend... It was sadly, very small...I wonder if it seems big to any little people these days?
We went on bike rides, all day long! We cycled for miles, took our lunches in back packs and simply cycled to places, rode around in woods all day long, then cycled home... Filthy! Black bogies were the sign of a good day out back then!
We went pond dipping, with ice cream tubs, cut up "pop"bottles or if you were lucky, an actual net! Newts, frogs, sticklebacks, pond skaters and tadpoles kept us amused (and cold and wet!) for hours!
We climbed trees... taller than houses!! What must our parents have thought? I get palpitations when my boys are a few feet off the ground with their crash helmets on! (Don't worry, i'm not that neurotic... they've generally scooted to the park, hence the helmets!)
We even dared to shout "names" to passing grown ups and then all sit there sniggering as silently as possible, so as not to alert said grown up to our hideouts... Invariably that would mean said grown up alerting our parents! Game over!
A simple visit from the council's lawn mowing men, was a huge excitement in the street... cut grass, built up high, was turned in to "nests"... Our very own pre crop circle grass circles! It seemed the mowing men always came in the morning, so waking up to the pleasant(?) roar of a mower and the smell of freshly cut grass and dog poo went hand in hand! Ahh the smell of an 80's summer morning... Just not the same these days!
Even rain didn't stop us... We spent hours sitting under shelters or underpasses, playing games or riding our bikes through puddles.
A simple visit from the council's lawn mowing men, was a huge excitement in the street... cut grass, built up high, was turned in to "nests"... Our very own pre crop circle grass circles! It seemed the mowing men always came in the morning, so waking up to the pleasant(?) roar of a mower and the smell of freshly cut grass and dog poo went hand in hand! Ahh the smell of an 80's summer morning... Just not the same these days!
Even rain didn't stop us... We spent hours sitting under shelters or underpasses, playing games or riding our bikes through puddles.
Don't get me wrong... Some of us were lucky enough to have a computer... (Sinclair or Amstrad!) but even that was turned in to a group activity... I recall many a rainy day, groups of us spent rotating between the bedroom and loft where we had various computers set up, taking it in turns to take a life each on Alex The Kid or Sonic.
I live now on quite a busy street. I know that my boys won't get to play half of the games I did when I played in the streets... And it makes me sad. Sad that they might never play a simple game of Curby or Crash Bang Wallop unless it's a rare occasion where council permission is sought to close the street for a day... Maybe this is the way forward?
Maybe we need to reclaim our streets for our kids? You're only young once after all.
