Summer..............

Watching kids playing in the summer reminds me of my own summers long ago. I think I left the house in the early morning, my parents would have been at work. I would walk across the fields for hours, the whole day sometimes. I had a best friend for a time, his name was Mick Bird and he was older than me by a few years. We would be gone all day hunting rabbits (that we never caught) and climbing trees. The Blue Waters was our favourite hang out. The Blue Waters, every kid in the village knew it as that, was a disused chalk pit. One day when taking out chalk it had hit the underground water source and flooded. It made an awesome place to play. Probably not at all safe but what did we know. Our parents were raised in the same village and probably did a lot of the same things we did. We found Sticklebacks in the pure water that came from the chalk and watched them for ages. We would hunt for birds nests and learn all about them. We knew the names of all the trees and flowers. We build dens in the bushes. Where Mick lived a few doors down from me, their back garden backed onto the embankment overlooking Bedford Road. We had pathways through the trees and bushes that were thick on the sides of the banks. We could watch and not be seen. We also dug a deep hole in his back yard and put corrugated metal on the top to make an underground house.We would sit in that with candles and think we were real survivalists. Micks dad did nothing with his garden so it was an over grown mess and just wonderful for us to play in. Unlike mine that was perfection because my dad loved his garden. We built ourselves a chassis or a soapbox car. All the boys did that. Me being a girl was just a helper, I loved to go along and look for the pram wheels we used for the body of the chassis to run on. We found ours in the hedge down Thorn turn where the Gypsies had been all summer. I remember climbing the sheer chalk cliffs over in the working pits, we would look for fossils and rabbits there. One day Mick and his little brown dog were exploring a rabbit hole and I sat watching. There in the grass was a baby rabbit. I sat petting it and Mick turned and saw me, his shout scared the rabbit and off it ran, oh was he mad at me. I don't know if he had intended it for the stew pot or as a pet but in the end it would have gone to the pot. So that bunny lived to enjoy another day. He also got me chased by a herd of cows but I think I told that story already. As Mick got older and his interests changed we no longer hung out together but had a few memorable summers that I am grateful for. Most of my summers were enjoyed on my friends farm. I especially loved harvest time. No wonder English kids of my generation never had a weight problem as so many today do. We were never inside. Our curfew was to be in when the street lights came on. Otherwise one would hear mothers calling in their kids. No phones at all, let alone cell phones. We went by the sun and the moon and were very happy to do that. The water in the streams was pure, we drank without thought of consequences. We were hardly ever sick. We were probably hardly ever clean either. We made mud pies and climbed trees. The freedom we had will never be known again I don't think. That's a shame. The farmers around our village didn't care that kids wandered free over their land. We knew to shut gates and respect the crops so they had no reason to be concerned. No one sued anyone if they were hurt. So different from todays world. I loved my life.