Flash-back…
It’s July 1966. We are rowing down a dyke in a half-cut barrel “ borrowed” from Tom Bygott’s Brookfield Road building site. The Thorntons, Gerards and I know well the sides of this agricultural drain after weeks spent following the vole, pursuing frogs, observing the haunts of blackbird, linnet and song-thrush; and tracking down the secret nests of skylarks on what will soon become homes and gardens. We’ve pioneered a hush-hush track through head-high thistles in the field by Springfield Road before the rugby club raze it, for potatoes at first, and then for new pitches. Or we are hunting for stickle-backs and newts over Fairfield way, off the path that leads by the Gairs to Bradley Road. We follow each other‘s long sunset shadows through the grounds of the Springfield Sanatorium, homeward bound.
Flash-forward to August 1967…
Rick and Arthur and I have cycled over Peake’s tunnel and by Low Farm and down through Humberston. We’ve hidden the bikes in long grass and are now stepping cautiously across the great pipe that spans Buck Beck by Cleethorpes Zoo. Silently, we watch each other in turn, hoping we all succeed. And we do, though one of us chooses to straddle rather than walk. And then, cash starved, we squeeze through the hole in the fence, off to see Calypso the killer whale, the monkeys, camels and giraffes.
Flash forward to Easter 1968…
Michael, Chris, Tom and I lean our bikes on the national speed limit sign where the houses end on Louth Road. We are unsure of its meaning and significance as we study the OS Survey Map Sheet 105, planning a route to Lincoln that will take us by Barnoldby, Brigg, Hibaldstow and Riseholme. Along the way we will discover a part buried sheep as we pitch our two-man tents; spend a night in a disused airfield conning tower, watching rats; and another under an electricity pylon near Nettleham, before returning home to report our adventures to parents who thought we were camping at Waithe.
I am mildly troubled by our enjoyment of the caged animals and by the havoc we might have reeked among the habitats of local species. I am confident that we have all turned out to be well adjusted individuals, at peace with ourselves and the world, and wonder if our confidence and independence were being forged in those childhood adventures. I don’t believe our parents were reckless or uncaring in allowing us the liberty to embark on such schemes. And I do not believe that they were being irresponsible in letting us out of their sight and their hair in a time that was charged by reports of the trials of Brady and Hindley. And I am glad they let us loose, and I love them none the less.
And the reason I say all of this is that I recently read of how the Oxford University Press edited their Oxford Junior Dictionary, replacing words no longer considered relevant to the realities of modern childhood. It seems that ‘acorn’ has been replaced by ‘attachment’, ‘bluebell ‘by ‘broadband’, ‘conker’ by ‘chat-room’ and ‘viper’ by ‘voice-mail’. I am in no position to argue with their research and reluctantly inclined to agree with their position. But I think it is very sad.
This piece first appeared in the Pause for Thought column of the Cleethorpes Chronicle in April 2015.
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