Childhood Celebrations

Celebrations, were do I begin. My childhood was full of celebrations but I was to young to appreciate what was happening.

I was fortunate to be a part of a fairly extended family, geographically speaking. Now I know that in American terms 100 miles is around the corner but to us in England in the sixties it may well have been on another planet.

Celebrations happened every time we met usually in the summer holidays, when haymaking was to be done and my parents took a break from the factories they worked in and worked on the land for two weeks helping my Uncle Paul and Aunty Vera to bring in the harvest.

Its strange that when you are young the summers seem endless and your family seem to be immortal. I loved those summers, building castles out of bails of hay, walking to the village for sweets and sitting in the Pub garden waiting for your parents to finish talking no doubt with a drink or two on the way.

What I remember more that anything was the dark, not just dark like when you live in a town  but the ink black dark punctuated with stars that made you feel very, very small and insignificant.

I suppose thats why we always had lashing of hot chocolate to get over the ordeal of walking home with my older cousins telling ghost stories to frighten the living daylights out of us younger ones on the way home.

Celebrations in the sixties were small affairs but special never the less. Today the expectation of the young is that you will be educated  to become highly successful without having the time to savour those magical moments that made my childhood magical.

So here is my challenge to all the Grand Parents out there, take time to relive the magical moments that you had as a child. Forget computers and technology but watch the face of your grandchild when you show them something truly magical. A kingfisher darting in the stream, the full moon rising over the moors or even how to skim stones on a lake.

It matters not a jot what it is, but whatever you remember from your childhood and I will guarantee your grand kids will find it magical, just like you did.