Childhood memories

A couple of weeks ago I was tagged for a meme about five things that I miss from my childhood. I was reminded of one of those things yesterday when we had a day of typically British weather.

As a child I loved splashing though puddles, the bigger and deeper the better. Of course it had to be barefoot, it’s just no fun if you can’t squish your toes in the mud or grass at the bottom whilst trying to get as much of you wet as possible without actually sitting down in the water. Actually I remember a couple of times when I did just that *grin*

The village I grew up in is a stereotypical little English village. It consisted of about 40 houses and cottages (some with thatched roofs) around a large village green, with a cricket pitch, pub, post office and of course, a manor house. We always had a dog, a border collie, and as I was an only child I used to spend a lot of my free time in the summer, out on the green playing with the dog, and he liked puddles too.

The village green was fairly uneven, with many dips and hollows in the long grass and after heavy rain these hollows would form some fantastic puddles for jumping in. I remember one occasion, a gloriously warm and sunny day after several days of rain, there was a huge puddle on the green right outside our house. Out I went in my light summer dress, dog by my side, to play.

About half an hour later I heard my mother yelling me so I called the dog and we headed back to the house. Fortunately my mother had a sense of humour and she just fell about laughing when greeted with the sight…

…of a daughter and dog, soaked from head to toe/tail, muddy up to the knees, both with the biggest grins you’ve even seen.

I still like splashing through puddles and walking in the rain, as long as I can get out of my wet clothes straight afterwards and get dry and warm. Not when I have to get on a tram and spend the next forty minutes packed in with other similarly soggy and miserable people, as I did on my way home from work yesterday. These days I tend to confine my puddle-splashing to when I’m driving along the many country lanes where I live now. Where the water pools at the bottom of the hills and forms great puddles for splashing through with the car. I have been known to cackle evilly when I see a large puddle coming up on my side of the road and deliberately head for it, when all the other drivers are swerving to avoid it.

I may look like an adult, but I’m still a kid where it counts *hee*