Category: Childhood
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Remembering War
Very recently we marked the one hundredth anniversary of the end of the First World War .My memories are a bit more recent, as I was only a child in the middle of the Second World War. My understanding of what war meant was limited , both by my age ,and by my relative safely…
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Places I Read as a Child and Adolescent
I have always read anywhere and everywhere. Today I usually carry a book with me where ever I go. If I have to wait for something or someone I can always rely on the distraction of an interesting book. My favourite places to read at our first farm were the broad windowsills in the nursery.…
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St. Marie’s School for Girls
I think I must have been just turning nine, that August in 1946,and I was getting ready for the fall term at the village school. Then came the bombshell! My mother said, “You are going to boarding school at the end of the month.” Maybe there had been discussion prior to this but I do…
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Summer Holidays at Elie. (late 1940’s)
I think I remember that in the late 1940’s we went on holiday to Elie each summer for a couple of weeks. It says much for the unchanging nature of this village that when my sister had her memorial holiday there for the family when she turned 70, my brother was able to find the…
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Tea time in the Fields
This must have happened during the harvest of 1942 or 1943. At that time my parents were farming in central Scotland and I must have been five of six years old. It was a hot day for Scotland and my mother was taking the men’s tea out to the fields. She asked me to come…
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The Challenge of Keeping Warm
Recently the weather here changed and I dialed up the temperature in my suite! Voila!, the radiators came on and the room warmed up! It made me remember life in Britain during the war years and after. To stay warm then required much more effort than now. As anyone who has lived in Britain can…
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The Great Divide! Starting School
I remember very little about the first school I attended. St Margaret’s had been evacuated from Edinburgh to the country for the duration of the war. For various reasons it did not return to the city until sometime in the 1950”s. I think my parents saw it as bridge between home and the more rough…
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The Midnight Snack
When I was a little girl, probably about six or seven, I lived with my family in an old farm house .It was situated on the banks of the Tummel River a tributary of the river Tay in Central Scotland. We had come from Paisley to escape the intense bombing focused on the river Clyde…
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The Secret Garden A Favourite Book from my Childhood
The most important thing about this book is that it is a good story. It starts in an exotic locale. There is a lot of mystery, and many questions that need answers. In a children’s book like this one the central characters are a always children. They must be the main movers of the action.…
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The Significance of Reading
I do not remember learning to read so I don‘t think anyone taught me. I do remember being frustrated at being unable to sound out the word, ”the” and making a decision to skip it! I was very glad when it turned out not to make any difference to the story! Like most children I…