There's nothing that makes me more annoyed than a child sitting around with a bored look and when asked what's up, says "I don't know what to do". The favourite plea of the young thug caught beating up old ladies is "I was bored" and the do-gooders fall over themselves to find some occupational therapy for the poor lad when it could have been averted at source by giving him a good thumping every time he said it when a child.
The lady who had the unenviable task of instructing my mates and myself in the ways of the Lord at Sunday school, where we were sent by our parents, more to get us out of the way for a couple of hours, than concern about our spiritual welfare, was about four feet ten, weighed around seven stones, middle aged and had the looks and temperament of an angel, and always wore a black dress with white lace high round the neck.
I was whiling away the time during one session of her quiet soft talking by pulling at the pigtails of the girl in front of me, to her muttered disapproval, when the quiet voice stopped, then in the same tone asked me to step to the front of the class. Then she said would I be kind enough to lean over the desk at which she was seated, which I did, smirking at my mates. I was most surprised when a hand with the weight of an elephants' foot was placed in the small of my back and another which felt like a bricklayers hod, was applied with vigour to my backside. She laid into me solidly for a good five minutes and wasn't even breathing hard when she let me stagger back to my desk.
I learnt two things from that session, that God moves in a mysterious way, and appearances are deceptive, and have never felt the need to beat up old ladies. You never know, you might get a karate chop across the throat.
Mind you, I blame it all on too much telly. Proper mind destroying robot, and now it's on all day the kids' don't stand a chance of thinking for themselves, and if it breaks down they're at a dead loss. Can't understand it, can you ? Bags of things they could be doing, like learning the alphabet backwards. Not many people can say that and it could be quite a party piece.
I learned very early in life that loafing about only resulted in being given a back-breaking chore like running errands for Mum or getting the back of the old mans' hand for being idle, and kids of my time kept themselves busy with innumerable games in order to avoid such calamities.
The streets of Paddington were alive with children in earnest pursuit of enjoyment of their own making, and I don't think they were any the worse for not having television to lose their minds in. These games were usually perilous to the players but not deliberately aimed at maiming the onlooker although anyone had to be wary, especially when passing a lamp post where a boot in the back was quite likely from the flying feet of the girls swinging on ropes tied at the top as a maypole, and the old and infirm didn't stand much chance of getting out of the way of the child who belted along propelling an iron hoop as large as himself with a hook acting as a skimmer.
Mainly we got the bruises, as in "Releaseo", the old "Cops and Robbers" game where one team of boys set out to capture another. When one was caught, he was put in jail, a chalked square on the pavement, with a jailer, and he had to stay there so long as the jailer remained inside, and it was the job of the free robbers to get him out which they did by pulling his legs to prise him loose from the railings to which he clung. The shouts of the lad whose arms were being pulled from their sockets via his ankles while his head was thumping the rails was an unforgettable sound. That and the calls of "Releaseo" from the prisoner soon brought the scouting coppers back to engage in a free for all which was the whole object of the game.
Multiple leapfrog called "Wallie Echo" or "Jimmy Knacker"* called for devotion to duty beyond normal expectation especially when some hefty lout landed on your neck leapfrogging over six other lads at one go to get there, and had to be held up until the rest of team had landed and three verses of "Wallie Echo" were sung.
Games of conkers were usually won by the boy with the least bruised knuckles rather than the one with the hardest conker, and football matches, played with a tennis ball with coats as goalposts always ended in one of two ways, and always with the immediate flight of both teams. The crash of a broken window or the call of "Copper" from the lookouts posted at either end of the street.
Skipping ropes stretched across the street swung madly while boys and girls leapt like startled fleas in the middle, marbles played along the gutters, marred now and then by the disappearance of a favourite one down the drainhole, fag cards flicked along the pavement in games of "kissums" or knockdown, tops spun on to the hand or whipping tops thrashed to death, scooter races on home made scooters constructed with two lengths of wood, a tarry block, four screw eyes, two ball races and a large meat skewer, all activities strenuously and continually enjoyed by a generation who did not have a great standard of living but were lucky in not having their minds in danger of being made plastic by big brother in the corner of the living room.
By the way, if anyone would like the alphabet recited backwards, I shall be happy to oblige. I learned it the other night when our telly went on the blink and I couldn't think of anything to do. Never to late to learn, is it ?
Notes:
* Read more about Jimmy Knacker, "an excellent game which is both stupid and occasionally dangerous", here: Strange Games - High Jimmy Knacker
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