On Saturday, as I mentioned, I went for a stroll down memory lane. This is the village where I grew up, now a smallish town.
There used to be a large factory, where just about everyone that didn't work in the quarries was employed. It was bought out and, of course, all the production moved abroad. So now the town has a lot of commuters living there.
As I was walking down the main road, I noticed that the gates of my old infants school were open. It's no longer a school but some sort of educational and youth centre.
Mrs Hadwin's class was behind the first door on the left. It was not the garish yellow then, but dark green. The cloakrooms and the corridor to the other classrooms is on the right. I say cloakrooms, but it was just a row of sinks as we still had outdoor toilets, really. The school matron was also somewhere by the sinks!
The milk crates with the tiny bottles were left near the right hand door every morning, and at break we had our milk, with a straw poked through the top, and two McVitie's Fruit Shortcake each.
I remember being five and in that class, making a pasta Christmas decoration, with red string and milk bottle tops. My Mother hangs it on the tree each year. The milk bottle tops were from my friend Peter's father's farm. They bottled their own milk and the bottling machine punched circles in the tin foil, leaving another handy decoration- a strip of foil with holes at regular intervals.
Mrs Garner's class was up some old stone steps to a door high up in the wall, both now gone and turned into some sort of store. In that class we all had German Measles at the same time, and chicken pox, so we all went to school as usual.
I remember making Valentine cards and being allowed to take in a toy of our choice at the end of term. I have an old photo of the end of term summer play. We are in front of this building, I am wearing a mop cap, knickerbockers and smock. We sang Lavender's Blue. Duncan B, the school favourite, was the king. I think I must have been some sort of maid, but as My Mother had made the costume it was the best! She is nothing if not a perfectionist.
The school hall was also up the stairs. The Very Reverend Griffiths used to stand on the stage in front of the big windows, if you stared for a long time without blinking then closed your eyes, he was there in outline like a large bat in his vestments.
The headmistress had dreadful varicose veins. We all sat on the floor and as she passed she would hiss 'Mind my legs!' as she went along. We sang a lot of lovely hymns in that hall, and we did PE there as well.
Wearing our white vest and blue knickers we would cavort around. We got changed on the stage and left our clothes there in neat little piles. I was once sick in another girl's shoes and begged her not to tell. I got taken home in Mrs Varicose's car, a rare event. The shoes were never mentioned again to my knowledge.
The gate to the rear playground and garden was firmly bolted on Saturday. There we had had swings and monkey bars, a gate led to the village park. There was a garden and a sandpit. The school is at the top of a hill, we lived at the bottom right at the other side of town. It was a long walk each way, but I hated going in other people's cars and so would never have a lift even if it were offered on a rainy day. My Mother must have found it unbearable but I don't remember her moaning then. She regularly mentions it these days when reminiscing.
Usually when you go back to places you haven't been since childhood they seem very small. Maybe it's because of the Victorian scale, but it didn't feel like that at all. It felt good, no bad memories. I loved school. My Mother says that after my first day (in a little HORSA hut over the road, gone now, but here's a similar one ) my comment was 'It's great, there are so many other children there.'
My senior school (different town), which was on two sites-lower and upper schools, is long demolished and turned into housing estates. Both sites had much history, one being a former asylum. The two boys' schools have gone as well. One is now the library, the other a tiny hub of the enormous conglomeration of all four...where I work.
I have spared you a Cat Stevens link.
