Childhood

Well I thought I would test the blog waters, though this will be more my random thoughts than a journal of my life. I’ve been thinking about childhood, and yeah, childhood is kind of unusual, because as a child you sort of take things at face value and have an odd way of prioritizing things. In my childhood these are the things I thought about most: Rabies, and getting rabies. I was really worried about it and as a result I know a lot about rabies even now. Are you scared of water? Have you got foam around the mouth? That’s Rabies. And also quicksand, I was really worried about quicksand, I remember at points in my life saying the words “Oh no, there might be quicksand!” and “Careful of quicksand.” Quicksand isn’t everywhere is it? It’s probably rather uncommon but I was worried about it on a daily basis. If quicksand is so dangerous, how come that sign that is stuck in the quicksand doesn’t sink? It’s not that dangerous then is it. Because fear is used an awful lot in childhood to control people, I remember being told “oh be careful with chewing gum, don’t ever swallow chewing gum dear or it will make a web inside ya” or “Don’t swallow the seeds in an apple, it will make a tree grow, a tree will bloom through your head, you’ll be a tree boy and no one will love you.” Looking back there is probably only a few things that I really got joy out of as a child, I liked it if you were at school and a dog got in the playground for a bit, all bets were off then, it was just “Wooo! There’s a dog in the playground, yes! yes!” or do you remember when sometimes at school, naughty children would just turn up at school on BMX’s, that don’t go to school even. These kids were all reckless like pirate children, you wanted to join these children and be their squire on their rogueish lifestyles. We then progress onto teenagers and it’s like the end of childhood innocence no longer are we snug in what Jim Morrison called, “The wooly cotton brains of infancy” and soon long for those days.