大象传媒

A story written up by Karen in the 大象传媒 Open Centre Hull

My dear lifelong friend Margaret and I had a magical childhood, despite the war, thanks to our Mothers who never gave us any idea of the turmoil which must have been going on in their hearts. We would take old rags to the rag yard to get pennies for the pictures, bottles to another yard for more pennies. On the railway embankment at the back which was like a lovely meadow then (ie grass where you could take your dolls and have a picnic, as opposed to the rubbish tips of nowadays) we would spend time as little girls do with dolls prams and reading books etc and it always seemed to be sun shining then! We went through a phase of hauling our dolls prams on top of the square brick air raid shelter, goodness know where we got the strength from. We would find rope and haul our prams and rugs up, goodness knows where we got the strength from 鈥� and play up there. A little older and wiser, we would go on the lines coal-gathering, no sense of danger, shopping bags full of coal. Then we would have ball hunting days, i.e. counting how many balls we would find in one day on the embankment. I could write a book and probably will, about our friendship which is still as strong as ever from the age of four and five, until this day. One day Margaret and I decided we would have a 鈥減arty鈥� and invite the boys 鈥� we would be about 8 years old 鈥� (we lived about 100 yards away from each other and often experimented with tin cans and long strings towards our bedroom windows so we could have a sort of telephone line 鈥� but it never worked). This party was to be held in the brick air raid shelter in my garden. (There were two kinds of air raid shelter, i.e. the brick square one with the flat roof and the Anderson shelter which was concrete with an arched roof.) So we went to the local sweet shop (Enid鈥檚 which is still on the go on Anlaby Road) and bought spearmint chews, lovely long pink slabs of spearmint about 8 inches long and 2 inches across with little square stamped out a bit like American apartment blocks. Then we called in to the corner greengrocer Mrs Carfunkle and bought some plums. Why spearmint and plums I will never know!
Then our Mothers said they would each make a large jug of tea, so we invited about eight boys and told them they must bring their own cup. Then the hostesses with the mostest lit candles and placed them on very convenient jutting out bricks inside the shelter near the roof. The shelter had like a stable door which swung outwards. We then placed the spearmint chews and plums in small sections where the boys could help themselves, (lit the candles which our parents did not know about) and waited for the boys. They started to arrive at the appointed time, waving their various drinking vessels in the air. It was a hot sunny day but we thought we were the bees鈥� knees because we were having an indoor 鈥減arty鈥�. They all placed their cups on a trestle table and went in to taste the delights of the plums and spearmint chews. It was going quite well, the aroma of hot children, juicy plums, candle wax, and spearmint was 鈥� well different. Then one of the boys broke wind 鈥� there were howls of let me out, etc. etc. they flung open the stable door, which promptly knocked into the table, all the cups went flying, and need I say it, that was the end of our party.
Incidentally one of the boys, Brian, used to be my sparring partner in 鈥渃omic races鈥�. i.e. when his Mother went out, we would go into his house carrying a pile of comics each, then lie on our bellies in front of the fire and see who could read the most comics 鈥� and he was the first boty to ply me with drink 鈥� i.e. we sort of got the idea that it was daring for him to open the pantry door, climb on a chair and get the 鈥淢ilk of Magnesia鈥� down. I didn鈥檛 know what it was, but the bottle was a pretty blue colour and we enjoyed a drink each. For years afterwards I could not see Milk of Magnesia without laughing 鈥� perhaps it is still on the go.

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