This series of stories will be titled 'I'm surprised I turned out as well as I did, given my childhood ...' 18

Today, we’re at RAF Odiham for their Family Day. No, we don’t have family in the military, but one of the members of the military does have a Mustang and he managed to get an invitation extended to the Mustang Owners Club.

Because it’s mainly about family, we took our granddaughter, Mia – she’s five and swings between an absolute delight and a bit of a pain… I’m thankful her swing-o-meter only goes to ‘bit of a pain’ because I do know how much worse it could be.

Mia having a go at walking the tightrope - she was very good

She had one turn on one of the rides and a little later wanted another go.

We took her back and she decided the Batman plane wasn’t right for her, but as there was a little girl sitting in the Disney Princess one, she’d have to wait.

Nope. That’s not how it goes at all, apparently.

She spoke nicely to the little girl in the Disney Princess plane and the little girl budged over so Mia could sit in there too.

You know what? Kids are awesome. They don’t have ‘politically correct’ agendas or hang-ups and that’s one of the things that makes their lives so perfect. Wait til they get hold of all the neuroses from the adults… sigh

They spent the whole duration of the ride taking it in turns to press that button to take the plane up and drop it down. They both wanted to have another go, but took it in stride as it was pointed out that other kids wanted a go too.

As she was going round and round, up and down and thoroughly having a wonderful time, I got a memory arrive in my ‘internal email’.

Mia taken by iPhone

We’d gone to an amusement park – I don’t know where and I’m not even sure ‘when’.

I hopped into one of the planes on the rides and I’d been watching the other kids having fun and wondered how it all worked.

My mother insisted my brother (two years younger than me) ride along with me and I was not a happy camper at that piece of information. I remember that much clearly.

So, there’s a button at the front of the plane and if you press that, the plane goes up. Let it go and down it comes. (That was the connection that reminded me of this memory.)

My brother didn’t like the first time I pressed that button. He complained – OK, OK, he screamed…

I knew this would probably be my one and only chance at this ride, so that button was pressed for the WHOLE of the ride, screams from the side of me, or no. And believe me, there were screams. He never stopped yelling that he didn’t like it, and he wanted to get off.

When we got off, my mother was annoyed with the guy operating the ride because he could see her son was upset and shouldn’t have allowed the ride to stay all the way up there if he was screaming so much.

I can’t recall who pointed out the fact that the ride’s up and down facility was ‘in house’ and the rider operated it… I’m pretty sure I didn’t tell her…

We had one holiday per year as a family, a week in Skegness in Lincolnshire, at my mother’s sister’s static caravan (trailer).

Row upon row of similar caravans and there’s no wonder children lost their bearings.

At least once every visit, we’d go off to the toilet block and come back to find ourselves lost – good ploy, parents, lose all three in one go, save on search-parties…

They were obviously the ‘good old days’ because every time we opened the door to the wrong caravan, we weren’t chased out with a broom, but I do recall a few confused expressions as three little kids arrived in their holiday home.

I’m the eldest and therefore, I was always the one responsible for the other two. Oh boy… my parents did not have great judgement.

The seaside was awesome. Every day was hot and sunny, just perfect for wading in the sea, a balmy temperature with a gentle breeze blowing, just enough to ruffle your hair.

Who am I kidding?

Gale-force winds to the extent that a windbreak was mandatory unless you wanted every bit of exposed skin ‘exfoliated’ by the shearing wind blasting minute particles of sand at you.

Freezing water, the colour of diluted mud and then, sometimes, mud the colour of sand on the top crust, but black as tar under that crust, and twice as sticky! With nothing but sea-water to wash off the sticky, stinking mud, there was no choice but to brave the water.

I remember almost drowning myself every damn year because I just couldn’t fathom my own boundaries. Just a little bit further… and then that massive wave, strong enough to re-float a beached tanker would arrive from nowhere and tumble me over and under, scraping me along the sea-bottom, only to spit me out just before I drowned.

I’m not sure if King Neptune threw me back personally or not, but I wasn’t as delicate, pretty or tuneful as Ariel and that was probably why I was spit back out.

With three kids, and a husband that always seemed to be elsewhere when it came to getting kids dry and dressed, I was always dried first and left to dress myself. Oh I remember that pantomime!

A towel, damp and barely big enough, wrapped around my waist to preserve my childhood dignity, and then the mad, embarrassing struggle to keep my naked bottom from mooning at the rest of the holidaymakers.

Then, dressed and dried, waiting for my mother to dry and dress my brother and sister, I got bored.

A bored ginger kid is not the recommended ideal happy holiday recipe.

As I said… no notion of boundaries.

I always went back to the caravan with my shorts in my hand and that towel wrapped around my waist.

Images from google unless credited