When I was a child.......we were poor.
There were things that I wished for, but knew that I couldn't have because we couldn't afford them.

I wanted to go up in a plane....the one that all the school children went on, on ascension day.
It was only a bog standard Turbo Prop plane, but it flew over the town, and all the children whose parents could afford it, could look down on the local geography.
I wasn't particularly interested in geography, I just wanted to go up into the clouds......it never happened. (Well, not until much later)
On ascension day I would watch the planes flying overhead and imagine what those lucky children could see.....and I would envy them.

I wanted to go on holiday with...

Margaret Pilkington

Reading westenders blog about her brother made me laugh. So thought i'd tell you about my day with my brother. He's older than me - he was 49 last week and wind him up about his age seeing as he'll be 50 next year ......

Monday im still in bed ... and my mobile goes. Its my brother - "can i come and use your phone?" "Yeah give me half an hour and come down" - "im outside right now!!!" He should have been at work - well i thought he should have but turns out hes on holiday from work. I stuck the kettle on and he sat down and said wheres the phone - which is a very good question - when you have one of them cordless ones .. I said ring it - when it rings i'll find it. So he makes his call and the kettles...

shillelagh

The Chinese have a saying, "The much-loved child has many names". Our dad surely loved us, then, as we all 3 had dozens of names from him. We answered to them all, too.

Brother 2 (7 years my senior) was, by all accounts, a very inquisitive small child. Our dad could do a passable impression of his younger male offspring who as a toddler, apparently, met every statement and action with the flat demand, "Why?", accompanied by a determined expression. You didn't get away with ignoring him. It didn't take long before our dad referred to him, often, as The Why? Boy.

He was a tactile man, our dad. He wasn't given to openly embracing his children, particularly his sons, once we'd got past pre-school...

West Ender

It's my biggest brother's birthday in just over a week. That's my biggest brother, in years not in size, not my 2nd big brother who's nearly 3 years younger than him but 4" taller. My big brother will be.........75.

I'm sure there's something wrong somewhere. Some years have, apparently, been put in a time-cruncher and disposed of in a hurry. It's not that time already, is it?

We first met, obviously, on the day I was born. I don't remember this meeting - the mists of time, you know how it is - but, I gather, he and my 2nd big brother had no idea I was about to arrive (such matters were, in 1943, considered too indelicate for children to know about). I made my rather loud entrance into the world at 7.15...

West Ender

Well, it has been a proper grey old day today........it really has felt like Winter is advancing...what with the grey days, the evenings drawing in and the mornings being darker.

We walk through Mercer Park to Take Miss Bossy drawers to pre-school...the squirrels are rampant and eating as many of the horse chestnuts as they can...dropping any bits they don't fancy onto the grass...so watch your head if you go that way, as some of the bits aren't so little.

Some of the leaves are already off the trees.......and the air smells of leaves.....i can't explain what I mean by that, except it is a very rustic Autumn smell.

A lot of the shops have the Hallowe'en merchandise, and (groan)....... there are even...

Margaret Pilkington