Retirement blog about childhood games

Looking back to better times? They weren’t really of course. In many ways they were tough but through a Covid19 haze they seem better. A little dabble with the past in these tricky times seems quite acceptable so long as it doesn’t become a habit. This is after all a retirement blog not a childhood blog.

This minor dabble, in the past, was brought on during one of our walks through the park with the dogs. Some children, at least we supposed it was children, had chalked an outline of hopscotch on the path. For Mrs Summerhouse it was a nostalgic moment. It brought back memories of her past. And nothing wrong with that you say.

No indeed. It didn’t however, bring on memories of my past. Did you play hopscotch when you were a child, she asked? I did occasionally but in those days I remember it as a girl’s game. Heaven forbid we boys should have indulged, no matter how much fun it might have been.

What it did do was bring back to me all those street games we did play. The obvious ones – hide and seek, count to 100 (those of us who could count that high possibly did, those of us that couldn’t might have got to 20 then it was, coming ready or not. Yes, a little cheating did take place – 1,2,3, 100, coming ready or not.

Then there was a variation of that where the person who was ‘on’ stood by a post or tree or similar, closed their eyes and counted to whatever. The rest who were hiding had to get back to the post / tree whatever against which the one who was ‘on’ and ‘tig’ the post before they were ‘tigged’ by the one who was ‘on’. Hope you’re following this.

We used to play this game with the kids when I was a teacher in a school for emotionally-disturbed children. These were tough kids from often terrible backgrounds, street kids who had to be street smart to survive. We played at a place called Brimham Rocks in North Yorkshire. Quite a dangerous place at the best of times. As the setting for this game it was lethal.

The lengths those kids went to avoid being ‘tigged’ was remarkable. They jumped into raging torrents and jumped off of quite high cliffs. Health and safety, I spit on such a concept. It would of course never happen today. Imagine, the court scene, so Mr G could you explain why the child jumped off of the 50’ high cliff when you were chasing him.

Somehow the explanation, we were playing ‘tig’, you had to be there, would have sounded a bit thin. The amazing thing was that for whatever madness the kids engaged in, my colleague and I were every bit as crazy. We were fit young men in our 20’s and we certainly weren’t going to let them get the better of us. I shudder at some of the things I did in those early days of my teaching career. It’s a bloody miracle I went on to have any kind of career in education at all.

But back in my real youth (8, 9, 10, something like that) we played on the street. I tried to explain to Mrs SH the games we played. There was Hot Rice, which as I recall involved somebody with a tennis ball hurling it as hard as they could at any of the rest of the group whose job was to run round within a specified area and avoid being hit. If you were hit you joined the throwing team. Eventually there would be only one person not struck and being chased by say 10 ball-throwing maniacs. Although how we managed with only one ball, I really can’t remember. I know, as with all our games there was a strong element of danger to it.

There was a game that I think was called ‘My bonnie lies over the ocean’ or ‘statues’ or something like that. This game was relatively safe. Parents would have liked it but then of course they had no idea what we were up to. They may have had a fit had they known but then it being a coal-mining area, many of our fathers worked down the pits (not mine he was already dead when I was 5) and that was really dangerous. I digress.

So this game, whatever its name, had one child on one side of the street eyes closed up against the wall. The opposition of 5, 6 however many kids, were on the other side of the street. They had to get to the same side as the eyes closed one without being spotted in motion. The child with eyes closed would turn round unexpectedly and try to catch anybody in motion. If caught, you were ‘out’.

Sounds simple enough but there was a real skill in deciding when to turn round. Quicker than predicted or slower. There were some kids who, as soon as the child with head against wall turned to the wall, would charge like a crazy thing across the road in one go. Their ‘technique’ quickly became known and the eyes closed child would turn round immediately and catch them. It has to be said that some of us were not very bright. You could tell then which of us were going to pass the 11 plus. We could have made the decision right there on the street, saved a lot of money.

But my absolute favourite was a game called, and I swear this is true, get ready, ‘rumstick, a bum, finger or my thumb’. Sounds disgusting doesn’t it but it wasn’t but it was exceptionally dangerous. It took me a long time to try and explain this particular form of madness to Mrs SH and I’m still not sure she understands the subtle nuances of this harmless (no it wasn’t) pastime. Which is why I’ve asked her to draw her understanding of it at the top of this blog.

As simple as I can make it, it goes like this – two teams of same number, usually 4 or 5 in each team. Team A formed up rather like an elongated scrum or an untidy centipede. First player up against the wall, and the rest with heads up the bum of the child in front. No hang on, it’s harmless fun, well harmful fun, but not rude. The other team had to run and dive as far as possible onto this formation. You had to get as far along the line as possible to leave room for your subsequently-diving team-mates so none of your team fell off. The goal of the diving team was also to collapse the squatting team.

When the last child had flown crazily through the air, if the team below had not collapsed, the last one would place his hand behind his back where the crouching team could not see it and utter the immortal words above. Rumstick was a clenched fist, bum simply meant he had his (for some reason it was always us boys that played) on his bottom (what did you think?); finger, hold up one finger, thumb, obvious. If the team beneath guessed correctly you changed places. If not you carried on as you were. If the team beneath collapsed you stayed the same or if the diving team fell off, you changed.

Simple enough and I can honestly say I’ve never written about this childhood activity before. I’m exhausted just writing it but I feel better for it though. That’s what being in lock-down does for you, it makes you a little crazy. You write a retirement blog about crazy childhood games rather than something sensible.