Sunday 21 February 2010
Sailor suit
My Dad was obsessed with sunshine. We kids were wrapped up and bundled into whatever car we had at every opportunity. My brother and I were a self-contained unit and my older sister ignored us. As long as there was 'enough blue to cut a sailor's suit out' in the sky - we were off. We would go to woods to pick primroses, cowslips and bluebells (years before they became protected species). We would hunt for orchids and gaze in amazement when we found an unusual one. We would go to the beach, as long as it was sunny, and still have grainy photo's of us huddled up against the cold wind taken by an old box camera. We hunted for shells, fossils and crab shells whilst checking the sky to see if the imaginary pattern for the sailor's suit still fitted into the blue.
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I did all these things too but mum never said the 'sailor's suit' thing to me, I have heard it though when I was a lot older - was it a dad thing? I knew it was dad who was the orchid fanatic, there was a book of his... Mum must have taken it all on afterwards, I remember we found a rare Man orchid once on Dean Hill, then we went back every year to see if we could find it again. Bee orchids are the best. I found a whole swathe on Skiathos one Spring and went to say hello each morning. I miss being able to pick bunches of primroses and bluebells and one rarely sees a cowslip nowadays. I remember collecting bags full of cowslips with our brother when he was a student so he could make wine - how old are we!
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