Happy campers...
LIKE many, one of the few positive experiences I've taken from the trauma of lockdown, is the extra time it allowed me to spend with my family.
Back in May, my boys and I incorporated a long leisurely walk in our local woods as part of our routine. As we ambled along, I would tell them of balmy days in a long gone seventies summertime, where me and me gang of Jimmy Osmond clones would run wild in similar woodland and build camps and dens.
You can imagine my pride, when a few days later, my lads ran up to me and informed me of the brilliant camp they'd just built. My heart raced with a long-forgotten excitement. I loved building camps when I was their age.
Along with burning airfix models, poking a dead spuggy with a stick or getting the security man off a building site to chase you – it simply didn't get any better than that.
As I wandered out of the living room I wondered if it was an indoor or outdoor den they'd constructed? Both had their own particular set of challenges and skills and it would be beautiful to see their little brows furrowed when solving the same sorts of problems we faced back in the day.
In the glory of summer, nowt beat an outdoor camp. It was usually found in a local wood, garden or park where the grownups tended not to go. Secrecy was vital. We developed a level of camouflage and concealment skills that would not have shamed a British Army close observation platoon in seventies Belfast.
Old tyres and wooden pallets would provide the inner frame and furniture, around which leaves and branches were stealthily woven.
Sadly, many a potential hide was compromised by the appearance of a girl, invariably called Sharon or Sandra. She was the school tomboy who could out-run, out-climb and outwrestle any boy stupid enough to challenge her.
Oh how we both admired and feared her, and who was the total opposite of the Black Beauty-watching and Tiny Tears-loving softies back in school.
She could wreck things quicker than Gavin Williamson making an exam decision u-turn. The irony was, however, that, fast-forward 10 years, and this was the girl everyone was chasing after as she glided like a vision across the smoky dance floors of Tuxedo Junction, Scamps or Tiffany's.
In our pathetic and desperate attempts to connect with this queen, we would bring up our shared childhood camp building experiences.
Alas, all was in vain as she disappeared into the night with a man of James Bond-like sophistication; a Twenty-something rep from Heaton called Terry who had a curly perm and a top of the range Capri. Anyway, to return to the beginning! My kids finally brought me to the fab “camp” they'd constructed – on a flipping iPad on that Mineshaft or whatever they call it.
Horrified, I blurted out “Givowwer! That'd never have gotten you a dance with Sandra on the boat!'
“But it's made out of obsidian and protected by lava”, they explained patiently to their dark-age dad.
“Givowwer”, I harrumphed – at least you could have made an Airfix pontoon bridge, coastal defence or strongpoint. It took real skill to make and paint those bad boys!
As usual, they rolled their eyes, and went back to “building” their camp in cyberspace...