Last week I hinted at how I once lost a penknife at Girl Guide Camp. To clarify at that time Brownies / Guides and Cubs / Scouts were single sex organisations for the kids, the “rules” are a little different now I believe but I’m not sure of the exact parameters. Anyway back then (mid-’70s) the former was definitely the case.
I was probably around 3, so this is really stretching the old memories a bit, but my Mum was a Guide Leader. For me this mostly meant that one evening a week she would go off for a couple of hours and I’d spend time with my Dad before going to bed.
Once a year however there was a Guide camp holiday. Tents, outdoor cooking the whole kit and caboodle. I’m not sure of the circumstances but I suspect it was for a lack of babysitting options at the time that I went along too. Or at least during the day, while my Dad was working, I don’t have any memories of sleeping in tents like the rest of the Guides were, so I suspect that my Dad came and got me after work and took me home. Although this was camping it wasn’t very far away from the village where we lived.
I remember mucking in with the Guides, or at least about as well as a 3 year old can. There were activities, and simple meals cooked outside and washing up with water boiled on the campfire. I doubt very much I was doing anything strenuous.
There was also another boy there, one of the other leader’s sons, I suspect looking back probably in a similar situation. Although a few years older than me, we used to get on well enough to play together when we weren’t doing Girl Guide things.
As a present before we went I’d been given my first penknife, a small affair that I talked about last week. Not really a knife, more of a blunt letter opener, but when you’re 3…
Anyway, I had this on a lanyard around my neck and tucked inside my t-shirt most of the time. I was very proud of it - I distinctly remember that - and how I came to loose it.
When I was playing with the other boy, he for some reason untied the lanyard behind my neck. I tried to grab the knife through my shirt but my chubby kid fingers obviously missed it before it slid off of the lanyard into the long grass. Despite trying to find it, retracing our steps and going back and forth over the area where we were, we never found it. I remember being very upset at it’s loss. A present from my Dad and I’d lost it in less than a couple of days.
I suspect he wasn’t too surprised that it had gone missing and a week or so later he took me to the village hardware store to buy a replacement. I remember they were marketed on a bit piece of cardboard with little elastic loops holding the different knives onto the card. I chose the exact replacement for the one that I had lost. As you know I still have that second knife to this day, and have a certain sentimental attachment to it.
Thanks for reading.
:) Awww, that's sweet!