Tag: SwallowsAndAmazons

Returning to self

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This is the first in a series of blog posts about my recent ADHD diagnosis. I wrote most of it in one sitting, and kind of reached a natural pause (more like screeching to a halt), but here I am concentrating on school.

When you don’t fit in, other people’s social norms become layered on top of you. By reacting to their behaviour towards you, you stop doing (or curtail) what makes you, you. As Oh says in Home, “The true is, among Boov, I do not fit in, I fit out.”

Becoming homogenised into ‘acceptable’ is hard work. It is draining, soul destroying, and it breaks you. The moment you either blurt out something that you want to share; or if your outside of school / work / social group hobbies are a bit different to everyone else – life gets harder again. The layers of pain, shame and bewilderment take ages to scour off, if you can.

I didn’t want Barbies, I wanted the electronic Battleship. I didn’t really know what to do with the dolls, but I changed their clothes along with everyone else. At home, I loved building houses from Lego, would fully furnish them with itty bitty furniture. I also oved reading, but they were the wrong books.

I lived inside Swallows & Amazons, being handed the first one to read when I was 7 years old and had exhausted all the books at my grandparents. We lived there for nearly a year while our house was being renovated, as I moved up to Junior School. Over that year, my reading increased from ‘Oooooh!’ to voracious.

Instead of playing in the playground all the books other children had read, or recreated from what was watched on TV the night before, I wanted to be Captain Nancy Blackett. I tried to explain the plots of the books to my friends at school but was met with blank faces. Excluded from the group while they played keeping house. I tried to play Swallows & Amazons with my younger brother, but he’d not read them, and wasn’t interested in boats.

From memory, I only managed to persuade him to play this with me once, we were on holiday in Great Gransden, an old tree had fallen down at the back of one of the fields on the campsite. In my head it was my boat, I borrowed three of the poles from the windbreak and rowed all over the lake. Our Dad took a photo of us, my brother sat before one of the poles stuffed into the tree as a mast, I’m wielding the other two poles like oars, my face split from ear to ear in a grin.

(I’d still love to learn to sail. I’ll put that on the list for next year, I’ve got enough on my list for this year).

I was happy enough though, because I had John, Susan, Titty, Roger, the Swallows, and Peggy and Nancy from the Amazon to keep me company. In my mind I sailed from one side of the lake to the other, built campfires, boiled a kettle for tea, and had picnics of bread and marmalade.

This sailing knowledge came in useful one day, when we had an incursion with actors putting on a play, when one of them asked what the zig-zagging against the wind to sail was called, I blurted out ‘Tacking’ before anyone else.

Excluded from the group, know-it-all.                               

The girls played different games, guessing our favourite colours, what colour our bedrooms were painted, our middle names. By calling letters out, we’d move forward on a paving stone until we got to the other side of a courtyard to win. I didn’t have many letters in my name, and they were surprisingly easy to not be called out. Over and over again, I’d be last, laughed at. So I started adding in middle names to move forward.

‘That’s not right, you’re a liar!’

Excluded from the group.

Or when Uptown Girl was massive, friends of mine sang the song in the playground. Excitedly, having grown up on Billy Joel, I asked them to sing other songs of his. They were all right there in my head, my parents had them on LP, with cassettes for the car, then days of days, slowly brought all his albums on CDs to play. But I was met with blank faces again, because why would they want to sing anything from The Stranger or Glass Houses? They only knew a couple of songs from An Innocent Man.

Excluded from the group again, weirdo.

To this day, I hold swathes of song lyrics in my head. I can sing musicals from memory, It would drive my brother mad when I’d listen to songs on the radio, taping the top 40 onto cassette to listen to through the week, by Tuesday I’d have all the songs ready to sing along to. ‘How do you learn them so quickly?’ Particularly in the days of the Music Factory of Stock, Aitken, and Waterman, sometimes I’d only need to hear the song once or twice and it was there.

I also used to be able to hear a song and play it back on the recorder and sight-read music and play it accurately and consistently. Now, I don’t think I can even read music off the page. One day we had a performance at school, I wore a pink jumpsuit, (Hey, it was the 80s! I loved it though, it buttoned up like a shirt), not knowing I needed to be in uniform. Instead, I was shoved into the changing rooms and told to swapped clothes with Joelle. I stood in her school dress, crimson with embarrassment and tried to concentrate on playing.

When I got to Senior school, my recorder playing, (both the normal or descant, and the larger tenor version), was expected to be converted to clarinet. I was excited to learn this new instrument, but when it arrived, I hated the feel of the reed against my lip. I wanted to carry on noodling around with the recorder, but there wasn’t a place for that either in lessons or in the orchestra. So, I stopped playing altogether. Poor Mum and Dad, they would have heard all sorts of music from my bedroom, for it to stop completely.

Sweet Valley High books were all the rage by the time I got to Senior school. I didn’t particularly like them, but needing to fit in, I read them. I could read a book in a day and retain the basic, formulaic plots. Being able to talk about them meant I did fit in, but the waiting list at the library was long and we didn’t have much money to buy them. So, I stole them. Walking out of WH Smiths with bags of them. In a fit of overwhelm one day, I threw my entire bedroom contents over the banister and down the stairs.

I can remember Dad asking, ‘Where did she get the money to buy these?’ None of us wanting to address the elephant in the room. I didn’t have the money. But what I wanted or needed to fit in, I would take.

I hate this about myself.

I know now after doing more research into ADHD, impulse control is a massive indicator. The list of things I stole in my teens and early twenties is wide, varied and long. I’m not excusing my behaviour. I’m trying to understand it.

I’d be asked to do something, by the time I’d got to where I needed to do the thing, I’d have forgotten about the thing.

If I have no interest in something, I’d rather not do it. At all.

See barefoot bowls, no thank you. I don’t know if this is a legacy of being bullied because of my feet, or a legacy of being an absolute klutz with any type of ball.

Or going to see Cats when I wanted to see Starlight Express? I’m not going on the excursion at all, even though I respect democracy and we all voted on it; I know would make it miserable for everyone else.

This was really hard to manage at school. I wanted to study the period of history from the Tudors to Victorians, instead of Modern World History at GCSE, because I’d done the 20th Century to death and was bored of it. But as there were only 8 of us who wanted to study it, the school couldn’t put it on as an elective exam.

Simple solution. I didn’t study, at all. I relied on my prior knowledge to scrape a C when I was predicted an A, pissing the teacher off good and proper.

I would question teachers, ask them things over and over to explain something that didn’t make sense. Trigonometry and percentages are a closed book. I can do percentages only if I look up on google how to do them, every time. My maths teacher would explain things the same way over and over, I didn’t understand how he explained it. But he wouldn’t change the lesson so I could understand it. Instead, he shouted and humiliated me for not getting it, when everyone else did.

When I was taught how to teach swimming, I was taught that I would need to show some people how to do the strokes, I would have to describe how to do the strokes and I would have to assist some people to do the strokes. Some people need a mixture of all three to learn something new.

I was in trouble a lot for being disruptive and talkative in class, I’d do the work set for an hour in 15 minutes, ask for more to do but not be given anything. I would make a lesson last an hour, my speed and ability to absorb information slowing down. There’s nothing like a once-labelled gifted child being struck into inaction with perfection paralysis, or unable to start something altogether, because as we progressed through school we couldn’t learn at our own speed.

At times, I would be put on ‘report’ where I’d have to carry a card around with me. The teachers would initial the card, but only if I’d behaved, in their lesson. If I handed my homework in, I’d get another initial, but I’d forget to do my homework.

Sometimes I’d also forget the card, and the length of being on report would be extended out. Or I’d leave the card in a pocket in my uniform, it would get washed, and it would be extended out again. I’d go into detention to do my homework, then lie to my parents to say I’d missed the bus home.

I struggled to fit in. I’d work out the current trend, hop on it, it would change, I’d be excluded again. I was bullied for my height, my feet, my hair being short. For swimming, for not dancing; for laughing too loud; for being too loud; for when I was having fun playing; it was the wrong kind of fun. I liked the wrong kind of music.

I was bullied for having zero spatial awareness with any ball sports at school. Be that field events from athletics, tennis, hockey or netball. In netball, I was parked at Goal Defence as I was so tall, I would just stand there and block everything. One game I mishandled the ball, dislocated and broke a finger. The teacher watched me pull it back into place (not recommended) but didn’t send me to the medical room. Particularly frustrating as two minutes after it happened, someone got the ball bounced off the ground into their tummy, burst into tears and was despatched to the medical room. Maybe it’s because I didn’t cry, I just looked down and thought ‘That’s an interesting angle.’ After hours at emergency waiting for an x-ray, I had it taped to another finger for weeks. Going into school with it swollen and purple the next day. Dad was furious.

I was a preternaturally gifted swimmer, there’s more on that coming in another blog post, but because I was so good, the teachers expected it to cross over to other sports. Not for me it doesn’t. I’m so clumsy I’m still covered in bruises, and it was at the GP suggestion to assist with my brother and I’s coordination issues, we went swimming in the first place.

I have no poker face to hide my emotions, my face will tell you what I’m thinking, even if my mouth doesn’t. There is nothing like the look of disdain across my fizzog for something I do not want to do. I can’t fake it for politeness. Let it be known, I do try, but then I spiral into anxiety. Which presents as a short temper, which if I can’t wind down, ramps up to aggression, or paralysis. Fight, flight, freeze – or disruption, disenchantment, disconnect and defiance.

Dymocks Reading Challenge – 06

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This past weekend I finished three Arthur Ransome books, Winter Holiday, Pigeon Post and We Didn’t Mean To Go To Sea. These three books are some of my favourites in the series, closely followed by Secret Water, (but we’re not there yet). This is the first of three posts, it was way too long for one blog, about Winter Holiday.

I know I’m slightly out of order. If there are any other Arthur Ransome pedants who find this, I decided to skip Coot Club, and to read that back-to-back with The Big Six, to enjoy the Norfolk Broads in one hit.

Winter Holiday introduces us to a sister and brother, known as the ‘Ds’. Dorothea and Dick Callum have been sent to stay at Dixon’s Farm for the last bit of their holidays before going back to school, as their parents have gone to Egypt to ‘dig up remains’. The Walkers (crew of the Swallow) are at Holly Howe before being despatched to their schools for the new term. Mother, ‘left just yesterday’ as their Father’s ship is stationed relatively close-by at Malta. Mother has taken the youngest child, Bridget to meet him as, “Father’s never really seen Bridget since she was a person.”

The Swallows and Amazons (SAs) see the Ds as they row to Wild Cat Island on the D’s first morning at Dixon’s Farm. The Ds are, in turn, by the lake watching the six of them in the Beckfoot rowing boat. The SAs are practicing Morse code and Semaphore, they’ve taken up signalling with a view to an ‘Arctic Expedition’. But it’s not cold enough yet for the lake to freeze, and the holidays are nearly over.

That night the Ds head up to an old barn for an observatory, so Dick can look at stars. Dick loves geometry, takes daily readings on the barometer at home (he’s frustrated that he didn’t bring his pocket one with him), and is learning about astronomy from a new book, he chose the old barn for his observatory for its ‘horizons’. He’s often is so deep in thought, he can’t hear his sister when she talks to him, “Well, you ought to hang out a notice when you’re not there.”

Dorothea is calm and clear headed, but also full of stories. A bit like Titty, although Dot is full of romance and wonder; whereas Titty is a product of her Australian mother, Naval Officer father’s more stoic upbringing. We never meet the D’s parents in any of the five books they’re in, although they write to the children and seem quite happy when they get swept up and along for adventure with the SAs and also the Coot Club children. The Ds are the fulcrum point, bridging the Norfolk Broads and Lakes children and books together.

Dick is affectionately known as ‘Professor’ in the books. He is often deep in thought, and sees things the other children miss; for example, in Winter Holiday he notices that a car has driven past with snow chains on, but hasn’t come back along the road. The other children don’t make fun of him polishing his glasses when he’s got something to say, but is too shy to interrupt; or when he writes down birds he’s seen in the ever-present notebook that is in his pocket. [Typing that made me realise that none of the children are made fun of. Although there are pointed jibes from sibling to sibling, it’s never malicious, as an example, John saying to Roger “I don’t believe you’re ever full.” You feel like you’re watching family dynamics and vernacular, it’s a running joke that Roger is always hungry.]

While watching the stars from the barn, the Ds are able to see Holly Howe farm windows. With lanterns and torches, the children signal to each other. The crew of the Swallow answer in Morse code. The Ds (not knowing Morse) decide that of course they can’t communicate – Morse, Mortian, Martians. In the morning, the ‘Martians’, now including the Amazons, all march over to meet the Ds. On the way, Nancy and Peggy run across a tarn that has a thin layer of ice over it, but it’s not bearing yet, so they go into the cold water up to their ankles.

When they all meet at the barn, the Martians are disappointed the Ds aren’t in trouble, as they thought they were signalling they were in distress. Introductions are made, the Ds are asked to join them for the day by the SAs. They all head down the hill to Dixon’s Farm to get the D’s rations for the day. Mrs Dixon laughs and tells them they’ve “Not made too long a time of it” in meeting the Swallows and Amazons, and packs the Ds off with a picnic.

The Ds are told about the Arctic Expedition and shown the ‘igloo’, which is a stone hut they’re covering in snow, and told about the planned trip to the Arctic to the North Pole, which is at the head of the lake they’re on. Although the end of the holidays is just around the corner, they’re all hopeful to get some skating on the tarn, even if they won’t be able skate on the lake. Nancy and Peggy dry out shoes and stockings by the fire in the igloo.

Over the next couple of days, the Ds are taught both types of signalling, Morse and Semaphore. The SAs decide it would be rather beastly to leave them out of things, even if they’re not sure about Dot’s pigtails. Then the ice freezes the tarn. At their first skating practice, the SAs see that both the Ds have been ice skating on an indoor rink near their father’s university all winter and skate well. This clinches the friendship, Nancy says she’ll keep teaching them signalling if they can teach everyone how to skate. During a skating and signalling practice, Captain Nancy writes down the ABCs of semaphore for Dick in his notebook. She also tells him when the expedition is due to start, she’ll run a flag up the pole at Beckfoot, so they know when to leave to head north on the lake. This he also makes a note of on a page in his notebook.

Just as the holidays are drawing to a close, with the lake finally showing signs of freezing, Nancy goes down with the mumps. Because the other children have been ‘fairly stewing’ inside the igloo with her, none of them can go back to school. The certificates telling the school they’ve not been in close contact with anyone sick, can’t be signed, (sound familiar?). They have to stay in quarantine, which gives them a whole month more of skating and practice for their expedition.

Nancy is filled with glee, Mrs Blackett is worried they’re all going to come down with it, Peggy is despatched to stay with the Swallows at Holly Howe. For a few days, they do the best they can without Nancy. Bur after skating and signalling practice, then ensuring the igloo is covered with snow, they run out of ideas of what to do. Eventually, they all pile over to Beckfoot to ask Nancy what they should be doing, using semaphore in the garden so they don’t get too close and get sick:

Captain Nancy gives instructions

The circle over Nancy’s face says, ‘It would be unfair to draw Nancy’s pumpkin face’. I love Dick in the bottom right hand corner, looking up the alphabet in his notebook while Peggy is signalling. Roger is on the right, standing closer to the steps; John is at the back; Dorothea is writing the letters signalled by Nancy in one of her exercise books she uses for writing her novels, leaning on the sundial; with Titty far left; then lastly, Susan is in between John and Peggy. Got to love how the boys are all in shorts, in the middle of winter. I also like the nod to Captain Flint’s relationship with them all, showing his telescope in the ground floor window.

Nancy’s arms windmill letters, she’s full of ideas for hiking up the mountains, crossing ‘Alaska and Greenland’, making Wild Cat Island Spitzbergen, to keep up with their training. While signalling, she’s pulled away from the window, Mrs Blackett tells them all off, reminds them why they should be on the other side of the lake, and sends Nancy back to bed.

The next day on their first trip to ‘Greenland’ the children are taking it turns pulling a sledge as ‘dogs’, all hopping on the sledge to slide down hills. While the youngest four are exploring, Dick saves a cragfast sheep by walking along the ledge it’s got stuck on, the other three using the Alpine rope as a lifeline. I love this exchange:

“Half a minute,” he called again. “I’ve got to sit down. Let out some more rope.”

“Is anything wrong?” That was Titty’s voice.

“No. But the rock leans out, so you’ll have to let the rope out a lot and then jerk it around. Don’t start jerking just for a minute. I’ve got to get sitting down.”

“Why?” called Dorothea. “You’re not giddy?”

“No,” said Dick. “Centre of Gravity. If I try to get past standing up, my Centre of Gravity will get pushed too far out by the cliff.”

Overhead, on the top of the rock, Titty and Dorothea and Roger looked at each other.

“I suppose he’s all right?” said Titty.

“Quite,” said Dorothea, “so long as he talks like that.”

Winter Holiday, p.143

Mr Dixon makes the Ds a sledge to say thank you, giving the expedition two sledges. Nancy smuggles the houseboat key out via a tobacco tin sent with the doctor. The book continues with Captain Flint’s iced-in houseboat becoming the Fram; which is soon decorated with polar bear fleeces (sheepskins) arctic fox pelts (rabbit skin) that they sew into mittens and hats as it gets colder and colder.

Captain Flint comes back from overseas when he hears about the lake freezing over, he joins with them all on the expedition and helps Nancy with North Pole preparations. On a day when the Ds have to leave early to prepare a sail for their sledge, Captain Flint tells the Swallows and Peggy that Nancy is due to be let loose tomorrow and will run up a flag at Beckfoot. Depending on what colour it is, depends on whether she’s allowed by the doctor to come to the houseboat for a conference and planning for their final push to the Pole.

The next day, a flag is run up the Beckfoot pole. As Mrs Dixon is getting ready to go to the market, the Ds are running late when they see the flag. They head off with their provisions for the day. They also take the sail for the sledge they’ve finally got ready with the help of Mr Dixon, but not had a chance to practice with. The others are only at the houseboat, but have pulled their sleds around the other side of it, to discourage other people from climbing aboard. The Ds miss the smoke from the fire that was only lit as they hurried past houseboat bay, thinking they’re behind everyone else.

From there on in, it’s a rush to the finish of the book and the North Pole, complete with a storm blowing snow and wind along the ice. The Ds hoist their sail and are blown straight down the lake like a pea in a peashooter. Despite the expedition being split, with search parties, and the Walkers and Peggy skating the length of the lake at night, they all arrive at the Pole safely, but at different times. They find a fire ready to light and provisions ready to eat. In the morning, the miscommunication is explained about the flag, it’s agreed that they had a proper expedition instead of the planned coordinated effort, and all’s well.

There’s never much more than implied danger and the odd scuffed elbow in Ransome’s books, Nancy is the ring-leader, she’s strong-willed and obstinate. But all the children are self-sufficient characters, and from Winter Holiday onwards, the characters move around each other, with each of them holding their own, bringing their own strengths forward when needed.

I’m loving re-reading the entire series of Swallows and Amazons, although I don’t recommend a twelve book series to count as one selection for the challenge! The pile of books by my bed are staring at me and is not diminishing very fast at all. I’m taking a couple of books with me when we go away this weekend, but next week I’ll read Secret Water and try to convey why I love it so.

Dymocks Reading Challenge – 08

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This past weekend I finished three Arthur Ransome books, Winter Holiday, Pigeon Post and We Didn’t Mean To Go To Sea. These three books are some of my favourites in the series, closely followed by Secret Water, (but we’re not there yet). This is the third of three posts, it was way too long for one blog, about We Didn’t Mean To Go To Sea.

It is one of the last books in the series I was able to buy, as even in the UK the more obscure books weren’t easy to find. It is also the only book that scared me, the usual mild peril ramped up to a stormy sea crossing.

It’s the book with the shortest time frame of just six days, and focuses entirely on the Walker children. Commander Walker after years of being away overseas, has been stationed at Shotley and is travelling home. Mother and the five children have all arrived to greet him, they’re not sure when he’s going to arrive, as it depends on his overland connections across Europe. All they know is, he’s arriving by steamer for the last leg.

They’re all staying at Alma Cottage at Pin Mill with Miss Powell while they wait for Daddy to arrive. The book opens with the oldest four who have borrowed a rowing dinghy before supper, pootling about in and amongst other boats and buoys. They’re watching a Gaff Cutter called Goblin coming into moor, but due to the ebbing tide, Jim Brading misses his buoy with his boathook. Jim throws a rope to John who ties it with a bowline knot and makes fast.

Jim’s impressed with John, who has also offered to come aboard to help him stow the sails and make the Goblin neat and tidy. Before long the other three have also come aboard and have helped tidy up. Mother comes over in another rowing boat to call them in for supper. They all invite him to join them for the meal when they discover he’s sailed from Dover that morning, on his own, and hasn’t even eaten breakfast.

Miss Powell sees their new friend and laughs, as she’d made omelette and soup for their supper, which is what Jim and his uncle would order from her when they would come into Goblin’s home port. Exhausted, Jim falls asleep at the table, after which they all agree he’s become a friend. When they’re eating, he offers to take the four oldest out on the Goblin from the next morning for a couple of days, while they wait for their father to come home. He says there is a lot of sailing they can do in and around the Harwich estuary.

Mother tells them she’ll think about it overnight. The next day, after sounding out people who have known Jim Brading for years, she agrees to let them go on the conditions that they do not go past Beach End Buoy and out to sea; that they phone her each night so if she gets a telegram from Daddy, she can call them home straight away, and that they have to be home by Saturday.

Bridget is upset that again she’s missing out on adventures as she’s “..been trying to grow up as fast as I can”. Mother tells her she’s missing out too, and she needs someone to look after her.

The next morning, children are aboard the Goblin, Mother and Bridget arrive in a rowing boat with stores and to see them off. In the interim, they’ve been practicing raising and lowering the sails. They’ve swept decks, coiled ropes and Susan has stowed away all their clothes, blankets etc. She now puts all the food that Mother has brought away too.

Jim shows Mother the chart of where they’ll be sailing. Showing them Beach End Buoy and promising again they’re not going to sail past it. Mother compliments him on a nice tidy ship, Susan is happy and proud of the hard work she’s done.

Off they sail, they phone to say goodnight when they’ve moored up. The next morning they set sail, but are just floating with the tide as the weather is changing, there’s no wind and they can hear fog out at sea. Only when do they nearly reach Beach End Buoy, they realise how far they’ve drifted. Jim starts the engine, but realises he used more fuel than he thought when it chugs to a stop. He drops his anchor just off Felixstowe, jumps into the Goblins’ dinghy, Imp, and rows away to get some petrol.

The fog comes down around them, sounds are muffled and they don’t notice that the tide has come back in again. Only when the anchor makes a funny noise do they realise the tide is twice as deep now it’s fully in. Not only is the Goblin is being pulled along, they don’t know where they are. John tries to let more chain out, but the little ship is now moving so quickly, the chain pours out and both anchor and chain are lost.

They try to get another anchor out, but it doesn’t hold either. Still in the fog, they can’t see anything, but the water right beside the boat. Only when they hear a clang close to them, they realise they’ve been moving with the tide again and they drift out past Beach End Buoy.

They’re drifting in and around shipping lanes, around shoals (sand banks under the water), completely on their own and in a thick fog. Another buoy appears close to the Goblin, and this little picture gave me nightmares about buoys for ages:

Fending off with the mop

I don’t know why buoys give me the heebie-jeebies quite so much, but hey, I had nightmares over Miss Marple too.

John makes a decision to hoist the sails, he knows the only way to keep them safe is to keep Goblin safe. He checks the chart and chooses a course, about South East, that will take them safely out away from the shoals. He heads out, trying to keep in as straight a line as possible so when they turn around, they’ve got a fairly straight course to get back to Felixstowe.

The wind picks up, with waves of water coming into the cockpit as they’re being buffeted about. Titty and Susan are seasick, Roger frantically pumps the water out the boat, Susan is worried the further they go away, that no-one knows where they are and wants John to turn around. John gets angry, he knows he can’t navigate back in as he doesn’t know where they are in the fog, if they try to turn around, they could get swept onto a sandbank and Goblin would break up.

The fog lifts, but then it starts to get dark. Susan is now frantic with worry, particularly when they’re nearly mown down by a steamer. Her seasickness has calmed down, but when they try to turn around; instead of the wind coming from behind them and blowing them along easily, they have to tack into the wind. Turning around to sail into the wind, Susan gets even sicker, she knows she won’t cope if they try to turn around. Miserably Susan agrees for them to carry on, but John also now needs to reef the sails (make them smaller, so they’re easier to manage). Jim showed them how it was done, but he’s not done it before. Susan starts to steer, John puts a lifeline around his waist and nearly gets swept overboard.

When John gets back to the cockpit, the Goblin is much easier to handle. Titty and Roger who were below decks and being buffeted when they’d turned around wonder what is going on. Susan beginning to feel better, and heads down into the cockpit to make them cocoa. As if this isn’t enough to be going on with, they also rescue a half-drowned kitten they call Sinbad.

Susan is the only reason any of the children’s adventures go ahead, she’s the one the parents and other natives trust to ensure bed on time, fed on time and to keep them all safe. This book is the complete counterpoint to this, by showing her vulnerable; being scared and seasick is an awful combination. Arthur Ransome put Susan through the wringer in this story, she has to accept what is happening and make the best of it. She has no control over what is happening at all.

All night they sail, realising that when it gets light, they can work out where they are and ask for help. John falls asleep, Susan steers, Titty and Roger come up on deck when they’ve had breakfast. Sailing ships are heading towards them, they recognise the flags as Dutch and in amazement, realise they’ve sailed right across the North Sea to Holland.

Needing to call for help, they signal for a Pilot to take them into the closest port. John plays the part of ships boy, the other three hide in the cabin and try to make grown-up noises by singing shanties and stamping their feet.

As they head into Flushing, Pilot steering while John is standing on the cabin roof. A steamer is getting ready to set sail, John sees Daddy leaning over the barrier looking into the port. As the Pilot is navigating them into a berth, he bangs on the cabin roof to call the ‘Capten’ up on deck. He realises that the four children sailed themselves over in the gale and fog and is praising them. John tells the others that he saw Daddy, that they’ve missed him. Another boat comes chugging along, Daddy did a a pier-head jump and got a boat to take him out to the Goblin. Susan sees him and bursts into tears.

He and the Pilot piece together the bare bones of the story, the Pilot refuses to take any money for guiding them into the port. He also will give them a chart of the North Sea from Holland for their return journey, agreeing that they could pretty much turn around and sail back out again as the weather is good.

Daddy takes them all for something to eat, John falls asleep at the table. He gets the whole story about everything that has happened. He writes out a telegram to tell Mother what is happening, including that they’ve found a kitten, but he sends it via a colleague in the UK so she doesn’t worry to hear that they’re all in Flushing. He also tells John that “We’ll make a seaman out of you yet my son.” John chokes up with pride and relief.

They buy supplies for the return trip, filling up the petrol tank and paraffin for the lights. The Pilot arrives at the Goblin to give them the chart, telling everyone that these are the children came over the North Sea by themselves.

Daddy sails them all home, he’s been travelling overland and has been sleeping for two weeks, he doesn’t mind sailing overnight to get them home as soon as possible. He sits in the cockpit with his cigar glinting red in the darkness, singing shanties quietly, then louder. Waking up, the children listen to him and realise he can’t be angry as he wouldn’t be singing. They head back off to sleep again.

The next morning, they’re heading in towards Pin Mill, when they see a man rowing towards them with what looks like a turban on. It’s Jim who’s discharged himself from hospital, also frantic with worry. He nearly falls overboard climbing up from the Imp into the Goblin. When customs arrive to clear them to enter port, they tell Commander Walker they’d been expecting him to arrive. They also explain that everyone heard about Jim in his haste to catch the bus, was actually run over by it and has a concussion.

Daddy confirms with Jim that Mother doesn’t know they’ve been missing. When they’re pulling up at the Goblin’s buoy, Mother rows out to meet them with Bridget. She is angry that they broke a promise to her to get back in time, Roger tries to explain they’ve been in Holland, Mother thinks it’s one of his jokes. Bridget points out the kitten, a hand comes out the hatch to catch Sinbad. Mother’s jaw drops in surprise, just like Titty’s when she realises it’s her husband Ted.

The crew of the Goblin tidying up after their voyage watch Daddy row Mother to shore to call Jim’s relatives, on the way back he tells her what happened.

Dymocks Reading Challenge – 01

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Better drowned than duffers. If not duffers, won’t drown.

While I’m reading Australia Day, by Stan Grant, I also re-read Swallows and Amazons, by Arthur Ransome. I think this book has been in my life since I was 7 or 8 years old – almost 40 years. The book itself is just shy of 100 years old, being first published in 1930. I was given the complete set of twelve books in dribs and drabs for Christmas and birthday presents, or would buy them with book tokens. The husband brought me the beautiful Folio Society set for a birthday before we left the UK.

Re-reading it now, with a ten year old son is both nostalgic and eye-watering. I cannot imagine sending him off to an island, in the middle of a lake, on a boat, with no life-jackets onboard. No refrigeration for the food they take with them; or the milk they drink gallons of, being sent to visit Dixon’s Farm to collect fresh milk each morning in a milk can – they only rinse out in the lake, (bleee). Let alone the Walker children are just told to let the natives know every day or so that they’re ok. Every day or so?!

The story starts with the now accepted stereotypical trope of ‘get rid of the parents’; for the crew of the Swallows, Mother stays at home with Vicky the youngest child, (so called because she looks like photographs of Queen Victoria, and her Nurse) at Holly Howe, while Daddy is away in Malta preparing to set sail again serving in the Navy. The family have travelled to the Lake District for the last 2-3 weeks of their summer holiday. The Amazon pirates’ father was killed around the end of the First World War, their mother is but a fleeting glimpse in this book. But they also have Uncle Jim, who this summer has turned native, by writing his book ‘Mixed Moss’

I think we’re pretty free-reign with our son. When we go to a playground, we park ourselves on a bench, he then runs off and comes back for food and water. Before the old Eltham Wooden Playground was burnt down, I heard “Mama, I’m stuck!” To find him hanging on for grim death at the top of the slide, on the outside of the tube, after watching some bigger kids climb up it. A mere 3m off the ground.

He was about 7, or the same age as Roger Walker, Ship’s Boy, at the start of Swallows and Amazons.

He’s now 10, and no closer to being allowed to sail off into the sunset from the Peak of Darien on his own with a fishing rod, blankets and hay stuffed into a sack to sleep on. Never mind that he’s an only child, the world has changed and while we’re bringing him up to be independent. I can’t imagine not talking to him morning, noon and night. I miss him when he goes to school FFS.

Anyhoo, it was a different time. But, the first time I read it, I was caught up in the romance of it all. Living, breathing and swimming alongside them in the water of The Lakes. I’ve only been to that part of the UK a couple of times, and have only been to Windermere once. Needless to say, it wasn’t like how it is in my mind. Watching the original movie from 1974, I squirmed with disappointment, I’ve not even bothered with the 2016 version. Reading the plot synopsis, it’s too far away from the book for me to cope with. (A person’s got to know her limitations).

These twelve books have by my ‘Strength and Stay’, (to borrow from Queen Elizabeth II) for the vast majority of my life. Like Mapp and Lucia, when I’m feeling overwhelmed or anxious, I know I can open these books and retreat into a world I know intimately. Worlds so far removed from my own, but that I know like the back of my hand. That they’re all set between the wars is not lost on me either.

What are your favourite reads from your childhood? Swallowdale, (possibly my favourite) and then Peter Duck (my least favourite, next to Missee Lee) are next. I’ve promised myself I’m going to read all of them, so I will. But for now, I want to concentrate on Australia Day.