The great sock debate

I guess we all carry a bit of the past around in us from earliest days at school, to perhaps going to secondary school, our first real job and so on but perhaps that's a barrier to understanding that today maybe things are different and even perhaps what was normal for even then wasn't necessarily the case for others.

For those of us of a certain age our first school told parents what if any the uniform policy was, some had more a dress code you were expected to keep within in, others a rigid uniform that had to bought and worn OR else!

By high school we saw the prospectus and what it had to say around that and maybe compared notes with mates who perhaps attended a different one to us.

Surprisingly school appeared to have a lot to say about socks, that they should be branded, the length and if they had to have a turn over top.

The bigger thing was colour and most specified grey or for high schools with long trousers, black was common.

On the otherhand girls tended to told they had to be white which somehow got translated into white socks are "girly" and by extension had no business being on any boy and some that still carries on in the world of the adult little boy/schoolboy .

What tends to be forgotten is often sports socks for boys were white as in this example having worn many a pair myself, often for things like Maypole Dancing you had white pumps and socks and even some football socks were.

White socks and wearing them doesn't make you a girl even if many of your peers may not and within the ASB/ALB field really isn't an issue, just being in little headspace is what matters.

The school radio years

One boyhood hobby was shortwave listening of both broadcast and ham radio transissions and this did go go to school with me in various of necessity portable forms

This was a very specialized piece of kit designed for us during WW2 for SOE Agents behind German lines that came in two bits, this, the reciever and a transmitter that operated of a large battery as it used miniaturized tubes (Brit Eng: Valves).

The Radio portion had a simple Tuned Radio Frequency (aka TRF) design rather then the better Superhet design for space reasons, a socket for the long wire antenna and earphones.

After all you didn't want "Jerry" hearing you!

Dad made a DC convertor that you clipped over the battery connectors so you could run it off the mains.

That hole on the upper right is the coil pack that sets the wavebands it recieves - you had two reversable pairs and because the tuning knob only had a one to a hundred scale you had a graph that converted that to actual frequencies on the inside of the battery unit

That long wire caused ahem "issues" with school grounds staff as it run from the dorm window to the nearest object to clip it on such as a pole or a tree as they seemed to think it was a saftey hazard even though I had a bright marker flag at the far end so it was visable.

One that sometimes came into school was the Soviet made Selena B 212 portable radio that did have extensive shortwave coverage but having its own telescopic antenna had less issues although you'd have the don't leave the pointy bit sticking out lecture.

That had a earphone socket and the ablity to connect to a tape recorder.

The home side of things could never of been in school although it make an appearence in May 1980 was the R 1155 radio reciever that also had a matching transmitter the T1154 and was fitted to the Lancaster aeroplanes and certain ships in a different version.

The wavebands are selected from a knob on the left but the selection depended on model you had - mine covered from 75 Khz to 18 mhz, shipping to shortwave via Medium wave broadcast band radio.

It was modified to run off the mains and have a loudspeaker output rather then the leather headset with earphones and microphone built in.

By modern standards the electrical connectors would be condemned ease of reversal and carrying high voltages but, hey, I'm still living!

cc

Harvest break week thoughts

After tomorrow what was my Junior School breaks up for the Harvest break for just over a week a ritual that was punctuated by Harvest Festival that usually meant learning a reading, the whole Juniors practising the hymns, the Minister or Vicar giving a talk about harvest and thanksgiving and a collection by us with help from our parents of food to help the most needy in our community.

It's probably apt then that I spoke for a bit this weekend with Karl who was one of my boyhood friends at Junior School and, knowing me, is one of many boys and girls of that era here who respect me for what I made of my life given the stack of cards I had, doing things that many of them didn't.

We spoke with the natural ease of boys together many decades on that reminds you of that bond and those shared values you had and as the week progresses there is every probability I will see todays boys of the age we were who curiously enough are just the current generation version of us and exchange a few words with as they play and I enjoy what has become this lockdown my playtime too.

Boyhood is a link across the generations.

*based upon a ide from the old TSB and the wordpress back up.

In another world

 

This could of been me so easily in actual childhood, sat in class with textbook open upon the wooden desk staring into space, daydreaming or otherwise distracted which it had to be said wasn't something your teacher way back then was very partial too and most still aren't.

Actually as much is it seen settings such as school as a attention or discipline issue, a lot of research has shown that's it not time wasted so much as time and skills at problem solving and using your imagination that can benefit people.

Of course we can all think of just dreaming up an imaginary world which for some may well be preferable to their only too real one, but that imagination can be channelled into drawing and writing fiction.

Perhaps that's why it doesn't surprise me a good number of those writers and artists tended to fall foul of the school authorities. 

Leaving and resuming years later

In the old order of things you'd be in school this week as Summer Term wound itself down as we couldn't really go any further in our classwork  so we'd have trips out, maybe a school production, certainly a school leavers service and board games on school desks at other times.

I remember that time in July 1975 quite well as we had a composition to write about our time at school, the things we learnt and our hopes for our futures at high school all to the backdrop of It Ain't Half Hot Mum on tv and Whispering Grass sang by two cast members on the radio.

The kit you need, I need even, as the eternal boy reflects that era although we didn't have caps and blazers, and the latter was one item I had to get that summer, removing any outward appearence of an adult.

Restoration to a school aged junior boy is the order of my day which is why two impliments are included for bringing my behaviour in line consistant with that era as that's what I understand best.

A juvenile little boy really is best treated for his misdeanours with a well caned bottom which he was used to if not merely threatened with 1975 style.

It is a very effective way of teaching me a lesson and I support adults who as this adult little boy teaching me right from wrong caning me without question.

It'll make a good boy out of me.