The playground was fun. At first it was just a great big square of tarmac, with a grass edge. At the opposite end of the playground to the classroom were grass mountains, which backed onto one of the old farms. Another farm provided the right hand border. We weren’t allowed on the grass mountains; not until the summer when we were then given permission to move from the knee-shredding gravel and onto the softer, more natural surface. Of course, by the time summer arrived we were older. Even a matter of a few months helped us realise that these grass mountains were nothing more than landscaped bumps. Not that we knew the word ‘landscape’ at that age. We did know the word ‘bump’ though; every time one of us poor young souls tripped over the shoelaces we could not yet tie, we would be treated to tea and sympathy (but without the tea) from the teacher on duty.
“Oh,” they would sigh, “have you bumped your knee?” or whichever part of our tiny anatomies it was. Of course we had: how else would you account for the blood and grit mound on the offending body part. We hadn’t learned sarcasm at that age, either, so would make do with a tearful grunt to the affirmative. These injuries led us towards the first meaningful play I can remember. Richard and myself would hurtle up to the far end of the playground from the classroom as fast as we could. Louise, who was in the year above us, wore her coat undone, with her arms out of the sleeves, and just the hood over her head to keep the garment in place. She wanted to be a nurse. Richard and I would take it in turns to invent an injury, which the young nurse could then treat. This was play at its most innocent. We were treated to concern and affection from Louise. Louise made playtimes something to look forward to: forward beyond the packet of potato puffs that would come with a free football card inside, the quarter pint bottle of milk that was always too warm to enjoy and the promise of ten minutes away from learning. I didn't want to learn. I wanted to play.
Within two years though we were moved up the school, into what was known as the middle building, being as it was the middle of three buildings. The middle building had its own playground. This was called the middle playground, being as it was the middle of three playgrounds. Here we were faced with older boys and girls who were inevitably bigger, stronger, louder and in charge of the playground. Playing football on the netball courts at playtime was the only way to mix. In the summer we were allowed to go onto the playing fields if it hadn’t been raining. Despite geography, it never seemed to be raining in those early summers.
It was on these playing fields that I made the fastest sprint of 100 yards possibly ever witnessed. Being June, the weather had been rather warm, and as we merrily played at lunchtime we were too engrossed to notice the storm brewing ahead. Nobody noticed the first flash of lightning. No one except me. It wasn’t even a flash: it lasted too long. I saw it from the far end of the field and immediately raced to the school end, where the dinner ladies were sitting on deckchairs making sure nobody maimed themselves on the goalposts. At this stage I still wasn’t completely at ease with the concept of thunder and lightning. I was only eight. By the time I had made it to the school end, the flash was still decorating the slate grey sky behind me. In a state of complete panic I pointed to the fork, which must have spread out across at least three miles on the horizon, and urged the dinner ladies to get us all inside, quick. Even at that tender age I
was worried that someone would get killed. Amazingly, the dinner ladies laughed off my concerns and told me not to be silly. (It wasn’t raining, so why go to all the effort of packing everything up?) After what had seemed like an age, the air was filled with the most tremendous rumble. Everyone bar no one - except the dinner ladies of course - screamed like they had never screamed before. That was nearly two hundred school children, a noise great enough to drown out the thunder. Only the threat of mass panic (as opposed to my solitary panic) prompted the dinnerladies into action, and we were immediately invited to return to our classrooms to read old copies of the ‘Beano’ and ‘Whizzer and Chips’, or to “draw a nice picture”. The storm lasted the whole afternoon and people not far away from the school were killed by the lightning. I hoped that had taught the dinnerladies a lesson in doubting my storm-spotting credentials. It certainly rained that afternoon too; it rained so hard the old mill a mile away disappeared, prompting some of us with more active imaginations to suggest it was a ghost mill.
After a few years we again moved, this time to the upper playground. Here we had much more space for football. At the far end of the playground was a narrow blue iron gate, which was padlocked. Through the rails of the gate we could see the outside world. The outside world looked like a good place to be; the view from the wrong side of the walls (the school side) was of the village cricket pitch and the Rec; a slide, a roundabout and three swings. This was accompanied by a mass of lush, green grass and the vicarage wall, daubed with the message “Sex Pistols Rule U.K.” along with a letter ‘A’ in a circle. It was by these gates that we used to wait for the coach to take us for the weekly trip to the swimming pool (except for those with verrucas on their feet).
It was by these gates that I let slip my best friend Richard’s biggest secret: he fancied Sarah. He divulged his information whilst we were on the school trip to the Isle of Man. I swore myself to secrecy, but in the heat of a petty disagreement I chose to forget the concept of loyalty. For this I would apologise, but he got exact and immediate revenge by letting slip my biggest ‘secret’ (he’d been teasing me that I fancied Kevin at the time, though the truth of the matter was I’d only let it be known that my crush’s name began with a ‘K’) and the complete and utter embarrassment I endured was, I believe, punishment enough. At least he came out of the incident with dignity, and admitted his feelings. I backtracked instantly, denied all knowledge of the revelations, and wished I had never opened my big mouth. Never again would I divulge the deepest thoughts of a fragile heart. Well, not until the next time…
It was in the middle playground, however, that I faced my biggest shame. This was even an even bigger shaming than when I was pulled out of assembly for talking. I was only telling someone in front of me to shut up, because they were talking when they shouldn’t have been. Unfortunately, by being such a goody-goody, I too was talking when I shouldn’t have been, and it was me who got spotted. I was hauled to the front of the hall and given two great wallops by our corporal-punishment-favouring headmaster. I wet myself and pleaded to go to the toilet. I had only been trying to help. I wouldn’t ever learn.
No, the biggest shame stemmed from the middle playground, at morning playtime. Fresh from that warm quarter pint of milk and the packet of crisps (although by now we had moved away from those packets with free football trading cards in them), a group of us played by the red brick wall that stood five feet tall and separated the playground from the classrooms. There must have been about ten of us, boys and girls, and we were playing tag. Darting around and weaving through each other’s random routes, avoiding whoever was ‘it’. By the law of averages, it ultimately became my turn to be ‘it’, and I leaped around trying to make enough contact with someone else to be free again. I got Paul. Which was fine, except that when Paul left the moment of contact, a wadge of his hair remained entangled in my fingers. I don’t know how it got there. Well, I do: I worked it out eventually. Obviously Paul was in a bit of pain, and I didn’t know what to do apart from say ‘I didn’t do it on purpose’; I didn’t. The game continued. Paul disappeared.
A few minutes later I found myself being pulled from the playground by my own hair, which was in the firm grip of the deputy head, Mr. Whelan. The new hall (which was the assembly hall, the gym and the dinner hall all in one) through which I was marched seemed much longer than usual and the corridor to the staff room much quieter. I think I panicked; I felt nauseous, as though I had just swallowed the contents of the stagnant pond into which I had fallen two years previously. When I fell into the pond (not deep, but very cold on account of it being covered in ice) I just got told I had been stupid and not to expect any sympathy. This time my protestations of innocence fell on deaf ears, and I was sentenced to a whole month’s ban from the playground. Technically, I suppose I wasn’t innocent: that I pulled out that hair was beyond all doubt. I did feel a little aggrieved, however, that the intent (or lack of it) was never brought into Mr. Whelan’s kangaroo court.
Despite my punishment (and it was some punishment: four weeks solitary confinement, nothing to do but write lines and complete extra maths work), I still feel a sense of injustice. However, that cannot compete with the pain that Paul must have felt when his follicles parted company with his scalp. For this pain, Paul, I am sorry.
Text and images copyright John Hartley 2025
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