Ice and fire

Winters of my boyhood always seemed cold. Our house was exposed to the wind that hurtled through the vale, and we had no heating other than a coal fire in one room. The toilet was outside and across the yard.

There was one winter in particular that stands out for me. It started early and seemed to go on forever. The snow came in December and I think it stayed until march. Goodness me it was cold that year.

On a daily basis the glass of water at the side of my bed would have a film of ice on t when I was wrenched out of bed in the morning. The insides of the windows were covered with a patina of ice crystals, and the daylight had an intensity that I have not seen since. WE'd push pennies against the glass to thaw peepholes so that we could see out. Nothing kept us indoors though and with two pairs of socks inside our wellies, we'd don scarves and home made balacalavas and head out into the wilds.

That year the river froze, as did every pond lake and ditch. Wildlife had major problems finding food and daily, we'd find wood pigeons with their feet frozen to the tops of brussels sprouts plants. There was nothing that could be done for them and mostly they were put out of their misery. Snowdrifts piled over the hedges and formed wonderful sculptures around bushes and trees. They even formed shelves over the river, and often the unwary would fall through and onto the ice below.

The millpond froze, except in the area where the millrace entered. This was an accident waiting to happen. Mostly the ice on the river was about six inches thick, enough to support most things, but towards the mill race it tapered down to near nothing. We cut sticks and played our own version of ice hockey here - yes in wellies! Remember I did everything in wellies in those days.

One day, tired of ice hockey and falling over and getting cold and wet, some bright spark decided to have a competition to see who could get closest to the water at the millrace end. Now this would be foolish even if one could swim, but many of us couldn't, never having been taught, and so this really was insane. However the contest began and gradually, one by one we ventured towards the thin ice at the edge. The ice creaked and as we got closer, we could see the water through the ice, with bubbles pouring under our feet. Most of us saw the red light and backed off, but one lad didn't. He was determined to get to the edge. To everyone's horror and no-one's surprise, the ice gave way with a sickening crunch, and Richard vanished under the freezing water. For a moment his head came back up and he grabbed the jagged edge of the ice. It gave way and he went down again, this time, the current took him under the ice and we stood helpless as he thrashed away below our feet. The only way out was the way he went in and the current was dragging him away from that point. The ice was too thick to break and so we stood, helpless, and strangely detached from his plight.

I'll never know how, but somehow he managed to get back to the edge and hauled himself above the water. Someone reached out to him with a home made hockey stick and he was dragged, out and into safety.

No-one talked about that event. We knew that if a single parent found out what had happened, the river would become out of bounds, and besides, nothing that happened out of the house was any of their business.

There was little traffic in those days and what there was had compacted the snow into a lethal sheet of ice that covered every road. Getting to school was tricky and to manage the walk without falling over was hard. School was a welcome break from the aching cold and it was pleasant to sit in the classrroom with its coal fired boiler.

The nights were bitter. The cold was palpable and had a smell of its own, and journeys to the toilet were less than pleasant. There was always the risk of being frozen to the seat and mostly we learned to control our bladders and bowels, so that night visits out there were rare.

When winters go on for as long as that one did, the novelty of it all wears thin and we yearned for the thaw, knowing that it would bring with it the inevitable flooding. And of course it did come to an end as all things do. There were other winters that were as cold but none went on so long as that one. Global warming has it's good points.