Childhood Memories: Dens (Aged 3-6)
One of my favourite dens was the interior of a Rhododendron bush we had situated on a bank on the left of the drive. I believe my elder brother discovered it, but it became a great den for us all.
Once we had crawled through a gap, only visible to a child’s eye, the centre opened up into a small room. The floor was strewn with the thick glossy leaves and dry brown earth. The branches were positioned so that you could climb them and survey the interior below, or climb that bit higher and peek through the canopy to the world outside. The vistas were amazing. As we looked out at the world below, we felt like we were flying.
It was a place where you could be alone, and allow your thoughts to wander. However, we often went there to play. We would become different characters, albeit very stereotyped. Before my younger sister was born, I would play the role of mother and my older brother was the father and my younger brother we named John. I expect it was from the Janet and John books.
We also took on jobs to go with our characters. The boys would climb the branches and pretend to paint the walls and ceiling and I would pretend to make dinner and use the glossy leaves as knives, forks and spoons and old, rotten wood would be our stew. Then I would call them for dinner.
As my brother got older, he started his own den further a-field, high up on the hills above our house. He made it from existing bushes and planks of wood and branches for a roof. It was a den strictly for boys and I was banned. One day as the four of us went for a walk with Mum over the top, we found it in tatters and were to discover the hunt had ridden through it and had completely destroyed it!
As the boys had their own den, I sought one and discovered a large cavernous pit, which I made into a den. One day I asked my mother what had caused this pit and she must have said that it could have been a bomb. I had no concept whatsoever what a bomb was, but from then on it was known as my bomb-pit.
I always remember my Godmother visiting one day with her family and I innocently said to everyone, “Let’s go to my bomb pit.” I remember the shock on my Godmother’s face and the hurried explanation of my Mother!
(The photograph shows the rhododendron bushes behind us, where we had our den. My Godmother is to the far left. I am in the red cardigan and looking towards my father, who was bringing my brother from his nap!)
