One Summer's Day : Recollections of a small boy

     There is an air of great excitement about the day, an excitement that every small child would feel in a similar situation, for today would be the start of the family's annual holiday in Bournemouth. To be honest, it was not always in Bournemouth itself, because we often stayed in Boscombe, which is right next door. I think that I actually preferred Boscombe with its very own pier, although the pier was never as elegant as the neighbouring one. Much later in life, when I had grown up and entered the life working world, I went to live in Boscombe in a flat on the Christchurch Road, but that belongs to another story.
       Anyway, here I was, getting out of bed early without the need to be cajoled or threatened into doing so, with a thousand thoughts and questions going round in my head. I was remembering other years and other holidays, savouring the memories as if they had occurred only yesterday. I recalled friends that I had made in previous years and wondered, as I always did, whether I would meet any of them again. Alas, seaside friendships are a little like holiday romances, simply a convenient means of making the time more enjoyable, only to be discarded once normal home life resumed, and of course I never did meet up with anyone from previous years. Not a problem, because there were new friendships to be made, and I just knew that there would be someone waiting to be my inseparable friend already at our destination.
     We lived in a large house, and downstairs was already a hive of activity as the early breakfast was being organised, only to be eaten as quickly as possible in case it delayed the start of the big adventure. In reality of course, there was a timetable to adhere to, and so rushing through breakfast made no difference at all. Once the table was cleared away and the utensils washed, dried and carefully tidied away, the last bits and pieces of packing were completed before the suitcases finally got carried down the stairs to await the arrival of the car with Mr Buckle, resplendent in his chauffeur's hat and dark suit.
     Once the car arrived the luggage was loaded into the boot first of all, and then we children were ushered into the back under the watchful eyes of my father. I should say, "under the watchful eye of my father", because he only had one good eye having been blinded in his right eye during the war years. Mind you, the one good eye never missed anything! Once we were all in and settled down as much as possible under the circumstances, my mother was established in the front seat next to Mt Buckle from where she could keep an eye on the speedometer. If she felt that we were travelling too fast then she would say quietly but firmly, "Slow down please, remember there are children on board." The real reason of course, was that she was afraid to go over fifty miles an hour, and preferred to be slower than that if possible. 
     It was about ninety miles to our destination, and the journey would take about four hours, allowing for stops on the way to deal with children who were sick or who wanted to go to the toilet. It was a somewhat fraught time for all in many ways. As children, all we wanted to do was arrive and get onto the beach as quickly as possible, feeling the warm sand between our toes. We tried to make the journey go by a little quicker by involving ourselves in childhood --- and often childish --- games, playing 'I-Spy' until we were fed up with it, and dropped out one-by-one. We also, to my father's annoyance, used to sing a song about cows, dreaming up cows of every colour and shape, repeating it over and over until finally ordered to be quiet. Looking back on those journeys I realise how long-suffering Mr Buckle must have been!
      After what seemed to be more hours than the day had to offer, we duly arrived at the hotel which we would call 'home' for the following two weeks, all of us piling out of the car and glad to have the opportunity to stretch our limbs and breathe in the first hints of seaside air with it's slight salty and seaweedy tang. Well, at least I thought that it was like that. Almost immediately, we children began to beg to be allowed to go to the beach, as though we were only to be there for a few precious hours and didn't want to waste a minute. Not that it did anything more than further annoy the parents, already stressed by the long journey. The suitcases were duly unloaded from the boot and carried in to the hotel and Mr Buckle waved off, not to be encountered until our fortnight by the sea was at an end.
     We were quickly booked in and shown to our rooms, and my parents began to concentrate on unpacking the cases whilst the rest of us milled around begging to be allowed to go and explore this new territory. Eventually, with my older sister tasked with keeping a watchful eye on us, I and my other sister were allowed to go off to explore, my mother's warnings not to go too far soon to be forgotten in the excitement. 
     The holiday had now begun in earnest! After a cursory glance around the hotel gardens off we went, crossing the road and trotting off down Sea Road to the greatest prize of all --- the beach! So, some thirty minutes or so after our arrival at Boscombe, there we were on the golden sand. It was as exotic a location as it was possible to be, far removed from the countryside that we were used to using as our playground, and we were determined to make the most of it. We would stay on the beach too long and be told off once we arrived back in the hotel, but that seemed of little consequence in comparison to the joy of wiggling toes in the fine, warm sand. I remember that one year in particular we stayed on the beach so long that by the time we returned to the hotel we were sunburned to the extent that we looked more like freshly boiled lobsters than children, and we had to have liberal amounts of calamine lotion smeared over our red limbs. The worst thing was going to bed at night because lying down was even more painful. 
     So began the great adventure that was our annual holiday, when the days seemed to last twice as long and it was always a tired child who finally sank into a dreaming slumber at the end of them. After the first week had drawn to a close it seemed for a while that we had lived there for ever, but as the second week progressed the days seemed to get shorter, rushing by with undue haste until the Saturday arrived and we were all packed up, waiting in the hotel lounge for the arrival of Mr Buckle and the long journey home. It was a much quieter journey than before, all of us sad to to leave the holiday behind, and certainly some dreaming already of the next year when it would happen all over again. In the meantime there would be much to do once we arrived back home in more familiar territory, although we would have the memories of the experience with us for ever.