Christmas time in school and the old memories bubble up of the past 50-odd years of change. 1953, I was around 6-years old and presents were very simple. A Billy the Kid annual from a neighbour; the inevitable Broons and Oor Wullie annuals. I sent a penpal in Canada the latter one year. Wonder what she thought. A cowboy outfit complete with holster and gun and hat and leggings - I insisted in sleeping with it on and it stained the sheets brown. Mrs Howden tried to kiss me in the Co-op shop on our block. She may have been drunk because I remember squirming away from her looming face as she bent her 6-foot frame towards me.Now, it's not the same, of course. Innocence is replaced with commercialised greed and instant gratification. The shops are not as full as they were last year. People don't have so much money to spend and also more people are ordering on line. The high streets are dying.
1953: some random events were Queen Elizabeth II's coronation; the conquering of Everest by Edmund Hillary and Tenzing Norgay (who reached the summit first? We'll never know); the death of Dylan Thomas; pea soup smog in Edinburgh and Glasgow; an atomic device tested in Nevada.
Didn't think I'd ever reach 2010 57-years ago.
