Just when did the fun go out of the Winter Wonderland?

Date Published: {J}

In the past week I was standing outside the primary school with any number of other grandparents. Most were cowering from the bitter temperatures, all the talk was of the weather and the frost and all were wrapped-up snugly against the cold.

Then the doors opened and the hundreds of laughing, happy youngsters began to be disgorged . . . many of them were carrying their anoraks and coats, knitted caps were being thrown to the wind, and, within seconds, they were playing in the frost and snow.

The difference compared to the frozen sentinels who had been waiting was marked indeed. The kids were shouting, screaming, a few snowballs were being made from what was left of the fall from a few nights previous, and they were happy of the shady spot in the lee of the school where the sun hadn’t thawed the ice.

It was then I began to wonder – precisely when did the joy go out of snow and ice? Did it come with the ownership of a car, was it because snow and ice are about the only things which finally put paid to golf for days on end, or was it because, as you move on, things become just that little bit brittle for landing on your bottom on a footpath?

It is no coincidence that the vast majority of reports you hear from accident and emergency of people suffering falls and having to have fractures repaired, are cases of mature or slightly older victims of the frost and snow. A kid falls and bounces back up again . . . get on a few years and land on the bony part of your bum, and you inch your way upright once more and know that the ache will be there for quite some time.

However, it was not always thus. That pathetic creature you see inching along by the walls seeking out the spots where the ice has thawed or where there seems to be some slight purchase, was once the devil-may-care expert on the homemade ‘slide’ who could hurtle down the ice with the best of them.

There was a slight incline on the road near my home and, when the evening began to draw-in and frost was expected, we brought out buckets of water and turned maybe a hundred yards of main road into a slide on which you could run a toboggan event.

Dozens of youngsters gathered and we slid for hours on that section of ice. There were all kinds of variations – you hunkered-down half way down the slide to show your expertise, or you hunkered- down and two friends grabbed you by the hands and all three slid together.

Of course there were falls and accidents. We were banned on one occasion from sliding because, in the words of my father, it was ‘ruining the soles of our shoes’, but when he went next door to visit, we joined in the fun on the slide.

For more, read this week’s Galway City Tribune.