Unofficial Christ's Hospital Forum

When I was a little fellow of 11 years, I used to like to hide from the world up a tree and the best one was at the back of Barnes B. I used to climb to the very top of this enormous fir and have fun calling out to boys and masters who walked below and oddly they never looked up, only all around.

Now one day I was laughing so much because I had dared to call out the name of a terrifying master who was passing below that I lost my footing and fell about a hundred feet to the ground

The tree was an evergreen and had plenty of branches to break the fall but as I fell I did think "this is it - I'm going to die"

As a result I have always let my children climb trees.

They are now big and strong and not scared of a challenge.

I recall the tree well - in fact I think it was you who introduced me to the top of it - but werent there two???? I had the feeling that there was another one next to it and you could jump like one of those squirrels from one to the other?

....or plummet, as the case may be.

What....like a sheep?????

Rory wrote:What....like a sheep?????

Exactly! A sheep is not a creature of the air.....

Rory wrote:I recall the tree well - in fact I think it was you who introduced me to the top of it - but werent there two???? I had the feeling that there was another one next to it and you could jump like one of those squirrels from one to the other?

Right again Rory!

There were 2 trees but I only remember falling out of the taller one.

Oddly I have often been called upon by my own children, especially the boys, to go climbing trees with them and I found to my dismay that I don't have the head for heights any more - a bitter disappointment.

Did you ever jump fom one to the other? - I can vaguely recall doing it with fear and trembling - I hope I didn't encourage you to risk your life doing these pranks.

Just a vague memory but I think we did. And if I needed encouragement - I'm sure that it taught me a useful life skill....when you're about to plummet from a high tree, grab hold of a branch on your way down. In life, if you don't take risks, you'll never fall out of the tree. Maybe the trees were planted for that very reason. Oh - can you help with another faded memory.....in my first year I remember going down to the farm. Was there really an old barn with a piano upstairs??? I have a distant memory of a scene from "the aristocats" or was I drinking back then...

Richard Ruck wrote:

Rory wrote:What....like a sheep?????

Exactly! A sheep is not a creature of the air.....

....apparently, also a high class Welsh Leisure Centre, (allegedly !!)

J.R. wrote:

Richard Ruck wrote:

Rory wrote:What....like a sheep?????

Exactly! A sheep is not a creature of the air.....

....apparently, also a high class Welsh Leisure Centre, (allegedly !!)

Shirley that's a sheep tied to a lamp-post?

Richard Ruck wrote:

J.R. wrote:

Richard Ruck wrote: Exactly! A sheep is not a creature of the air.....

....apparently, also a high class Welsh Leisure Centre, (allegedly !!)

Shirley that's a sheep tied to a lamp-post?

You're absolutely right, and don't call me Shirley !!

Rory wrote:Oh - can you help with another faded memory.....in my first year I remember going down to the farm. Was there really an old barn with a piano upstairs??? I have a distant memory of a scene from "the aristocats" or was I drinking back then...

I don't know about the aristocats connection nor do I quite understand why something that plummets necessarily makes you think of a sheep but I do have a dream-like memory hidden behind seven veils of a piano upstairs in a barn in the old farm. I imagine it was totally out of bounds which was perhaps why we were there - I had completely forgotten this episode and only have a dim memory of it. Can you remember what we sang or played?

No - afraid not. The Aristocats reference was the scene - not the music. But the piano did play (not quite concert pitch tho). And yes - of course it was out of bounds. As for sheep...the tend to plummet because they can not fly. If you imagine a sheep balancing on a high branch ready to take flight, when that moment comes.....what happens?? It plummets.

As this is a tree related thread, I seem to remember that RR and I used to do a bit of "coppicing" in the woods down by the Arun. I wonder if anyone carried on our 'good work'.

Rory wrote: As this is a tree related thread, I seem to remember that RR and I used to do a bit of "coppicing" in the woods down by the Arun. I wonder if anyone carried on our 'good work'.

And in the wood between Sharpenhurst and the railway......

Way ahead of our time, we were.

There's proper coppicing in Shelley's Wood these days, together with a big charcoal burner.

Rory wrote: As for sheep...the tend to plummet because they can not fly. If you imagine a sheep balancing on a high branch ready to take flight, when that moment comes.....what happens?? It plummets.

But how did the sheep get up the tree?

I never once came upon a sheep at the top of any tree I climbed.

I think it would, in the name of science, be appropriate to go to Wales, hire a hoist to get a sheep up a tree and you could prove, once and for all whether it really plummets.

OK, the flying sheep thing is from an old Monty Python sketch -

http://www.intriguing.com/mp/_scripts/sheep.asp

It's better with sound and vision......