When I was small the gifts that would come were always paper dolls with cut out clothes and fuzzy felt farmyards. I was never a neat cutter out and predated Velcro with sticky tape to keep the intricate dresses and smocks on. My favourite was, unsurprisingly, Pollyanna and I would spend hours dressing and redressing a cardboard Hayley Mills in a selection of outfits. I think the fuzzy felt must have presaged my love for Farmvile - there was something so satisfying about the green of the grass with the cows and pigs and chickens artistically arranged.
It was during one of the times ( I was sickly child) that I was given Anne of Green Gables and Girl of the Limberlost. For weeks I was happily entwined with the Anne's "kindred spirits" and with the cruelty of Elinor's mother. It never crossed my mind that they were from a time long gone. I know I was given Little Women when I had my appendix out and, submerged in post operative gloom, wept at the death of Beth.
Illnesses varied - rarely dysentery, more often tonsillitis or some other long forgotten lurgy. I know when I was about fourteen I had dengue- not pleasant and it left a mumbling echo - even now when I have a fever I get the dengue rash beneath the skin.
My worst one was sunstroke. We had a school sports day - in May, in the baking sun and although my weak ankle meant I did not take part I was running errands for all and sundry. The following day at Firpos for Sunday lunch I regurgitated my fried chicken and ended up in bed for the next week. The school had a sharply worded note from my father suggesting they confined Sports Day to the cold weather months in future.
My appendix was a typical in the way that things got done. I had stomach ache, my father said it was nothing. I wept in pain - he said he had seen nothing but crying children all day and expected a little peace when he got home. They fought and my mother took me to lovely Uncle Eric - Eric Davies. Within the hour I was in Woodlands and my appendix exploded as they lifted it from my stomach. Mum stayed with me the whole time I was in Woodlands, leaving only to get her hair done and change her clothes. Maybe that is the reason I knew not to leave her alone towards the end.
How strange to feel nostalgic over illness, but, recovering from this beastly bug has left me a little low and feeling unloved. To remember those days is to remember being 'a top brick' and knowing nothing but love and care. How nice it would be to have a pile of books or some cutout dollies to take me through this. Still I have had Farmville.
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