When I was a child (many moons ago) I used to play ‘knock-a-door-run’ with my friends (much to the delight of our neighbours). I did feel a bit naughty doing it, so didn’t play it that often. But for the record, I’m really sorry, neighbours of old. For those of you who haven’t played this before, you basically sneak up to someone’s front door, knock on it and then run and hide. It’s not the most complex game but it kept us entertained for about ten minutes in the six-week summer holidays.
Here in Suffolk it’s not children who play this game, but birds: Long-tailed tits, to be precise. Mr G and I were sat working when we heard a knocking on the front door. We both looked but nobody was there. It happened a few times and eventually we caught the culprit – a very cute, long-tailed tit, balancing on the edge of the window in the door and tapping on the glass with his beak. He has a couple of friends who now join in and they knock on both the front and back doors. We are now familiar with their ‘knock’ so no longer get up to answer the door. And I have forgiven them for disturbing us, as they are super-cute.
The birds have been ‘playing’ this game for over a fortnight now and don’t seem to be getting bored of it. So I can at least be assured that my brain is slightly larger than that of a bird as I played this for about ten minutes before running into Mum declaring that I was “Boooooooored” for the millionth time that summer holiday.
I am now fully aware of how irritating it is to hear those words from your child when you know they have a bedroom full of toys, not to mention the stack in the shed!
And so I find myself sounding just like my Mum all those years ago, repeating to Amelie exactly what Mum used to say to me and my brother “How can you be bored when you have all of those toys”. And then I go on to say how we didn’t have game consoles, only had four TV channels (what!?), tablets were a solid form of medicine and ‘Mr Google’ hadn’t been born! My goodness, no wonder I was playing knock-a-door-run to help fill the holidays.
Cosy and Warm 