Random memories from your youth

ok... so does everyone keep these rings for life.. does anyone actually wear them?
Well, it's a "school spirit" thing. Some wear them for a few years, but most wear them till the school spirit thing cools down. While in school, if a boy 'goes' with a girl, he'll give her his ring, which she puts on a chain around her neck. It's the universal sign she 'taken'.
 
A fad during my high school days …. girls used their boyfriend’s high school ring as a ‘going steady’ ring.

If they didn’t wear it around their neck on a chain, the back of the ring was wrapped with tape and nail polished into a big GOB … I saved mine for years. ..lol
 
As a teen my favourite thing to do was to dance.... and aside from dancing at school... I did this 2 ways...One from being a young teen and going on Saturday mornings to the Roller Disco...and dancing to the lastest chart hits..

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..and on Friday nights or Sunday nights we'd go to the city centre Disco's... fabulous times...

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Ice skating in the early 60's is a really good memory. I was a teen and would go to the Clinton Arena for open skating on Sunday and Wednesdays. Other times it was open only for the Clinton Comets hockey team. I would skate round and round and in the center practice my turns and jumps, etc.Best time ever!
 
New Year's Eve, 1964, going into 1965. A fellow student had told me about a New Year event in his home town, that being the City of Coventry. It had to be worth the journey just for the band, alas the mists of time cloud the band's name.
It really was well worth the journey, what a rip-roaring night. Following the Auld Lang Syne drunken sing-a-long, we didn't want the party to end. Heading out into the City centre, many more revellers were still partying.

Then someone came up with a stunt like no other. Coventry is famous for the naked ride of Lady Godiva, she is depicted in the City Centre, on a plinth. Many a drunken reveller has climbed up the statue and given her modesty by putting a bra on her. The stunt that this fellow had in mind was of similar ilk but altogether far more dangerous.

Coventry had a new cathedral, following the destruction of it's previous, centuries old one, in world war two. The Cathedral is called: The Cathedral Church of St. Michael. There's a statue on the wall of the Saint, standing over a defeated, prostrate, Lucifer. It was Lucifer who was our target. He was depicted naked and what a big lad he was. It took a great deal of balancing for a group of drunken students to climb on each other's shoulders, three high, to somehow manage to get a condom on The Devil. When we finally succeeded, we all fell into a heap still laughing. It was probably the alcohol that saved us from serious injury.

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The photos show the ruin of the old cathedral, the replacement new one with the St. Michael Statue, then it's the actual statue and finally Lady Godiva.
Our stunt got us into the national press, we were castigated and praised in equal measure.
There's a fascinating postscript to that statue. It's the work of a New York born sculptor name of Jacob Epstein. He settled in the UK in the first decade of the twentieth century. Later he was honoured for his work with a knighthood. Arise Sir Jacob Epstein.
 
The first thing that came to mind was going camping
My 1st camping trip.... I went with my Uncle and cousins. I was 6, old moldy canvas military tent, huge storm and the tent half collapsed in the middle of the night. Then German Sheppard from the next site bit me on the butt and got my 1st stiches....
I still love camping
 
Most of you know I had an extremely abusive upbringing.... and I wont sully this thread with horror stories of that... but most of you were still having a lovely childhood during your teen years..

I wasn't. I was sent out to work at just turned 15..working 45 hours a week. I was tiny for my age looked no more than 12...

Anyway..that's all another story...

..at 16 just weeks after another beating, I ran away... my friend who was also in trouble at home came with me...

We took a train as far as we could afford, and that was to the city where my grandmother lived..

I hadn't seen her for years.. she'd never been a warm granny like my paternal granny... but I always thought of her as my mother's mother, my grandmother so where better to go, then her house..

Well... she sent us away with a flea in our ears... she never even opened the door...just called out of the window..

...and that is how at just 16 years old, I ended up living in the Salvation army hostel for women.. and picking potatoes for a band of gypsies in a field in the East of Scotland...
 
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The ring with the bold blue stone looks identical to my high school ring. My ring is made of gold and my high school friend just sold his for an unbelievable price. I told my wife that my kids can sell it when they clean out my stuff after I am just a memory.
 
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