These boots are made for wading

I managed to get to the bank in between showers today and got back home before a burst of torrential rain and some thunder too. I even bought myself some Wellington boots while I was out, because all around here, it’s too waterlogged to walk in ordinary shoes. Even on a bright day, I’ve been reluctant to walk to the post box. And I need the exercise - I've gained about 3lbs over and above my 'normal' weight since Christmas. Now I’ve got no excuse to avoid a walk.

They’ve been talking about sport on the radio. Roger Black, I think, has been trying to introduce more sport into schools. When I heard the excuses from the girls – left my kit at home; couldn’t be bothered to bring it, etc., I thought back to my own school days in the dim and distant past.

I remember sport all right. No-one dared leave their kit at home; but we weren’t faced with the birch or similar. We just did as we were told. And unlike me, the majority of the class actually enjoyed sport – I always regarded myself as an exception. Most of the girls were good at netball, tennis and gymnastics – and we had something like two lessons outside, even when it was freezing – and one in a well-equipped gym. So speaking as someone who had to be hauled into position by two other girls, when attempting the handstand, who never had the spring to land on the ‘horse’ or the ‘box’ and who was never welcome in any netball team by the other members, I can’t understand why sport is now so low on the schools’ priority list. The damage that political parties of both persuasions have done – the Labour party in the seventies condemning ‘competition’ and the Tories in the nineties, I suppose, selling off playing fields. What short-sightedness. No wonder we have an obesity problem. The one bright hope to get girls interested in keeping fit is the prospect of more dance at schools instead of games. I would have been very happy with that, all those years ago. The trouble is I’ve heard them say that before and nothing much seems to have happened.

rain; boots; sport; gymnastics; dance