Down at the End of the Street
March 15/2022
For many reasons, my adventures at “the end of the street” remain among my most favourite when I was growing up. We lived in a fairly new housing development in North London, “The Forest City”. Care was made by city planners to plant maple trees along the boulevard on each side of the street as houses were being developed, but the street “Sherwood Ave” did end about two blocks from where I lived at the time. Age 7-ish.
I had a group of about six friends, but my best friend lived across the street and we both had the same sense of adventure and love of outdoors. A day’s worth of activity at the end of the street was probably our favourite. In the early 1950’s parental supervision wasn’t nearly what it is today, which gave us great freedom to explore and do what we wanted. We were both cubs, knew how to light a fire and use a knife. We both had one, which were among our prized possessions.
After breakfast, with a canvas pack on our backs, we’d march proudly down the street until we had arrived at the end… True wilderness in our minds.
This is where our imaginations went into overdrive. We’d build forts, both land and tree, make rafts to traverse a swamp, became Indians, Pirates or Soldiers, depending on the circumstances. We’d usually come home dirty, exhausted, but very cheerful and happy.
On one of our excursions, we discovered “the dump” which yielded an infinite number of treasures for two 7 year olds. We would usually bring home the best stuff to show our dads. I distinctly remember a plastic blow water float toy with “just a tiny leak”. I was thrilled. We would bring our treasures to which ever father would be outside on our return. He would dutifully examine our hoard, exclaim how great it was, and bring it across the street to show the other dad.
We really never did get the message.