Memoir: A childhood story: Charles and the worms

I've just seen a dried up earthworm in my compost......seeing the poor shrivelled little thing brought back a childhood (1949) memory.

Saving the worms

One Saturday, Mum and Dad planned to go to Penzance and do some shopping in Market Jew Street.  Jimmie had got up very early in the morning and was off snaring rabbits with his friend, Ego James, in Bejowan Woods. 

I was left in charge of my little, very energetic, brother, 3 year old Charles.

Charles was a handful. He could never sit still, and was always poking around to see what he could find to play with. As baby of the family, Charles, of course, could do no wrong and always got me into trouble.

When it was time for Mum and Dad to go, Mum gave us both a kiss, a piece of Cadbury’s chocolate to share, and headed off to the bus stop with Dad.

We waved goodbye from the back window and, as Mum and Dad turned the corner, put on our shoes and went outside to play in the back garden. After a few minutes kicking a tin can around, we picked some goosegogs from the three gooseberry bushes, sat on the grass, and ate them as fast as we could. They were green, chewy, sour, but good.

Suddenly, just as we reached out for more goosegogs, I felt a spot of rain. A huge black cloud covered the sun and, as I looked up to the sky, it began to pour cats and dogs. I took Charles’s hand, and we ran inside, closed the door and climbed on two kitchen chairs to watch from the kitchen window. As the rain ran down the window, we shared our chocolate. The rain pelted down and we moaned that Mum and Dad would be back before it dried and before we had our fill of goosegogs.

After a few minutes, though, the black cloud moved slowly across the sky and the sun reappeared. The rain stopped. We went back out in the garden again, jumping over the puddles on the path. Charles bent over and picked up a worm that was swishing around in one of the puddles, then started finding more and more of them. He held one in his hand and looked at me. "Johnny......w-o-r-m-s..."

“Poor things. They’re drowning."
"We mustn’t let them drown, Charles. Let’s save them all.”

 I went inside and got one of my Dad's old tobacco tin, ripped up some newspaper, and put it inside as a lining. 

We searched over the puddles and collected every worm we found, put them on the newspaper to dry and then took them to a safer place in the garden.

The following day, Charles found four dried up worms...........killed by the heat of the sun. He wanted to save them forever, like his wishing rock, so we put them into an OXO tin. When we went to bed, I put the battered, scratched OXO tin under the bed, with all the rest. 

I still have that tin and those worms. They have been in the OXO tin for 62 years....... They're shrivelled......when I open the tin, my brain gets filled with pictures of baby brother Charles, long gone.