Summer, 1981
and I am 14. My parents, being both middle-class and desperate to have time apart from me, send me on a PGL camp for a week. Back then, there were less lawsuits flying around, so one of the activities was 'orienteering' otherwise known as 'dump the kids 5 miles away from the camp, give them a map, have the afternoon off and they can find their own way home'.

So, in groups of four or five we were scattered around the Yorkshire countryside with maps and compasses and left to our own devices.

It was one of those summer days that one looks back to - youth, the golden countryside, aimless conversations, no rush to get back, a stick in the hand to swat idly at the vegetation. We meandered and dithered and found a spot to eat our sandwiches.

As we came up a small rise in the path, we saw an old shed in the middle of a field. Abandoned but intact, someone years ago had put it there for some forgotten reason.

I don't know who threw the first stone; wordlessly we gathered whatever ammunition we could find, our youthful energies spent hurling heavy objects onto the tiled roof. In a matter of moments, drawn together by some unsaid pact, we demolished it; and then went on our way as if nothing had happened, whatever urges of frustration and anger within the teenage psyche mollified, for a while, in what we had done.
(TheImmortalJenkins, Sat 18 Feb 2012, 10:03, Reply)