Knives, Big Fack Off Pointy Ones . . .
Being brought up on the outskirts of the M25, by the age of six/seven, I had nurtured an unhealthy fascination with knives and swords. This was aided by my grandad and dads' collections, watching Robin Hood, Dogtanian and the muskerhounds and the cub scouts. My mum however did not like me having access to such sharp, pointy items. I was banned from touching the collections of shiny knives my grandad had collected from around the world. I remember being bought a Rambo themed action adventure playset whilst out on a shopping trip. You can find these things on the carousel in post offices or seaside novelty shops up and down the country. It was harmless, it contained a plastic colt .45, a blow moulded plastic walkie talkie, a blow moulded plastic grenade, a compass, a whistle and a life size, plastic, replica Rambo knife. Even though the Colt .45 was obviously a way of alerting a childs mind to warfare and killing it was the plastic knife that worried my mum. Before I had even taken the plastic instruments of death out of the packaging my mum asked for the knife.

"No, you can't keep it, you might stab someone, give it here!" She said.

"It's made out of bendy plastic, it hasn't got any sharp edges, why can't I keep it?" I grumbled.

"You'll poke someones' eye out!" was the retort.

The knife was confiscated, but like an elephant, I never forgot that day. Fast forward, five years later, aged twelve, and I was salivating over the Argos catalogue. Yes, the pages showing ladies demonstrating showers and workout equipment held my fancy, but it was the Victornox Swiss Army Knife that held my attention. I saved up for weeks, went and got the knife and brought it home. I played with it for a short while up in my room and noticed how wonderfully sharp, a fresh Victornox blade really is. I decided that I didn't want to keep it a secret and went downstairs to proudly state to my mum that, I now owned my own extremely sharp, pointy knife and there was nothing she could do about it.

"You'd best give it to me 42, you'll stab someone, or take out someones' eye." came her reply.

"Ha, not this time, I'm 12 now, I'm carefull, I'm mature enough to own a knife, I'm keeping it!"

About an hour later I was in the garden, whitleing a piece of wood, when I slipped and lopped the tip off my thumb, clean off. There was blood everywhere, I hid the wound, but it wouldn't stop bleeding. I owned up, I handed the knife over, my thumb healed. To this day, I still blame my mum. Oh sure, she was right, but if she had not confiscated that plastic knife in the first instance, making them seem dangerous, out of bounds and therefore more desireable, I wouldn't of hidden my knife fascination away, so at least I could have been supervised and safe! Ungrateful little sod, that's what my mum calls me!



length - well I lopped the tip off, so about 4 millimetres less than the original.
( 42 Loves Teh Funphenschnaffles, Sat 10 Mar 2007, 12:37, Reply)