Places of My Childhood

As I wrote in one of my latest articles entitled Soundtrack Of My Life, there is no better way to keep a healthy mind as recalling parts of your life in as much detail as you can. It doesn’t mean that one has to be a nostalgic one as I am not myself, but laying down with some music of one’s choice, one closes one’s eyes, trying to recall all those places where one was in and also the people one met for some time. 

Collbato town and the Montserrat Rocky Mountains

Collbató is a small town few miles away from Barcelona. It is on the side of the popular rocky mountains of Montserrat. On its peak, there is a Monastery ran by Benedictine monks. During the dictatorship, these monks gave shelter to all those who escape from the police as the police weren’t allowed to enter the place.

In this town, my family used to rent a house for summer vacation and we used to stay there until the autumnal rains and it was time to go back to school.

Recalling back to those carefree years, I visualise the house, which was right in the middle of a lonely street as the town was in fact way further the main road. But this street was part of it, or at least, this was the name of the town we wrote on letters whenever we wrote the address. On the ground floor, there was an enormous kitchen with a log fire. The dining place was at the entrance hall. Walking along a corridor, one reached to the back garden with a well, an old-fashioned toilet, a washing place shadowed by a grapevine tree. If I have to recall something of that backyard, it will always be this grapevine tree with big grapes that we used to make necklaces as they weren’t for eating.

Going up the wooden stairs, there were two big bedrooms with good wooden wardrobes, washing stands and metal framed beds. I guess that all those furniture would please sellers at any of the antique furniture shops, if they haven’t landed in some of them by now.

It doesn’t rain much in Barcelona, but when it does, there are big storms with thunder, lightening and lashing rain flooding many of these towns.

I haven’t forgotten one of those storms at the end of one summer. The day had been a bright one, but as it progressed, it became darker. As we played outside, we felt some drops on us. we were called in. As we laid on our bed, we watched a first bright lightening and few minutes later, we heard a big thunder. Time later, it started to rain heavily. It rained and rained until the street seemed like a river. Nearby there was a estuary that burst its banks to flood the near fields. At that time, we were scared being school children as we were, but it is an scene I like visualising now and again as I like storms no matter how frightening they may be.

At the far end of our street, there was a house, which was used by a big family. Several members of them became sick with a strange illness to pass away before the summer was over. Neighbours whispered when they passed the house. There seemed to be a stench in the street and none of us, children, wanted to pass by that house whenever we were sent to do some errands, scared as we were and just in case we were infected.

Believe me. This is a good way to recall without becoming nostalgic and to keep a healthy mind, because as we know we lose what we don’t use.