As she goes off for a day’s outing with her school friends, mother notes with satisfaction how “good” the navy blue ribbed cardigan looks on her. The gay buttons add a note of contrast.
How times change! This book, Knitting For All, was published seventy years ago, just after the war; here is ‘a teenager’, with her sensible shoes, her ankle socks, box-pleat skirt and the navy blue ribbed cardigan, and a beret – a school beret by the looks of the badge on the front. Was that the way they wore their berets at the time, or was she being ‘trendy’? One thing is for certain, no-one these days, especially those ‘in their teens’ would ever describe anything to do with their own clothing as ‘gay’!!
I also notice in the background is a horse and cart – might it be a milkman?
Lois Elsden 
That picture makes me think that we have lost the innocence of youth that we once had. There should be a chain guard on the bike to.
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It really does, doesn’t it… and I remember getting chain oil on my legs and socks!
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Have you seen ‘Hot Fuzz’? A lot of it was filmed in Somerset
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Haven’t gone to the movies in years. I was just thinking about waiting for my wife outside a mall a few weeks ago when a van full of Mennonite kids pulled up along side. They were all clean and well behaved and friendly and said hello and waved at me. Then I glanced at a couple of teenage girls with there hair purple and there smart phones on there heads and that look of disdain on there painted faces and the contrast was out of this world.
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That would have been such a great photo! is there a Mennonite community near you?
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The Mennonites started moving here about ten years ago. We sometimes take a drive out to buy there produce and sausages. The first thing they do when they buy a house is to rip out all the wiring because they don’t like electricity. They still farm with horses and don’t have cars or trucks. They ride the bus or rent a van to get into town and I think that they have to have diesel engines because they don’t like the idea of a spark at the spark plug. For the most part they seem happy with there lot but I know a few young people that have left the sect. One girl that left said that the husband and wife sleep with a sheet hanging between them with a small hole in it for sex. Not to sure about that but wasn’t too eager to join anyhow!
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It must be a struggle for young people
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