The joy of scabs

[tozzin]

I can’t remember just when I last saw a lad with a scab on his knees, I suppose with short trousers being abandoned sometime in the fifties, knees were offered some protection from falling and grazing or cutting them by being shoved into long trousers plus the fact kids seem to have stopped the rough and tumble of playing on asphalt or concrete. Scabs were a very rare thing on the little girls as a result maybe because of the different types of play, lads scroming trees and walls and girls playing with dolls and prams. 
I can’t remember not having scabby knees and shins right up to when I got my first long trousers at the age of eleven or so but I do remember the pastime of picking scabs, lifting the hard crust and invariably causing more blood to flow, the times my mother berated me for picking my damaged knees, I’ve never had cut knees, shins or elbows since my step into adolescence by way of my first long trousers, today’s children are dressed as adults as soon as they gain the ability to crawl, lads don’t bare their knees until football catches their attention and in some respect the same happens to girls, school games warranted bare knees but nowadays the play areas have soft surfaces, our children are not made of delicate substances they bounce back, scraped knees grow back, I often catch a glance at my knees and I have to smile as I have the scars to remember falling and ultimately getting scabby knees, ah, they were the days.

[History dude]

Short trousers were still on the go in the 60's. I was wearing them at infant and Junior school in the 60's.  But plasters were more common. I did once scrape my face and a plaster on my chin! Just before the school photo! 

To prove we had shorts still here's me and my neighbour crashing our cars down the steps!

 

[tozzin]

1 hour ago, History dude said:

Short trousers were still on the go in the 60's. I was wearing them at infant and Junior school in the 60's.  But plasters were more common. I did once scrape my face and a plaster on my chin! Just before the school photo! 

To prove we had shorts still here's me and my neighbour crashing our cars down the steps!

 

In 1960 I was fifteen and I was six foot tall, so really starting work in short trousers wasn’t really an option, looking back I’m amazed that my school friends and my play pals wore these short trousers all through and every winter, now they get togged up like they’re going to the South Pole , I had a summer coat and a winter coat, it was the same one, a two button fasting jacket but in winter I did turn my collar up and I was wearing my dads shoes when I was twelve, the only winter protection I had was wellingtons, that had R and L stencilled on them so you couldn’t wear them on the wrong feet, I do know that long trousers for schoolboys was forbidden by law during the war and I suppose the wearing of short trousers became the norm until times and fashions changed.

[MartinR]

I wore shorts all year round until I was 12, then I had longs for Sunday but it was the following year that I went into longs every day.  That would be 1969.  I can remember some of us sitting down in the playground at Carterknowle Junior and comparing the blue veins visible above the knee on a cold day, that would have been winter '65-'66.

[Lysanderix]

One”joy” of a scabby knee was picking it off when “ripe”. I still have knees bearing the results of such picking!😀

[rover1949]

Out and about yesterday I noticed the pupils going back to secondary school.

Most of the girls were wearing either torn jeans or black leggings, but what were many of the teenage boys wearing?

Short trousers!!

[tozzin]

2 hours ago, rover1949 said:

Out and about yesterday I noticed the pupils going back to secondary school.

Most of the girls were wearing either torn jeans or black leggings, but what were many of the teenage boys wearing?

Short trousers!!

Now we’re they short trousers or shorts  ? There is a difference.

[hilldweller]

Now that I'm in my dotage I still feel the overwelming urge to pick at things.

As well as all my other health problems I was born with a damaged lymphatic system in my legs. By my late teens I was starting to develop swollen ankles. By my early thirties my left leg had assumed heffalump proportions and I consented to an experimental surgery to de-bulk it. Big mistake !

From the first few months I deveoped celluitis problems and the leg began to be covered with keratin growths and weird wart like growths. It's like finger & toe nail material growing on my leg, It's no exageration to say that it looks as if the skin belongs to a alligator

Nowadays I could take the leading role in a horror film. A quick glance of it would be sure to instil nightmares.

The point of this saga is to point out that I have great difficulty in resisting the temptation to pick at the scaly bits covering it, just like I did as a 12 year old with gravel rash on my knees or chin.

I know that if I did pick at it, I would develop celluitis and probably finish up in hospital within hours. I resist the temptation and take a twice daily dose of antibiotic to keep infection at bay.

Oh and it hurts, a lot ☹️

But at least I'm still here.

hildweller

 

[tozzin]

3 minutes ago, hilldweller said:

Now that I'm in my dotage I still feel the overwelming urge to pick at things.

As well as all my other health problems I was born with a damaged lymphatic system in my legs. By my late teens I was starting to develop swollen ankles. By my early thirties my left leg had assumed heffalump proportions and I consented to an experimental surgery to de-bulk it. Big mistake !

From the first few months I deveoped celluitis problems and the leg began to be covered with keratin growths and weird wart like growths. It's like finger & toe nail material growing on my leg, It's no exageration to say that it looks as if the skin belongs to a alligator

Nowadays I could take the leading role in a horror film. A quick glance of it would be sure to instil nightmares.

The point of this saga is to point out that I have great difficulty in resisting the temptation to pick at the scaly bits covering it, just like I did as a 12 year old with gravel rash on my knees or chin.

I know that if I did pick at it, I would develop celluitis and probably finish up in hospital within hours. I resist the temptation and take a twice daily dose of antibiotic to keep infection at bay.

But at least I'm still here.

hildweller

Ler

You have my full sympathy hildweller, having to go through life with a problem like that and I though I had it rough because my nose was broken when I was around ten years old and my parents never had it fixed for me, from that day to this I only look in mirrors to brush my hair and shave, It’s a cross I’ve carried all my life but your honest description of your problem must be hard to live with.

[Melvyn Baxter]

My 1st long trousers, [grey flannels] loved them, went round mums friends Whit Sunday and loose change placed in pockets, then they were swiftly put away for best.

[MartinR]

Similarly, first time I wore longs to church (Millhouses Methodist) I got the comment that the first time a boy wears longs he should have something to put in them, and coins were slipped into my pockets.  1d and 3d as I recall, but that made me rich in my eyes!

[tozzin]

9 minutes ago, MartinR said:

Similarly, first time I wore longs to church (Millhouses Methodist) I got the comment that the first time a boy wears longs he should have something to put in them, and coins were slipped into my pockets.  1d and 3d as I recall, but that made me rich in my eyes!

The only thing that slipped in my long trouser pockets was a chickens foot, pull the guiders and the claws moved, had that for a few weeks, free toys like that you just don’t see in boys pockets anymore.

[Athy]

When I started at King Ted's, just about every boy in the 1st form (11 to 12 year olds) wore short trousers. By the time we went up to the second form a year later, just about every boy was wearing "longs". That was in 1961.

[tozzin]

I had fall just this week, I wanted to go one way and my boots wanted to go the other, result a fall, knocked up my wrist, large bruise now on my elbow BUT I also hit my left brow on the floor, a bit of blood but the upshot is I’m now developing a scab and I’m toying with shall I or shan’t I pick it.

[hackey lad]

7 hours ago, tozzin said:

I had fall just this week, I wanted to go one way and my boots wanted to go the other, result a fall, knocked up my wrist, large bruise now on my elbow BUT I also hit my left brow on the floor, a bit of blood but the upshot is I’m now developing a scab and I’m toying with shall I or shan’t I pick it.

Wait while it gets reight crusty then go for it

[tozzin]

1 minute ago, hackey lad said:

Wait while it gets reight crusty then go for it

My wife has unfortunately tied my hands behind my back.

[MartinR]

Whatever floats your boat

[SteveHB]

1 hour ago, tozzin said:

My wife has unfortunately tied my hands behind my back.

I had eczema I was born with it, I remember when I was around 7 or 8 years of age my dad bought me a pair of boxing gloves, he made me wear them at bed time to stop me scratching myself   🙁