Sometimes I would walk, with a friend from Gorgie across to the river that ran close to Murrayfield Stadium (where the rugby international team play) and Murrayfield ice rink. There we would fish for tadpoles, taking a net and jam jar for our specimens.
This was quite some journey for a five/six year old to take. Through Murieston Lane into Murieston Place and on to Murieston Crescent. Continuing on into Russell Road then Roseburn Street and Roseburn Place where we would arrive at Roseburn Park and the river that runs north of the park.
Our daily life was always very active and the council provided an additional source of fun with the play park full of swings, slides and roundabouts, where we would congregate, close to the church where I attended Sunday School (and where my baby sister was christened). Although the singing songs wasn't that popular, we would listen to stories and involve ourselves in activities. Each year the kids would be taken on a Sunday School outing to the park where we would play games and have a picnic.
I guess that, as children, there was still a philosophy where children should be seen but not heard, so the outside world, playing with our friends gave us the means to express ourselves as children would.
Life at home with my parents wasn't memorable, not because it was dull or regimented, but that life at home seemed to be about eating, sleeping or getting prepared for a day at school. We weren't accompanied to school or picked up at the end of the day and we weren't restricted as to who to play with or where we could go. Parents seemed to live in their world an us in ours.
Only later would a darkness begin to fall over my family and unknown events of the past begin to catch up.
For now, life would move on, as I was told that we would be moving to a new house, outside Edinburgh, in a place called Penicuik and I would be starting a new school. My fourth school in four years.
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