The Essence Of Childhood

I was tagged by Anna at Adventures of a Middle-Aged Matron, to find one photo that sums up the essence of childhood. We hope to highlight the tragedy in West Africa where children have nothing like such a childhood. More information at the end of the post about how we can help.

I looked long and hard for the photo to sum up the essence of childhood. It could have been the swing - I spent hours as a child just swinging and daydreaming. Playing under the dining-room table with cousins at Grandma's; sleeping with a favourite teddy; in the pool with Mummy and blowing out the candles on a birthday cake were also contenders. In the end I chose this one:

Playing in the park is what we do after school. The fact that we have school and then have well equipped parks to play in. The fact that we meet other mothers and children to play with because what else is there to do between school and bath/supper time? The fact that we have baths with running water and we don't have to dig wells and bring home questionably clean water in cans. The fact that we have plenty of food for supper.

None of the above is a sign of privilege. It's not membership to a country club or piano lessons. Being able to play in the park after school is a basic right (and rite) accessible to all children in the Western World. But not to the children of West Africa.

This is what Anna wrote about the current campaign:

This is part of a blog-hop organised by Patch of Puddles to highlight the plight of West African children who have been deprived by drought and poverty of such a childhood. The charity Worldvision has until 30th August to raise funds that will be matched £1 for £1 by the British government. Donations will provide food, sanitation, health services and long-term development programmes for destitute families. I tag Midlifesinglemum and Older Mum to choose a photo that they think sums up childhood to help spread the word.

I tag Gemma from HelloItsGemma and Vix from Vegemitevix to choose one photo depicting the essence of childhood and help spread the word.