Maybe We Know Each Other
A Memory of Kirkcaldy.
"...I used to play in the castle and what we thought were dungeons in the middle to late 1950s. It was our playground for many years. We went to the beach nearly every day summer or winter..."
Maybe we know each other?
However, my best remembered memory was when I was seven or eight, playing in the rock pools below the castle (filled in with sand now) and I fell in. I could not swim. It was autumn and the beach was deserted, but two men from Dysart, walking in Ravenscraig Park, heard me shouting for help and rushed down the steps and along the beach, but I was gone by the time they reached the rocks. The rock was covered in green slime and one man slipped in, as I had. While in the water he touched me. He grabbed a hold of me and his friend pulled the both of us out.
I remember to this day that my thought was, 'I will never play in front of those factories (Nairn's Folly) again - I will never fight for possession of Hill 60 again." (Hill 60 is the name for the bank leading up from the shore to the houses in Nether Street - where I was born.)
I have dried out now.
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Comments & Feedback
I remember you telling me about this years later. I never learned to swim until I was 34 lol. Me, Lorraine and Jimmy used to go up to the castle. It was scary for kids but, as long as there were several of you, it didn't seem as bad. Do you remember that little kid who fell of the cliff face where we all used to climb up. Sadly, he died and I remember seeing the blood on the walkway next day. I never climbed up it again. D you remember the cave ...and the little spring with drinking water around the corner as you got to Ravenscraig Beach from below the castle?. Ravenscraig Beach is now just a grassy bank ...10ft higher than it was! This was due to the silting up caused by the Dubbie Pit at Dysart. I miss the sight of all those large and imposing Nairns factories on Nether St and elsewhere. Do you?. I visit Kirkcaldy whenever I can and have noticed dramatic changes everywhere. Your old house and mine have been demolished and three great Soviet style apartment block placed there instead. All over Kirkcaldy, beautiful old stone built house and buildings are being knocked down...in the name of progress. I helped to build the 'New' Kirkcaldy Technical College in 1965/6 and believe it or not....they even knocked that down in 2019. There is no end to the destruction of a beautiful town and the High St i no more. It is now just a pedestrianised walkway....and has now died.
Love the memories though and I hope we'll meet up one day and reminisce.
John H.