[diebitter]

As I've just been out to a Guy Fawkes night, I remember one particular bonfire night. I must have been 7 or 8, maybe younger.


I don't know whose house it was, but we were in a back garden. It was dark, the stars were out, and there were lots of kids and adults around, but I don't remember a specific adult, not even my mother (who would have taken me, I'm sure).


I remember it being so dark, the fireworks they were letting off seemed so much brighter than any other fireworks I'd ever seen. They also had a small bonfire which was warm when you got near. I remember the kids being given sparklers - long metal sticks with 3/4 coats in a sort of gunpowder/sulphur, which you'd light and it would sparrkle and fizz. I remember playing with one and dropping it. An adult said to us kids they should go in a bucket of water which was nearby, and I picked up mine, but by the wrong end and it was still red-hot and I burnt my fingers and cried some. Some adult ran my fingers under a cold tap, but I still got big blisters which were very sore.

I remember going outside and watching more fireworks, and forgetting my hurt fingers (but sucking on them), and then a catherine wheel starting to burn and spin but coming off it's ping and spiralling around the garden and landing in a group of adults, whizzing around their legs while they shouted and jumped out of the way. I remember thinking it was really fun, and laughing my head off.

Then I remember being given a baked potato picked out of the bonfire with the tin foil peeled back, and cut open and smothered in butter, and just eating it without a knife or fork, just with my fingers, and it was the best potato I'd ever tasted (even to this day).