It was a different time and age. Very different.

Boundaries then were visible walls and frontiers, the kind drawn by mothers for their children.

Language was multidimensional. Words could only be articulated verbally if what they communicated had a taste or described something physical.

A magnet was not just a magnet. It was a friend.

The kind of friend that remained faithful even as it poked its head through the bathroom window behind its mother’s back and pretended to spy on the neighbors.

“Chuuuuuuu-chuuuuuuu!”

Not even the sound of the charcoal-fired train whistling down the tracks every other hour could dampen the sound of that cry. If anything, the hoot-hoot would fuse-in with the call bringing a much anticipated melody to the attention of one little girl sitting at the dinner table with her family.

She knew nothing of the city she lived in except for the grand name Beklo-Bet, or Poney-House. That’s where she lived.

When the little girl sprang out of her seat she did so unnoticed.

Her discipline at the table was remarkable. Every morsel of her meal had been licked clean off her plate; mind you she had made sure not to be caught in the act of licking it. Her meal-time duty had been accomplished.

There were other younger ones that needed to catch up while she made her silent escape.

“Chuuuuuuu-chuuuuuuu” came the call again falling on deaf ears except for the little one who did not run headlong for the doorway.

No, she walked backwards to make sure nobody was watching and secretly disappeared from the room into the outdoors. Now she could run forward, up to the concrete block. She scrambled right up and looked around to see if the dog was chained. He was. She nimbly let climbed over the wall and tiptoed across the garden to the wall that would deliver her to her best friend’s house.

They signaled to each other that was all was clear. The dog was asleep and the Mum’s were too busy to notice their whereabouts. One more wall and she would be by the citrus tree. Perhaps the fruit would ready to be picked this time.

Soon they were together, one looking down at the other from the concrete block wall, both ready to spring to one another. The little one placed her feet carefully onto the rungs of the ladder and slowly she made her descent until she finally reached the ground. Finally, it was playtime!