MY CHILDHOOD’ S END

MY CHILDHOOD’ S END

When I was a child , an old man named Jim was living alone  very close to my family’ s house .We children of the neighborhood used to call him uncle Jim. He had no family and I don’t know if he was ever married.

He was a tall , thin man and he walked unsteadily bent with age. He was always wearing a black long coat which gave me the impression that it was some part of his body.

He ran a small confectionery shop near the bus station. This shop was so small that it hardly had room for two children in it.

He was quite reserved and rather impolite to adults , but in contrast he was very good with children. Most often he could spent a whole day telling stories and giving cookies to the children , and during the winter you could see his words slowly printed on the gradually dampening glass door panes. That pane door was the entrance to a magical world full of cookies, candies and fairy tales . If uncle Jim was dressed in reds he would be Santa-Claus.

One day when I returned from summer vacations a boy told me that uncle Jim had died. His  life had ended so silently as he had always lived , and his end marked my own childhood’s end as well.