Cold feet.

Were the winters colder way back then?
They always seemed to be. I can remember sitting in the windowsill and watching the snow falling and saying 'Ally ally aster, snow snow faster'...and it would do.
The world was coated in white soft stuff....and I loved it.
We would badger Ma to let us out to play in it.
Well wrapped up in thick coats, scarves, gloves and wellies we would go out and roll in the stuff......we would stand in the yard looking up at the gunmetal sky and let the flakes fall into our mouths and melt on our tongues......we would make slides and spend hours skating down the glassy bits we had made....no thought was given to adults that may tread on our slides in the dark and fall into a heap. We had a sledge that Dad had made...this would get hauled out of the coal hole....but the problem was it would only hold two people.....three if one stood on the runners, and there were always fights over who was going to play with it. The fights usually ended up with adult intervention and the confiscation of the thing.
We would have snow fights.....we would try to build snow houses and snowmen....it was heaven. Once it went dark we were called in and our socks would be wet through, ditto our gloves and coats......it was almost painful to sit by the fire,and were told not to do so for fear of chilblains.
Ma would make us cocoa to warm us.
We would play out in the cold forever and a day, but if ma asked one of us to go down the yard to fill the coal bucket, there was usually an argument as to whose turn it was to do this. Ma would remark that it was never too cold to play out, but always too cold to fill the coal bucket.
Another place where the cold was not our friend was in the bedroom.....there, the cold was fierce. We made ice lollies on the inside of the window ledge!
We had a fireplace in there, but no-one lit a fire there unless someone was ill. Very ill!
When you got out of bed and put your feet on the lino it was like stepping onto stone floors.
Ma used to warm a couple of bricks in the fire oven and put them into our bed before we went to bed......and often we would go to bed in as many clothes as we went to school in. Vest, liberty bodice, socks, pyjamas and a cardigan over the Pjs...and sometimes a hat on too.

I can remember thinking 'when I am grown up I am never going to have cold feet again'
I equate cold feet with those winters and being poor.

I'm wondering when it was I began to hate the snow and the winter.