Disk 3 · early 1990s · age 8–10
The Carpet Sea
My sister and I went to sea without ever leaving the living room.
We were deep in Pirates! on the computer, sat far too close to the telly. One joystick and two captains, so we took turns. She sailed, and I did the charts: a notebook of every coast we ever found, copied off the screen in biro, with the courses dotted in the way we were sure real navigators did it.
Then the door went, and my brother came in with three swords rolled out of the Sunday paper. His was the comic, which he said made it sharper. We didn't even save the game. You don't, when there's a sword fight going.
In our house, a sword fight was mostly talking. You threw an insult, they threw back the answer, and whoever ran out of answers gave ground across the carpet. Every line that beat me went in the notebook, for next time.
And as the duels heated up, the living room gave up pretending. The carpet went first, turning to warm blue water from under our feet out to the skirting boards. Then the walls went out with the tide, the sofa became an island with a palm tree where the cushions used to be, and the coffee table turned out to have been a galleon all along.
My brother stuck a feather in his paper hat, declared himself champion of the carpet sea and climbed up onto the galleon's quarterdeck. It took every comeback in the notebook to put him overboard. Then Mum shouted that tea was ready, and the sea drained back into the carpet the way it came.
That afternoon is where the boats started. Charts, ships and the sea have turned up in most things I've made since. I blame the carpet.
