Spring draws new smells out of Vancouver. It’s not wet, but you can smell that it recently was. It also isn’t cold, but a slight breeze tingles your nose. As you walk, you pick up new smells of plants reacting to their newfound warmth. Their floral scents are a bit more obvious
The warmth and smells of spring create a dramatic contrast with the dull, greyness of winter. You reorient to the world. Rather than hunching over to protect yourself from the rain and cold, you look up to see the blossoms of trees and the flight of birds. This contrast also opens you up to the potential to experience something magical. This feeling triggers a childhood memory in me of marbles.
In elementary school, the beginning of spring marked marble season. Officially supported by one teacher, an entire society revolving around marbles popped up. This society was complete with an economy, hierarchy, work, gambling, games, and terminology.
Everyone would have a collection of marbles, often kept in velvet bags (Crown Royal purple was a popular choice). Some would spend their recesses trading in quasi-flea markets with the marbles they had. These ranged from “peewees” to “tom bowlers” (I remembered this as “tramboli”) to “kongs” to “king kongs.”
More popular was a carnival of games that would pop up. The one I remember best consisted of:
Digging a small hole and placing a marble in front of it
Drawing a line in the dirt for participants to shoot from
Participants use their marbles to try to win the prize by hitting it into the hole
We would haggle over what line we could shoot from depending on the marble size we were shooting with. Some would throw dozens of small marbles to try for a bigger one, others would use a kong from close up for an easy win.
There was also a sort of golf that would happen where kids would compete to flick marbles with their thumbs into a set of holes. Older students would take younger students on as “caddies” for their golf game and pay them in marbles. This would also include a sort of alliance, patronage, and protection in the carnival games. Older kids would haggle for better deals for their “caddies.”
Marble season was perfectly matched to its environment. It was neither hot nor wet because both would ruin the conditions of play. It happened on your hands and knees in the dirt in the forest where the smells of springs were constantly kicked up. Although I didn’t realize it at the time, it was a pure celebration of spring.
At the end of a week or two, marble season would be over. Everyone would move on as kids in elementary school do. More dramatically for me, I moved from Victoria to Vancouver before I had a chance to participate in my final marble season (and all the status benefits being at the top of the hierarchy entails).
This makes it particularly nostalgic to me. Although no one played marbles in Vancouver, the smell of marbles was still there. Every spring I am reminded of this. The smell of spring (and marbles) rekindles a little bit of magic from my childhood and I’m grateful for that.