I recently came across a photograph of my two brothers and sister, taken in early 1970 (I was born some six months later). The picture shows our old family Peugeot car, on top of which my dad has slung an old mattress, which he has tethered down with a bit of rope. My siblings – ages ranging from 12 to 4 – are sitting on the mattress, on top of the car, where they stayed during the subsequent car journey. My mum and dad smile from the car windows, no doubt without any seatbelts, but at least they are inside the car.

Admittedly, this was in Uganda, East Africa, where my family lived for many years, and where, one assumes, people lived their lives slightly more on the edge than, say, a regular family living in Pinner. And YET, when we moved back to England in 1972, this kind of reckless behaviour still formed much of our everyday life.

Once back in England, the old Peugeot was left behind and swapped for a VW family camper (a left-hand-drive, ex-police car from Holland, to be specific). This car had a sliding door on one side, so, rather than sitting on top of the car, we opened the door and, clinging to the doorframe with our fingertips, hung out to one side, grabbing bits of hedgerow as my dad drove along country lanes (and dodging back into the car whenever anything large loomed on the roadside).

Dangerous car behaviour was followed by lunatic schemes in the garden. Like many dads of the 1970s, my father was a do-er and maker of things (largely because it was much cheaper that way), and if that involved sending a very small child (me) up a very big tree to hang a swing, then so be it. (And God help you if you snivelled.)

I assumed that other children lived in normal, safer environments, with parents who didn’t allow them – or actively encourage them – to pursue stupidly dangerous activities. But, when I talked to adults of all ages, I realised that I was quite wrong. In fact, many of them, like me, got up to all sorts of nonsense when they were small either under the supposed supervision of their parents or when out ‘playing’ with friends – we’re lucky to have made it to through to adulthood.