What I Did With My Toy Soldiers

When I was a little kid, I loved toy soldiers more than anything else. This is a little bit strange to some people because I wasn’t a big fan of military toys. I had toy guns, a soldier costume and a water pistol, but I rarely used any of them. On the other hand, you could not get me away from those toy soldiers. I would sit down with them every chance I got. I would bring them to the dinner table, smuggle them in my pockets into the classroom with me, and even play with them on the way to and from school.
My very favorite toy soldier models were called “Knights of the Sword”. They were medieval toy soldiers and they were absolutely spectacular. Although they were made of plastic, they were some of the most dramatic and well designed soldier toys I have ever seen to this day. They were all in these great poses. They would have their sword arms ready to swing, the shields raised fiercely in front of them and their standards blowing in the breeze.
They also had a lot of toy soldier play sets. One day, my parents bought me an actual toy catapult that went with the set. It came complete with two knights to load it and plastic stones to fire. Although I did not actually have a toy castle to fire the siege engine at, I would set up blocks and knock them down whenever I wanted to pretend to have a siege.
Of course, I had many other toy soldiers as well. I must have had hundreds of green army men, but my parents would have taken them away if they knew what I did with them! The great thing about green army men was that they were so cheap to buy. My parents a buy them for me whenever I wanted. As a result, I could actually play war with them. Some of them would get broken to pieces, other ones I would melt with a lighter that I found in my dad’s study. I would get together with my best friends and we would play toy soldier games for hours on end. We would set up elaborate outdoor battles, complete with land mines and bullet wounds. Few of those toy army men survived more than a few battles and it is strange that my parents never wondered where they all went!