Top ' n Tail

[kiwisue]

Have you heard the term "Top and tail" before? Have you done it (other than with a baby - I'm not talking about that)?

When I was a kid, topping 'n tailing was what my sister and I did when too many rels came to visit. Aunt X would take one of our beds, and my sister would sleep in my bed, with me. She'd have a pillow at the foot of the bed, so her legs were pointing towards my head & vv.

I've also done it in a sleeping bag while tramping (bushwalking/hiking), when there were too many people in the hut for everyone to have a bunk for themselves. And at house parties (usually byo sleeping bag ones, again).

I have a feeling that doesn't happen as much, these days. Enlighten me, anyone?

ETA In addition to not talking about babies, I'm also NOT talking about doing things to beans or gooseberries, or washing adult bottoms and tops in lieu of showers/baths, Just sleeping arrangements. I've had some interesting replies, but please feel free to add.

Comments

[iibnf.livejournal.com]

Top n tail to me is the kind of wash my mother does. She hates showering, so she just washes top and tail. Maybe that's just a name thing, though.

Sleeping up like that, um, maybe. I did that when I was good friends with a set of twins, but it was the only way three of us could fit into a double bed. We were kids, it wasn't anything kinky. But their parents had the girls sleeping in a double bed, instead of having their own bed, which probably fucked them up a bit.

[kiwisue.livejournal.com]

But their parents had the girls sleeping in a double bed, instead of having their own bed

Oh, that's a little weird. Probably not very representative (I hope). And yeah, nothing kinky about the whole sleepover arrangement. You just had to hope the other kids didn't kick you in the night.

[mab-browne.livejournal.com]

I've heard of it, done it, hated it, and feel that you and I are maybe showing our ages here...:-)

NZ and Aussie term, or does it translate elsewhere?

[kiwisue.livejournal.com]

NZ and Aussie term, or does it translate elsewhere?

That's what I'm really interested in here. My B, who grew up in Tasmania, doesn't remember doing it as a child, but thinks it was a 70's term, or earlier, and only applied to girls. I can't tell, because our family was 2 girls, 1 boy, so guess who got to share (his was 1 boy, 1 girl).

[mab-browne.livejournal.com]

Well, I'm reasonably sure I picked up the term from my father, who was one of four boys close together in age, and they topped and tailed all four of them at one point in the good old days (hah!) in the thirties. Whether they called it that then, I don't know.

[mab-browne.livejournal.com]

And carrying on in the theme of linguistic detective, my Dad was a mainlander.

[kiwisue.livejournal.com]

I would have gone with ya, but BSL's just confounded that theory.

[kiwisue.livejournal.com]

Or maybe not - since I may have misread her comment. Unless someone else steps up with evidence, it's sounding like a very 'mainland' expression at the moment.

[cross-stitchery.livejournal.com]

nope, definitely not a mainland thing. i remember both the term and the situation and i'm and Aucklander born and bred (tho i consider myself an honorary mainlander too)

[kiwisue.livejournal.com]

OK - and it seems to be a Brit thing as well, but not Aussie, and (presumably) not American. Which makes me think it's a Brit expression originally, 'cos NZ is (or was) full of those.

[shaw012145.livejournal.com]

I was thinking of the wash top'n'tail, but as I read further I had a flash back to when my Uncle/Aunt and 2 male cousins used to stay with us during the Perth Royal Show.

We had 2 spare beds in the sleepout ... the wider one was used by my Uncle and Aunt and the small one by my cousins ... as you described ... until they got too big and one would sleep in the back of the station wagon in his sleeping bag.

Those were the days.

No idea if it still happens.

[kiwisue.livejournal.com]

Just checking - did you call it "top 'n tail", or was it something they just did?

[shaw012145.livejournal.com]

That part, unfortunately, I cannot remember.

Know my cousins were never happy about it, and I don't blame them ... bed sunk in the middle so it would not have been very comfortable for them.

So I will have to say ... something they just did.

Crawling back under the table now :)

[kiwisue.livejournal.com]

Noooo! Thank you for telling me the memory (I liked under the table as a child too - big sheet over the top, whole different world within :-)

[shaw012145.livejournal.com]

Games were so much more fun back then.

Also with the top'n'tail ... it was when the country came to the city so was something different, even if uncomfortable. Not something you did every day, so we probably tolerated it more than we would if it happened regularly.

I am glad I am not a child growing up in today's world ... too busy, too technical, too competitive, not enough time to smell the roses.

[kiwisue.livejournal.com]

n our case it was the reverse - city relatives visiting the country. And it didn't happen often, or every time someone visited. It depended.

[shaw012145.livejournal.com]

(similiar topic) ... much more comfortable to sleep on a spare mattress on the floor ... have done that ... at least you get it all to yourself :)

[nakeisha.livejournal.com]

(I liked under the table as a child too - big sheet over the top, whole different world within :-)

Me too!

[rose-gialle.livejournal.com]

'Sleep Head to Toe' is what we called it.

[kiwisue.livejournal.com]

OK, so I think I've established that people (esp kids) did it when necessary, but the description varies - of course now somebody's gonna throw the theory out the water *g*.

[sunray45.livejournal.com]

My family included a lot of cousins, so that when visiting for holidays, the only way to fit in was to top and tail. Parents had a hard time trying to get us to sleep, lots of giggles at first from the girls, then arguments.

Can remember the boys just complaining about getting kicked, accidentally on purpose I suppose.

By the way, girls in one big bed and boys in another room.

Think we must have been used to roughing it a bit way back then.

[kiwisue.livejournal.com]

Thank you! So did you call it top and tail (sorry - am aiming at something here, I swear *g*)

[sunray45.livejournal.com]

I really can't remember if it was called top to tail, head to toe, or something, just remember it happening.

I'm an Aussie born and bred although my parents and grandparents and their families came from England.

[heliophile-oxon.livejournal.com]

"top and tail" is what you do to green beans - cut the ends off! wow, linguistic diversity ... sleeping crowded like that as kids when friends came to stay, yes I think so - but not using that particular expression. (am a Brit)

[kiwisue.livejournal.com]

Yes, I've done that too - beans, gooseberries....

But not sleeping that way. May be regional - hmmm.

[heliophile-oxon.livejournal.com]

... that would have been "sleeping head to tail", now I come to think of it.

[byslantedlight.livejournal.com]

My (Brit) mum talks about "topping and tailing" when she was in nurses training in Manchester, so this would have been back in the fifties/sixties? And I'm sure I've heard my uncles and aunts using the term when they've all been reminiscing around the table (big family, small house, extra foster-kids at various times!). They're all same-ish generation as the lads (cos I've gotta get them in there somewhere!) - although admittedly mostly Manx, which was generally rather behind most of England in many things - language included back then, I suspect.

And I think we were put into a room to sleep "top to tail" with a bunch of other kids, when it got late at one of the few parties my parents ever went to - that was in Australia, but I can't remember whether it was my mum or the Aussies who called it that then! Mum did afterwards though, I think.

Oh, and we topped 'n' tailed beans from the garden, as well!

And... (*g*) mum still talks about topping and tailing when there's only a sink to wash in... Brit that, I think - can't remember hearing that one in Australia. Then again, we usually had a shower in the house!

*g*

[byslantedlight.livejournal.com]

Wait! How'd you top and tail a baby?! Ack!

[kiwisue.livejournal.com]

I think it's about a quick wash... other than that, better ask a mum! *g*

[kiwisue.livejournal.com]

cos I've gotta get them in there somewhere!
Of course! And it was that 'Sunday' story that got me thinking, because them sleeping together like that seemed so much like something kids would do, under circumstances - although the author never gave it a name, naturally. So I wondered if the practice was local, and if it wasn't (which makes sense) whether our name for it was just an NZ/Oz thing, as others have said.

Of course you've knocked that on the head *g*

[kiwisue.livejournal.com]

Oh, and top & tail for washing - yes, we had that term. On the farm when water ran short for baths (didn't have a shower back then - inconceivable!), or there wasn't time.

[kiwisue.livejournal.com]

My (Brit) mum talks about "topping and tailing" when she was in nurses training in Manchester
Just dawned on me, sorry - you mean "top & tail" patients? Wash hands & face to privates? 'Cos I was imagining nurses home overcrowding *g*.

[byslantedlight.livejournal.com]

Nope, you were right first time - she'd "top and tail" with her mate in bed when they came off shift, because it was warmer that way! Nurse's quarters back then were dire, apparently. And if they were on opposite shifts that worked too, cos one would get the warm bed the other one had just got out of. Ah, such innocent times! *g*

And yes - I thought that about the way they slept in the Sunday story too! a) the fact that they were in there together in the first place, even if if was top and tail, and it was considered just right (*echoes own innocent times remark*) and b) cos they really do seem a bit old for top and tailing in the first place!

My mum definitely did it though - I always thought of it as Brit thing... ooh, I wonder if it was a north Brit thing then. *eyes Brit's who've replied, and wonders if they're all from down south* Mind you, I think it was also a very working-class thing to do too (good dock-working/farming background me!) *g* Okay, except that now I'm thinking about it, I kind of think I might have come across references to it in things like Swallows and Amazons, and Enid Blyton stories and so on too... and they mostly weren't...

I also think that probably the worrying about where-people's-hands-etc-went thing is quite a recent phenomenon, especially when it's kids...

Oh! Google.co.uk it - there's loads of historical Brit references! Hmmn - see if this works: http://www.google.co.uk/search?hl=en&rlz=1T4GGIH_en-GBUS216US216&q=%22sleeping+top+and+tail%22&meta=

[kiwisue.livejournal.com]

I don't think I remember any Enid Blyton references, and I've re-read a few Famous Five's recently. I was never into Secret Seven, so something could have slipped past, though. I haven't read Swallows and Amazons in a long while (although it used to be a real favourite of mine - must see if I can dig up a copy).

Class-wise - presumably not upper middle/upper class, because they'd have houses with heaps of room? And I'm wondering about evacuees and the second world war, possibly people took in more kids than they had beds, and "made do" this way?

In fact, taking the WW2 angle and stretching it a lot, maybe Doyle's mum occasionally had a brother come to visit on leave with a mate, bringing a bit of illicit hooch with them. At the end of the night she tells them they're not driving back in the blackout, but they'll have to top 'n tail in the spare room. And they wink at her and don't mind a bit *g*

[caffyolay.livejournal.com]

Yes, used for washing babies here but I also use it to describe what I do to gooseberries after I've picked the bloody things...

[kiwisue.livejournal.com]

Oh gooseberries too, of course (don't have 'em here, but in NZ we had a bush in the garden and I surely do remember topping and tailing them, and making myself sick on the unripe ones *g*). I didn't know the baby one (although maybe I just wasn't paying attention). Thanks!

[caffyolay.livejournal.com]

Yes, when you've just had a baby here they teach you to 'top and tail' him or her, ie. wash its face and bum. :-) Not sure if they still call it that...

And I have, as youngster, slept with visiting relatives in the manner you describe. I don't know what we called it (I was was only 4) but I *can* tell you it's bloomin' uncomfortable for the poor devil sleeping at the foot of the bed...

[sc-fossil.livejournal.com]

So enlighten me as well. Why sleep that way at all? I've shared many a bed in my life and never done that. Seems rather -- rude to put somebody's feet in another's face! And talk about getting kicked in the teeth!

[kiwisue.livejournal.com]

*g* Well, we probably wouldn't have reached, when we were kids - tangling of lower limbs was about all. And single beds were narrow - they talk about 3 ft wide being standard, but I think kids beds could be narrower. Then there may have been worries about inadvertent fondling...

And tramping hut bunks were even narrower, so because we were adult size, top & tail meant you had some shoulder room. Also meant nominimal innuendo in the morning, if you top & tailed with your b/f, as some did (am reminded again how old I am).

[kiwisue.livejournal.com]

Also should add, I used to go tramping with a Christian group, who were fairly conservative about such things.

And I've just started to wonder if I first heard the term in Guides, which might take it back to early 20th century Britain...

[nakeisha.livejournal.com]

To me 'top and tail' is what you do to green beans, you take the 'top' and the 'tail' off them.

I also know it in reference to washing, meaning face and genitals.

I have certainly come across, but never done, the kind of sleeping you use as 'top and tail', but I have never heard it called that.

[kiwisue.livejournal.com]

Having just had a thought, that I first heard the actual term used when I was in the Guides (although this could be wrong - my memory isn't perfect, unfortunately), can I ask if you were ever a Guide? Not that it proves anything, one way or the other *g*

I certainly agree that also I've heard the term used as you say.

[nakeisha.livejournal.com]

I was indeed a Guide.

IMS, I *think* I first heard the term used by my Grandma, but I'm going back ::coughs:: more than a decade or two (or three).

[retrogirl73.livejournal.com]

Oh yes, I remember topping and tailing many a time with my sisters, cousins and the children of family friends (if it was a friend of mine and we had chosen to have the other "stay over" then we would sleep side by side or one would be on a sleeping bag on the floor).

I've no way of knowing whether people still do it, although it seems these days that, as far as kids are concerned anyway, more of them have bunk beds, spare beds or even double beds in their bedrooms (especially the girls) no doubt due to the increasing popularity of the American "sleepover."

I've just remembered a time when I severely pissed off the son of my mum's friend by relentlessly tickling his feet when he were topping and tailing (while my older sister was topping and tailing with his older sister in the bunk above). If I remember rightly, he retaliated by kicking me repeatedly in the face. We must have been about 7 or 8 years old!

Lizzie x

[kiwisue.livejournal.com]

Sorry for not replying sooner - and for all I know you're off to the delivery room, in which case, all the best...

The thing that my family didn't have for years, and it was a bit of a shock to sleep on one for the first time, was a lilo. Horrible hard rubbery things they were back then, much better suited to swimming pools. So it was spare mattresses, sofa or share beds.

These days I think air mattresses are cheap enough that most people seem to have one or two, or can easily purchase one. In addition to bigger houses and kitset bunk furniture, that may have made the difference.

Hope your mum's friend's son eventually forgave you *g*