For Her Story

Fussing and Feuding

2011-01-02T12:06:00.002-05:00

We broke up. After almost two years of being together whenever we could, we parted ways angry. I gotta tell you, that devastated me and it hurt him. And we did what all teens do when they hurt. We tried to get back together.

A friend of his told me that if I went out with someone else, it would make him jealous and he would want me back. It seemed like a good idea at the time. But it backfired badly. I went out with a boy older than me who was just back from Vietnam. I was in over my head with him. The things he did for fun were trouble - drinking and drugs and sex...I had learned about and liked all of these when I ran away from home, but he put some major effort into them to forget things he had experienced, I had only done them for fun and love...

It did make my boyfriend jealous, but it made him angry, too. He got his dad to sign the papers to let him join the army as soon as he could and we never saw each other again for fourteen years.

If you really want to get back together with someone, you have to do it WITH them. Go to them and talk it out. Maybe you can heal the hurt between you. But hurting them more will never work to heal things between you. And it feels BAD inside you to know you are hurting someone who cares...so you both end up hurting more - skip that part, if you can.

Wait a few days to cool off. Think about what upset your friendship. See if there is something you can both do differently to move ahead and stay friends. If not, you tried. If you can compromise and move on, you have built a new strength into your friendship by working out a problem together. That works. Hurt only hurts, it can't heal...caring and loving heals.

We didn't get a chance to show we still cared for many years because we were both too stupid to talk it over and work it out between us. He could have apologized for the hurt to me and I could have forgiven him the need to look cool to his friends and this story might have had a different middle altogether. Instead, we let our pride keep us apart.

From here, I'm telling you that pride is not a good reason to loose a friend, ever. Don't be too proud to try. Don't let hurt stop you from trying to heal it....you only hurt yourself...

Dog Day

2007-07-05T10:16:00.000-05:00

One day, while Mom was in town, we were playing out in the yard, all five of us and our dog. He was in the road for some reason, either chasing a ball or coming back from the creek, I don't really remember. He was just a little hound and we all loved him.

A blue van came over the hill and hit him right in the middle of the road. They slowed down and then sped off and left us standing there in shock.

I was fairly fast on my feet and knew this needed the Mom. I sent one girl to call her and I asked one for a blanket, I slowed down and looked for traffic but I was to him before they could reach the house. I didn't care about the cars that might come, I cared about that dog. I told the sisters and brother left to stay back and sent them up the hill to flag cars for me.

I dropped there in the road beside him. He was screaming dog pain and it ripped my heart. I looked him over and knew moving him would hurt, I had to wait for the blanket and my extra set of hands.

I spoke, I know, going, "Oh Ozzie I am so sorry, it's going to be ok", and such like that in a calm voice. Then I reached out my hand to comfort him, just to touch him on the head.

He bit me.

I stared at my hand and then the pain hit. His lips were drawn back and he growled and shook his head. That ripped my hand more. I tried to pull it back. He had his jaw locked down tight. I started crying, too.

I couldn't get him to let go and I finally hit him in the nose and yanked my hand as hard as I could to get him to give it back. I needed it to get him on the blanket.

Now he let me go when I hit him. I cradled my hand and ran back for the house with blood all over it. I called the other kids in with me and we left him lay there alone. I knew then and I know now that dog loved me but it was blind in its pain and bit on instinct. I knew the kids would be risking a bit and called them away.

While I tended my hand and the littlest girl snuck back out the upstairs window and found him where he had dragged himself. Mom got home. We loaded up and headed for the vet.

The poor dog had no bite left in him by then. My one hand was wrapped in wet towel but I held him on my lap and used the other one to touch him and I talked to him in case he could hear. "I know you didn't mean it, I'm sorry I hit your nose. It's going to be ok. We are going to the vet." and all the other things a girl might say to comfort her pet.

We had to put that dog down.

Mom took me to the doctor then because I wouldn't go until the dog was taken care of and I was screamingly sure of it. She accepted that from me, even after she saw my hand. I could wait while the poor dog needed help right now.

It was not Dad's good night to come home. Five sad crying children and a mother at the end of her rope.

I couldn't use that hand for awhile. I had tears in the palm and knuckles. I had scars, they don't show much now, but at the time they made me shy about reaching out that marred hand.

The neighbor dog started coming down and they gave him to us. He wasn't Ozzie, but he was neat and ran through our days with us. Our hearts accepted him for himself. He had lots of tricks. When he got old he used to fall on his side and have little sizures. We would pound on his chest and he'd get up and stagger a minute and be fine.

I like to think I will always be able to reach out and help, no matter how scarred up the hand I have left to do it with. I have had lots of dogs since then, and accidents that happened. I never left one with out my help, even with my fear.

Can you see the sadness in hurting each other in pain? If you love each other you can get through it, knowing the pain and love are both real but one stops and the other is always.

Even a scarred hand can show love for a friend. Keep reaching out your hand.

2007-05-21T08:40:00.000-05:00

Life is hard for me to track. I have a way of filing things in my head where I can't seem to relocate them. Somethings come back to me with time and others are just gone it appears. It makes it hard to get things in sequence.

I know this blog has been all sweetness and light and I would love to keep it that way but life is not like that. Mine wasn't, anyway, it was vivid and turbulent and out of the norm for kids I grew up with. I thought so at the time, I may be wrong. I think lives are filled with turmoil for teens but we don't know how to talk about it so we don't know everyone is dealing with it. Freeing teens up to talk is something I do that I like about me. They know I am straight and that I actually lived through something like they are dealing with now. It gives them hope of survival.

My parents were not all sweetness and light, they were humans with five off spring and worked to support them. That left me, as the oldest, in charge of the kids and the house a lot. It also grew me up a little more mature than some kids my age. One of the lures of the boyfriend was that he was also an oldest child of five and we understood that there were times we just needed to be kids, not in charge of anyone, not responsible for anything and free to romp.

During this transition time from 13 to 15 a lot got crammed into my life that I can't put in sequence. School was worse and worse for me. Classes were easy but boring. Other kids, except for five or six friends, were mysteries to me as to behaviour and tastes in entertainment. I was never happy being where I was and doing what I was doing. It seemed like I always wanted to be doing something else.

Dad went from being a drunk mechanic and musican on weekends to being saved by Jesus and starting a teen hotline for kids with some others from the church. There was a lot of church in our lives normally, as far as we were concerned. Now there was even more. Mom was thrilled and they were getting along better than ever.

Because of political boundary changes my boyfriend went to another school after eighth grade. That meant I had to work to see him and visa-versa. There was school skipping and hitchhiking included in that phrase. I was lucky in that I had study hall and lunch back to back so I had a two hour time frame to run over to his town, visit while he was on lunch and make it back without missing classes.

Now it gets rocky. We broke up around my birthday one year. I remember it as the week following because I learned he had taken another girl tobogganing on my bday. When I confronted him all hell broke loose. What a fight! We stomped and screamed our way around the lake and through the fields and I threw his ring into the weeds. It was a real tear jerker.

I was devastated and he was shocked. The guys were ribbing him for being pussy whipped and egged him into taking the other girl, a known easy lay, out to get some. We had not gotten to that point yet and it was all important to him to be seen as a man. For me it was a trust issue. I was betrayed by him. I could not see his need to conform with the guys being more important than us. It was a whopper of a hurt for both of us.

Mom set me up with a kid from the church for a date. He was very nice but it didn't work. I went out with a dark haired boy and had to beat him off with a large stick all night. I got home intact from that one by being meaner than he was horny. I started hanging in the next town over - away from the the other next town over where the boyfriend hung out. I met a girl and we got to be friends.

The boyfriend and I got back together for awhile. I made the decision to go all the way with him because he was who I loved to have touch me and he was who I loved and I believed he loved me. We had to work some pretty fancy cons to get to be alone together again. Both families were watching us like hawks now.

Life is not predictable. If I have learned nothing else I know that "Go for it!" should be our most used phrase to encourage each other with. Do it now, don't wait. If you love it, do it. I'll be back soon. I need to get this little project wound up.

Sex education for girls

2006-08-31T10:29:00.000-05:00

Things are different now, I hope, for kids learning about their bodies and how they change. We had one talk with the parents and some really vague information in science and biology in school. REALLY vague. I had a baby brother to go with the three sisters so I knew about boys and how they were different from girls. I saw my dad naked by accident once, too. I walked in on my folks having sex once, that was a bad rush all around!

My parents sat me and my sister down and discussed the mechanics of sex one evening. Inspite of their obvious embarassment they got through it and the sis and I were all "Not ME!" icky and yuck about it. Too gross for words! But they did it. We understood it.

Niaeve is not the right word and ignorant isn't the right word, but some combination of both applied to me in my youth as far as boys went. I had my first peer kiss at 13. The neighbor boy and I went in the cabin and my sis and his friend stood look out. It was a dare you situation and we were going to kiss! It was all the horror you worry about, bumped noses, how to breath and then a closed lipped, dry and chaste touch on my lips - it was over. Then we switched off. They didn't take any longer and the later report was the same...boring, no bells and whistles, nothing.

I had held hands with some boys by 13 and that was really as far as it went. Kissing was too complicated for me and too intimate.

That was the same year my period started. I was at the Labor Day Street Dance and it was one of the rare times I wore a dress. Mom had made us all matching sun dresses and we wore them down town that day. While we were listening to our friends band I realized something damp was running down my thigh. I reached down and touched it discretely and my finger came back bloody. I gathered up the skirt in one hand at the side and shuffled with my legs together to find Mom. She and I went home and she fixed me up with a pad and a belt.

There had been no symtoms, no cramps or anything and I was totally surprised. Mostly though I had been embarassed as I was in the middle of a large crowd and everyone wanted to know why I was leaving. I couldn't answer because I didn't know. I told them I didn't feel well and ran off to get it fixed. Somehow the period thing got skipped in the sex talk and at school it was run by so fast it didn't stick in my head or I didn't believe it would happen to me.

Now I was a woman and I had been kissed once. Then I met the boy that could flip all my switched into overdrive. It would have been a risky business but we were both virgins and afraid of being laughed at so we really went very slowly into our friendship and mating.

Most of that first summer we would hang out with all my rotten sisters or his or our friends and were rarely alone together. Once in a while we would ditch all the kids and get off in the boat or along the side of the pond.

We were alone on the west side of the pond one day, sitting near the lagoon in lots of shade. Our bobbers were, as ordered by Mom, out far enough she could see us reeling in once in a while and we were shoulder to shoulder as we leaned back against a friendly tree. We were holding hands and making eyes at each other instead of talking.

We had reeled in and cast out again then reseated ourselves without getting our lines tangled up. We laid our poles beside us and I rotated, with his willing help, to lean up against his chest for a hug. I pulled back a little and looked right into those eyes only a few inches from mine and froze like looking at a cobra. Our faces moved together, our lips met, moved, melded, molded and melted. There was even a tongue flick! Wow!

We broke off, panting from the intesity of our response to that first electric intimacy. I couldn't look at him, I felt like my whole soul was naked with my love for him and he was breathing like he had just run a mile at full speed. We didn't need anyone to tell us we were over the line. I spun away until I was shoulder to shoulder with him again and we picked up our poles. Not a word was said for what seemed like a long time. We were thinking.

I knew that if hand holding could get me sweating and stammering, and hugs or an arm around my shoulder or waist could make me feel like I was not breathing that I liked the boy plenty. This kiss, though, that set me back on my heels. My chest hurt from breathing too hard, I was all quivery and, what I later called, gooshie inside, my lips throbbed with wanting another kiss. OH, ya! Did I want to kiss him again! What a feeling, what a rush, not stars, like the movies but a heat and a rythym and a yearning that I knew only he could fill. I needed slaking!

So did he. I was too uninformed to notice but he was suffering an agony of embarrassment because of his body's response to one kiss. While I didn't see it, I was watching my bobber, he was freaking that I would think he had no control over himself. Or that "that" was all he wanted.

We sat and suffered our private hells of teen angst for a good ten minutes, peeking out the sides of our eyes to see if the other was grossed out or what. Then I turned my head and gave him a soft kiss on the cheek. "That was something." I said.

"Really?", he asked as he leaned back a little more and turned to look back at me. I let him read it in my eyes and then said, "Yes.", in a quiet voice.

I could see something in him growing. I think it was self confidence. He gave me a look I was to know well in my later life but that was new to me that day. Roughly translated it meant, "My woman. Want woman." LOL. I knew what it meant and I leaned slightly in as he reached across with his far arm to take my shoulder and spin me into his arms again. I loved laying across his lap and being held in his arms that way. He tossed his hair back and pulled me up to kiss again.

We practiced a lot longer this time. When we got to hot to handle he stopped and helped me rise turn and lean back on the tree. We reeled in and cast again. The heat and tension in the air between us was electric and undeniable. And that was just kissing.

I was ashamed to realize that I was reviewing my scanty sex ed and that it not only didn't gross me out but if that was so much better than just kissing and kissing was that much better than hand holding, I was getting mighty curious.

It was near the end of our first summer, almost fall. We had found a new way to enjoy being together and we found it didn't wear thin with the passing of time, but grew harder to control and more intense as we got better at it. We were just getting into what was called petting when it was time to go back to school. With going to different schools and the time it took from us and the chores and babysitting and lawn mowing/raking/shoveling it was harder to find time to be together. It was quite awhile before we decided that we were going to take the big step.

Summer

2006-06-22T14:38:00.000-05:00

Today is the first 'real' day of summer. For us, back then, summer started as soon as we could get into the pond without turning purple. The goal was to be the first in to swim, it was a macho/pride thing. We tried to get in on one sister's birthday in April. Sometimes we made it, sometimes we copped out and waited until the other sister's bday in May. We might make it anytime in there but we were usually the first kids to go swimming every year.

As soon as the temps hit 60 we were into our shorts outfits and swim suits. We were not the kind of girls that needed fancy stuff much, Mom was lucky to keep us in shoes. It was a big gripe of our Dad's - that we never had shoes on. Even as we got out on our own he would give us grief for running around bare foot. In fact, the last time I remember him saying something to me I was in my early 30's. I don't know that we were nudist material but we were in line for naturalist membership back then. Unless Mom caught up with us our hair hung free and we wore just enough to keep legal. If she caught us and had the time, our hair was pulled back and up until we joked we were half Chinese and we threw a shirt on over our swim suits.

Being out in the country we usually got away with a lot less clothing than town mom's could let their kids run in, even then. Mowing the yard in a bikini was just what we did, no big deal. Never thought about predators or pedophiles back then, just comfort. Mowing the yard was a big job and it seems like it was always hot when we had to do it. The grass clippings would stick to our sweaty legs and we would head for the creek or the pond after to cool off and clean up.

One suit that sticks in EVERYONE's mind was the year Vee got the navy blue suit with a yellow hand on one boob and one bun. There is a photo of her and I in our new suits that day. We were hamming for the camera. It was a bold suit for the time but she was a bold girl and is still a bold woman. I had a purple and white jungle leaf patterned suit that had just a little more material in in than hers.

The mate told me he rode his bike by our house one day and saw a flash of golden hair flipping in the breeze and spotted me mowing the yard in that suit and knew he was going to marry me. The next day he was down at the pond fishing. I met him down there when I went to see who was using "our" pond.

He wore a sleevless t-shirt, shorts and sandles. He was taller than me and had wide shoulders, a solid build, heavy biceps and thighs with matching calves and was looking hot to me with his rich, dark, thick auburn hair, parted on the left, long lashes around hazel eyes and a stern, somber look on his face. I didn't know then that he was shy and for defense used that look to keep people away from him. I just thought he looked kind of grumpy. But I went up to him and then I knew who he was so I just said, "Hi Mate, long time no see."

We started talking then. It was hard over our shyness and the heavy sweating and panting we had to ignore. Yes, we had that effect on each other from day one. All I ever had to do was see him and I was "on point" and he was "on, full speed ahead".

As we reached the hand holding point we always had sweaty palms but it was easier to slide our fingers in the secret patterns that excited us so much back then. When we got to our first kiss one day, sitting next to each other under a tree on the west bank by the lagoon, I think we dripped on each other from our chins. Man, could he kiss! Mmmmmm oh yeah! Those cupid bow lips were friendly and agile!

Just like our reunion in later years, we were joined at the hip from that day on. We lived about six miles apart on the same road. The rest of the summer was spent riding our bikes and meeting at either house or at the big lake in the middle to be together. There was a lot of swimming and fishing and just talking.

The mate is the only kid I knew who told me what he wanted to do when he grew up and then did it. He didn't want to be just a guy with a tank, he wanted to be the man that told the guys in the tanks what to do. I couldn't know then that he would accomplish this, with honors, but he did. He was one of the rare ones that continued to do what he said he was going to in his life.

Back then it was just an overwelming attraction for both of us. When you add in teen age hormones its amazing we were as controlled as we managed to be over the years. I was 13 and he was 14/15 then. For two more years everything I did included calculating how it affected our time together or our plans for the weekends.

This was our first summer of love. We didn't waste any of it.

Things happen

2006-04-21T13:43:00.000-05:00

I didn't really live at the pond a long time. It just seemed like a life time because we were so young. It was only really about 4 years. A lot happened in those years, to all of us, that affected what kind of adults we would be later or that grew to be favorite stories to tell our children.

Since I lost my mate in January I have not been able to post here. I was just getting to the the part where we get re-accquainted as he was fishing one day. The part where he rode by and saw me mowing the lawn in my swimsuit the day before and so decided he was going to marry me. I just have not been able to write it the way I want to and don't know that I can, yet.

So to get moving on I am going to try to condense that part of my life and move on. It really was only a year or two and I was doing other things besides being in love with the someday mate. I will come back and share it with you soon.

Thanks for understanding, this blog is not dead, just in shock.

A Short Holiday tale

2006-04-09T05:54:00.000-05:00

We were early rising, mad dashing, noisy, romping Christmas kids. Even though we knew the story behind the celebration, like many other kids, we thought the holiday was all about us, instant gratification, presents, candy, treats, parades and not doing chores.

One year Dad tied all his boots and some cans to the door knob of our room and flipped them over the railing. When we tried to race out the door, first it wouldn't open, then it did and the boots kicked on the door while the cans banged about and made a terrible racket.

The parents woke up, of course. We were sent back and told we could open gifts when our rooms were clean. This should only take, ohhhh, FOREVER! And the parents slept on...

The amount of stuff that can be stuffed under a double bed was doubled that day! Beds were made, tops of dressers swept into drawers, rugs put straight and we raced back out to bang on the parents door. "We're DONE!"

After a sympathetic inspection we were allowed to head down stairs for our gifts!

Turn your frown upside down

2005-12-22T16:18:00.000-05:00

Turning a chore into a game or a diaster into an event was our folk's specialty. One of their best reversals was the day the furnace went out. It was during a Michigan January on a Friday night and we never knew till later there was a problem.

When we got up that morning in our upstairs bedroom we could see our breath - but that was normal. There was one open vent in our room for the heat to rise through, pretty hit or miss heating. Usually it was still warm down stairs so we would hurry to dress and run down where theboy would huddle on a vent while we got breakfast around.

The folks were already up that day, we could hear them moving around. My Dad hollered up the stairway to tell us all to get dressed for outside, we were going to have breakfast in my brother's cabin. This might have surprised some kids because it was not "normal" routine. Our Dad was likely to tell us anything, he was always thinking up strange, fun stuff to do. So we just looked at each other, shrugged and scrambled for our warm clothes. Then we ran down to get out outside clothes on.

This was going to be wild because Dad had built the cabin for theboy. It was about 6 x 8 feet and only 5 feet tall inside. There were 7 of us, two of them adults, one of them extra tall and broad. (Dad was 6'2" or better) Inside the cabin was one three foot long bench and one built in bench four foot long on either side of an 18" by 4 foot table at one end. There was a stove made from a 5 gallon can that really worked in the center of the other end and a working propane lantern hanging from a chain in one corner.

We all got dressed and ran outside to play in the snow while Mom and Dad gathered up what we needed and got a fire going in the cabin. When they were ready we all ran to the house to help carry stuff. Theboy and Mom went in first and took the built in bench and started organizing the food and dishes on the table as we handed them in. Arr crushed in beside them. Vee , Cee and I took the little bench and Dad brought in a five gallon paint bucket, emptied the last of the dishes out of it and flipped it over for a seat with one leg in front of and one leg in back of the stove. Then we closed the door, looked at each other all smushed in there and cracked up. This was FUN!

Dad got the tin pot out and made perked coffee for them. While it was cooking he poured milk for us in 6 ounce plastic cups. Then he bent up two metal coat hangers with just his hands and turned them into a camp toaster. Magic! Once he an Mom had coffee steaming from their mugs he started making toast four slices at a time. We buttered it and put it in a pie tin leaned off the back edge of the stove and balanced against the stove pipe.

When that was done (14 slices) he took out of one coat pocket a little, 3" cast iron frying pan. We laughed and laughed. It was so tiny! He put a little butter in it to melt and when it was hot he broke one egg into it. It sizzled just like a real pan would!

While that egg cooked he reached over and opened the little window beside us a crack. We had all unzipped and unbuttoned and tossed off our hoods and scarves and mittens. It was really warm in there! We had to leave them on because there was no room to take them off and no place to put them if we had.

The coffee and toast had made it smell yummy in there over the scent of the burning wood, now the egg and butter made our mouths water. We were telling stories and jokes and cracking each other up while Mom got out the little 4" plastic cake plates and a fork apiece and sat them around the table. There was one for everyone and one for Dad on the end by his elbow.

When it came time to flip the egg we were all waiting to see what he would use. Did he have the world's smallest spatula in his pocket? Nope. He saw us watching, grinned and grabbed the handle on that pan with a corner of his shirt, gave it an upward flip and a jerk and it went up in the air......turned over...... and splatted right on top of the stove and broke! He sat there staring at the tiny, empty frying pan, looked at the egg on the stove and started to laugh. So did we kids.

"ARR!," Mom snapped, "We only have just enough to go around. Now what will we do?"

Still laughing Dad took a fork and rolled the egg up on itself, showing that the bottom was ok, stabbed it and put it on theboy's plate. The boy made a face at it, but I knew how to handle him! "I want it! I'm the oldest and it's the first one, I should get it!" I looked right at Vee while I said this and she chimed right in.

"No! I want it! I like my egg scrambled!"

"It's Mine! theboy cried, "Dad gave it to me! Mommmm! Tell 'em it's MINE!"

"Now you girls stop that, " Mom fussed at us.

We just giggled as theboy ate the slightly scrambled egg and a piece of toast with gusto now. He was a contrairy little cuss. You just had to know how his head worked.

So we sat and laughed as Dad successfully flipped egg after egg, one at a time, in the tiny frying pan. Every one had toast and jam and milk and 2 eggs. Mom and Dad had their seconds on coffee. It took a long time.

For clean up Dad stood up all bent over and we put everything left into his bucket. "I'll be right back, " he said, "you all wait here for me." It's a good thing the door opened outward! He squeezed out the door, reached back for the bucket and headed toward the house.

We started singing songs then. It got loud and rowdy considering we couldn't move! He was back after "Henry the Eighth" and before the 89th bottle of beer. The door popped open and he said, "Button up and come on back to the house!" So we did, talking all the way about making tiny hamburgers for dinner that night and tiny pancakes for Sunday breakfast.

Once inside we hung up coats, stacked boots, hung scarves, did dishes and took out the trash. It was just another winter Saturday. Later Mom told us the furnace man was here the whole time we were having breakfast. It could have been awful, cold, inconvenient and full of cranky cold people. It was fun then and is a treasured memory today. My folks were not saints but they knew how to have fun!

Maybe we're ragged or funny

2005-11-28T18:15:00.000-05:00

Even though our family wasn't rich we had great holidays. Oh, I know - everyone says, "Back when I was a kid..." or "...When I was younger.." It was better, worse, harder, slower, faster, whatever. Mostly claiming the way things were done "back then"were better. Like Holidays. It's not always true but things are new and fresh to children and seem more vivid, I believe. That may be what makes them seem better.

When I was a kid holiday meals were always at the grand parents place or the great grands. We had one for each side of the family. Two huge celebrations of the season filled with belts, waist lines, skirts, slacks and shoes of aunts, uncles, great aunts and uncles and the faces of our cousins (we were short then).

For my father's family we had tables and counters and end tables full of food that scented the air with tempting aromas. In the kitchen it was SRO with cooks. The oven and stove were on full time with last minute dishes still being prepared. Little kids were delegated to haul stuff to the tables or fetch last minute ingredients while the cooks stirred on.

The ambient temperature in the house was 100 degrees from the cooking and the bodies crammed into too little space. The furnace would never run after the first hour. Men's jackets and ties were off and, with the ladies sweaters, littered the backs of every available chair as the coats piled on the bed reached the ceiling and there was no more room there, except the top corner where the babies were changed.

We were always early to visit with those we hadn't seen since last year. With empty tummies growling all around us in anticipation, conversation levels well into the "shout to be heard" range and a football game on the TV ear plugs might have been a good idea. There was no thinking, you couldn't hear yourself to do any..LOL!

The "kids" always had their own table and I was the oldest so it was my job to clean up spills, stop food fights and maintain a semblance of order. Most of the time it was ok. All the cousins and 2nd and 3rd cousins got along and liked each other but we were a bunch of scamps. Pigtail pulling, devil horns during photographs, stuffing a cookie in a pocket for later from your neighbor's plate, and other food snatching entertainments along with the occasional chair pulled out from under the person attempting to sit down were pretty prevalent. I was doing well if I could just keep them quiet during the blessing.

And it was good. The fun, football, food and family were the elements of a day to remember.

On my mother's side things were a little more toned down. There were not as many of us there so the heat and noise levels were lower. There was just as much and just as good food prepared in the same friendly and slightly over crowded kitchen way. There were fewer cousins and if my uncle didn't bring his family there were just the five of us for the "kids table" which, of course, was still created to make enough seating for everyone.

We kids would help set the table, just so, with all the best china and the silver from the big box in the sideboard. Then we would go watch the parade or a movie until it was time to eat. Mom and Grama would finish putting out the food, the call to dinner would sound out and we all sat quietly while grama gave thanks for all of us.

After the final crumb was eaten the female kids and the ladies in both families would clear away the dishes and package up the leftovers then do the dishes up and put them away while the men watched sports or a movie and visited.

And there was the bone in my craw. I thought that it was totally unfair that the men and boys didn't help. I would sneak off with the guys every chance I got. I'd find a spot on the floor beside a handy set of knees and watch the TV with them. Mom would notice me missing and send a sister to find me. I would ignore my name call but the creepy cousins would point me out and I would have to go back to the "girl chores". I swore in my youth that this would change when I had my own home. I kept that oath!

For that story go to the other blog.

Breakfast with the Family

2005-11-04T19:36:00.000-05:00

So we had all the wide world to play in but we had all the same duties and chores as other kids that lived in the country. Even then, there was just not enough time to have fun!

Our day started early. We had to be at the bus stop by 7:10 so we were up at 5:30 or 6:00. Mom and Dad were getting ready for work, too and there was only one bathroom. We got around it by using our rooms to get dressed in but we still all had to shower and brush our teeth and such like that in the morning. It was first come, first served but the parents out ranked us and could call dibs on next.

Then came the morning fashion fights with Vee and Mom and the slob fight with Mom and I. My sis was born to be a current trend follower. Being raised in a church going house hold when mini skirts were hot made her life a constant challange. Myself, I threw on whatever was handy and if it wasn't perfectly matched, Oh WELL!

So Mom would be explaining to Vee why she was not going to school dressed in that scanty skirt and then I would rumble down the stairs in my jeans and a top and Mom would turn on me to get a top that matched the green cordory jeans, blue was wrong. Wear green, white, tan, brown, black - anything but red or blue - and go back to convincing Vee to go change while I trudged back upstairs for another, more Mom approved shirt.

Meanwhile the rest of the bunch would be getting their breakfasts, someone would spill a glass of milk or tip over a cereal bowl, Vee would leave the room crying dramatically that NO ONE wore skirts to their knees anymore and she'd NEVER have any friends, much less a boyfriend and stomp up stairs while Mom lectured who ever spilled whatever that day on the cost of food and how far it had to stretch until they cried in guilty sadness that they had been so careless.

Then Dad would come in looking for his coffee and griping it was boiled, not perked and everyone would settle down to avoid annoying him. Just about then I would be back with a print shirt on with lots of colors in it and Mom would roll her eyes and give up on me. Not so for Vee. She would stomp back down the stairs and slam the door with her "church acceptable" outfit and glare at everyone till it was time to leave for the bus.

Breakfast was usually cold cereal and toast or oatmeal and toast if it was cold outside. Our milk came from Grampa's cow. Our eggs from Grampa's chickens. About a year after we moved to the red house gramp put a trailer on the back of the property. He still had the truck with the camper topper to travel with but he wanted to have a place of his own again.

Once the trailer was in he built the shed and chicken coop and put a milking cow and the chickens in place. It was nice to have him there. He taught us a lot of neat stuff, like how to milk cows and kill and pluck a chicken..LLLL! Not that we thought it was fun at the time, but I won't go hungry anytime soon, thanks, gramps!

We only had to walk about two blocks of main road to the house next door for the bus. Most of the time it was no problem. Heavy rain or thigh high snow banks built by the snow plow presented difficulties but we got used to it. There were two boys and a girl that got on with us. The bus was a world in itself ruled by the bus driver and populated with kids of all ages.

We were about the third stop so the very back seats were taken by the big boys who got on before we did but most of the bus was still available. The girl who got on with us, Sally, would take a window seat up front. I would take a window near the front and the rest would scatter out and take what they were most comfortable with. Vee would start rolling her waist band to shorten her skirt the minute she got a seat.

I sat by a window because it was one less side to be annoyed on and I liked to look out or use the light to read by. If I had a hot book going I would only put it down for classes, I even read walking in the halls sometimes.

Then it was stand and defend until we got to school to be educated. You couldn't sit with someone else's boyfriend and, if you had a best girl friend, you had to save the place next to you for her or she would be mad at you all day. You had to keep your seat, protect your lunch or lunch money, watch out for your sibs (if you were an "oldest"), and do all this in a way that didn't catch the bus driver's attention or you went on report and started your day in the principle's office. This would be reported to your parents by phone, too. A fine line to walk!

If all the kids were polite, well mannered, courteous, and thoughtful the bus would have been a great invention. They weren't then and they aren't now. There were trouble makers, jokers and bullies to dodge and some of them were even girls! (gasp!) Most of them were boys, however and I resented everytime I had to put my book down to deal with one of them messing with my sibs.

I wasn't mean but I wasn't a 'fraidy cat, either. And there were five of us so we outnumbered most of the bunches that rode with us. Usually they left us to ourselves pretty much.

But some days it got exciting.

Making it ours

2005-11-03T18:07:00.000-05:00

While Mom had us racing to see who could roll the most old, rusted barbed wire fence in the biggest roll the fastest in teams of two she used the lawn mower to take down a field of now fully grown swamp grass and graze.

You know the routine. Tip up the front of the mower, roll it ahead, lower it slowly over the very tall grass until it is back on the ground - repeat until the mower quits in protest.

We were trying to clear some of the ground between the pond and the house. I guess someone had a horse or a cow there years ago. The fence posts were so rusted they broke off more often than they pulled out. The barbed wire was rough and nasty with rust and more; spider webs the size of beach blankets, weeds, and mystery stuff.

But Mom wanted yard, not field, so we tugged and pulled and rolled and pulled and pushed and dragged for a whole weekend while she kept stalling the mower. The grass was hip high on us and it was just a standard power push mower. It couldn't take it. She blew it up. There was a loud CRACKing noise, a billow of black smoke and the mower went to mower heaven.

When dad got home she asked him to fix it and he went through the roof about five minutes into the job. It needed a whole new motor and it was a brand new mower! When he asked her what she did to it she said, "Just mowing the yard." and he laughed in her face.

I guess it must have been under warranty as it got fixed and Dad didn't rant about it anymore. Mom got her side yard down to where the spring made it too soft and wet to mow. Another twenty feet and she would have been mowing the bank of the pond.

The path to the pond ran right through the wet spot. Being resourceful kids we dragged an old barn board down and tossed over it. I don't know why we bothered. It kept us from getting our feet wet but two minutes later we would have them hanging in the pond anyway....Kids!

_______*********________

The pond, the dam, the pool below the dam and the creek became ours. We never saw the state there so who cared if it was really "state land". We had paths both ways around it and another down to the creek where the swimming hole was cool and shaded all summer.

You couldn't go completely around the pond without a boat, the swamp at the far end was nasty and deep. So "Our family name here's Path" ran along the west side of the pond and around the "lagoon" and back to the far road while the trails on the other side went back to my stump and over further east to the sand pit, the swamp and the pines.

Along with the cows, horses, chickens, goats and assorted critters we kept as our own over the years there were deer, chipmunks, raccoons, squirrels, rabbits, wild dogs, geese, ducks, herons, cranes, frogs, moles, possoms, porky pines, ground gophers, beavers, foxes, wood chucks, owls in assorted sizes, snakes and many kinds of birds. They were OURS! You did not mess with them! Fishing was ok, but hands off the animals.

The pond below the dam had pan fries and bullheads while above the dam there were large and small mouth bass, monster pike and what we called hammer handles, the little pike, blue gills, sunnies, a few perch, crappies, and minnows all over. Lot's of people came to fish there. In the winter we would have a little shanty town and we were friends with a lot of the people that came out.

We were not, however, friends with the idiot who kept trying to run traps on the pond. We had Ozzie and a cat for mousing now and didn't need them losing a leg. The boy wasn't all that smart, either, he was just little and could have easily gotten snagged by one of the open jaw types this person used tagging after us..

As soon as we spotted the first one in the fall the little kids would take the family path while Vee and I took the trails on the east and we would use a stick to pop all the traps. We were not allowed to "steal" so we had to leave them them but I don't think the guy ever took another animal after that first coon we saw dead and bloody laying under the trees in the sunshine by the bank. Once he started we checked every day and when they were re-set, we re-closed them.

We were not being animal activists, those were our friends! On the shore of the far swamp we had chippies that would come out and eat cookie crumbs from our hands. The Mama Rabbit in the lilacs would let us watch the babies play. The coons wouldn't come close but would sit and chatter to us while we watched them washing their catch in the creek. The big blue heron would let us watch him gobble frogs and minnies.

For active, energetic kids we could sit really still for a long time if it meant we could get a chickadee to land on our hands or see baby coons playing. The youngest girl, Arr, was really good with the critters but we all had our special places and friends. Back by my stump in the swamp were beavers for a few years. I loved to watch them dragging their sticks and patching their homes.

I don't think we ever missed the TV till after dark and back then one TV channel would come over the FM radio so we listened to that as we did chores and homework in the evenings. Moving us out there and taking away the TV may have been one of the best things that ever happened to us.

We had so much that kids can't anymore. Letting a bunch of girls run alone in the woods would not be safe now. Swimming with no supervision, Ha! Riding bikes on a main road, mowing the yard in a swim suit, playing Tarzan and eating wild mushrooms - I was a very lucky kid. I even knew it back then when I could take a book up a tree and read all of a Saturday with the sun trying to find me in the shade of the old oaks and not a soul to bother me. I am so glad I have those special outdoor places and events to remember.

If I ever hit the lottery I am buying it back.

I don't like spiders and snakes

2005-10-21T10:02:00.000-05:00

One of the first things we did as we got chores done that first day was run off to explore. For some reason I got off all by myself. It's too bad because I could have used a witness.

I headed right for the pond. The water drew me like a seagull to french fries. You just cut across the back and side yards to walk right down to the old mill dam. In fact the place used to be called The Mill Pond. Now we called it Two Flag Dam, I have no idea why. I should look into it.

The dam was only about 12 feet from the top to the drop but is seemed taller to me as I was about four feet and a piece now. There was a 12 or 15 inch wide steel beam to walk across on or several 2 inch bars over the back of the dam to tip toe across on very carefully. Of course, the first time I took the narrow steel to prove I could do it.

Once you were across you continued east about 100 feet until you came to the first access road. People could park in that area to fish or further on about 25 feet it forked south or east where you could hunt or train your dogs in the woods and fields further in.

East took you up to where the exit road hung a sharp left and another trail continued east past the swamp, the sand pit, the field and the pines. South took you along the shore of the lake through the woods and pines then became a path that led to a clearing. At the very edge of the clearing on the south there was a perfect for sitting on tree stump where you overlooked the creek feeding the pond from the east. It filtered through a little swamp before becoming open water just as the whole thing turned north and became the pond proper.

And yes, I wandered through most of this in my hour or so but did so quickly. I got to know it all much better later. But this day I ended up at the perfect for sitting stump and sat looking over the swamp with the creek cutting a trail through it to the pond and daydreaming of being Diana the huntress or Maid Marian or a wood sprite or a druid princess.

It was just perfect back there. You could still here the harley's and the big trucks but they were far off and easily ignored. The sun drew a yellow path across the waters for the turtles and fish to sport in. In the woods behind me the jays scolded and the squirrels chattered a challanged back at them. The frogs and crickets sang. The air smelled of lake and hay in the heat as well as the lilies clustered all over the near edge of the swampy area. The stump was comfortable with a root exposed just where your foot would brace naturally. I sat and watched the blue heron poking around for treats across from me.

There were dragon flies dancing and fish rising and frogs leaping and turtles sunning. I loved it from the first moment I found it and it was all mine. But as I gazed out over my new kingdom I noticed what appeared to me to be a beaver or muskrat swimming just to the left of my seat and headed my way. He was out about 10 yards but closing fast. He was in the sun lane. It was a little hard to see.

I had never seen a wild beaver so I got up and moved to the shade of the tree line east of me, slowly so I didn't startle the critter and looked again. Just then 2 huge coils popped up in the water behind it and I realized that the thing with a head the size of a large beaver was a HUGE SNAKE!

I was still a city kid in training for the country I guess because I lit out of there, racing like the devil was coming for me, tore through the field, crashed through the forests, whipped in and out of the pine trees, raced over the parking area, across the fishing area, levitated over the dam, slashed throught the swampy field, staggered across the side yard to the back door and collapsed in a chair safely inside the house. I could not catch my breath! I think I did a 1.5 minute mile that day.

Mom and the kids are all "What happened?!" and I'm stammering and gasping for enough wind to do more than hiss, "SSSssssssnsssnss snssss!" I finally gulp out "SNAKE!!! BIG SNAKE!!" and they start looking out the window and such before I can finally tell them where I saw it. Mom makes me show them but I didn't want to share my clearing very much.

We all went back out to look for it but, of course, it had probably eaten all the frogs it needed and was gone. So was the heron and most of the turtles had run for cover. Even the crickets and squirrels were quiet.

So Mom issued a strict go in pairs rule that we all broke as soon as we were out of sight of the house. We did have whistles and calls for emergencies and were usually where we could hear each other.

After some searching in the Encyclopidia we decided it was probably a black rat snake. But it could have been a water moccasin. When I described it I told them the head was as big as a can of frozen juice. The thing was huge.

Welcome to the wilderness!

There's a Red House over Yonder

2005-10-19T11:50:00.000-05:00

The red house move is a story all in itself. We had a limited time to get out of the house in town and the people in the red house didn't want to move out. They were finally evicted but totally trashed the place. The kitchen was bad enough painted a dark purple, add obsenities in black paint on the walls and it was pretty dreary. The basement was just a dirt "Michigan" basement and had been used as a bathroom. It was that way all over the poor house and toss in garbage, unbagged, all over for the final picture. Ick!

The good news was it sat on 5 acres+, had a pond about 50 yards east of the house that fed down to aand was state land on three sides. There was a large tree out in the west side yard just screaming to be climbed and a forest across the road and behind the house it went all around the pond for wandering and hunting in. Aside from the cars doing 90 mph down the road, it was perfect.

There was a massive family and friends clean up day, of course, to get the place at least fit to live in. We cursed the previous tenants with every bucket of filth and trash we hauled out and breathed deeply of the pine and pond scented air the second we were ou the door.

There was a pile of stuff to burn and bury at the end of the drive and Dad got our attention when he hauled the TV off the truck and dropped it on top of the pile. He looked at us all watching him, bent over, picked up a rock and said, "This is why you don't throw balls in the house," then proceeded to put the 4 inch rock through the vaccuume tube.

It EXPLODED! BOOM! and shot glass everywhere. Mom screamed, "ARR! What are you DOING!"

"I'll never get a lick of work out of these kids if they sit around all day watching the boob tube," he exclaimed! "Now they won't be."

Stunned is as close a word as I can find to fit how we felt. Appalled in in there, too. Wow! No TV ever and no appeal, that really reeked.

Now we were bus kids with no TV. Great!

Another Move

2005-10-11T17:18:00.000-05:00

There are more stories from the white house but the ones that affected me the most are here, I think. If I forgot any we will come back to them later.

I guess I should throw in here that my mate went to the same church we did til I was about 9 and then we switched churches. We used to race around the building during the break between Sunday School and Services. I thought he was cute when he was 7 and I was 5. When we were about 9 and 11 I was in a kids program with him and watched him learn to do a 4 strand braid in a flash while I fumbled around with mine.

Then both our great grand parents lost their partners and married each other so we both had the same great grandparents and would see each other at family dinners and parties.

Our story starts way back here. I just wanted to mention it in passing because at the time, that's all it was, being in the same places sometimes.

The landlord again notified the folks that the house was up for sale. Being large, in town, on a corner lot with a garage and a nice yard it was more than they could afford at the time. We were looking for a new place to live.

Renting with 5 kids and a dog and a cat was not easy. As we got closer to the deadline for moving things got a little tense around the house. Trying to pack us all up was a killer, too.

Dad worked on race cars, motorcycles and pretty much anything else with a motor that was broken. The garage was a project in itself. Five kids collect a lot of stuff plus beds and clothes. And the kitchen! We could feed half an army with the pots and pans and they could all have a real plate!

While we didn't know it at the time there was a story behind the next home we had. When my town Grampa and Grama were younger they wanted to move from their apartment downtown into a lovely little bungalow by the river with a big yard. They didn't have enough saved to pull it off by themselves. My great Aunt, grama's sister, bought the house and sold it back to them on a landcontract.

Now they were in a little better shape and decided to buy us a house and do the same for my parents. Mom and Dad found a brick two story farm house on a pond with state land on three sides and got it for less then than you pay for a great used car today.

The good news was we would have the whole outdoors to play in. The bad news is now we would be, OMG!, Bus Kids!

Stay tuned for the Red House stories!

The boy

2005-10-11T05:01:00.000-05:00

On top of all the rest that being twelve made me deal with it wasn't quite done being a big year for me. Mom was pregnant again. It must have happened just after Grama and Aunt Mary died. The results were a brother for all of us and a son for Mom and Dad that fall.

A brother that was 6 years younger than me was a little hard to figure out what to do with. He was too small to play with and pretty boring at first. We all added fetch and carry for the baby to our list of chores and soon it was like he had always been there. He was so much younger than me that it was like having a live practice run on having a baby. I did a lot of his care when Mom was busy.

While he was still little, cute and defenseless we dressed him funny and ran him around in his stroller a lot. When he could sit up well we used the little red wagon and would dress him and Baby Lion up funny, like little clowns or teddy bears, then drag them around the block so all the kids got a laugh.

When he was about 8 months old Dad got him a beagle pup. I think we called it Buttons or maybe Puddles. The boy loved the pup but he didn't last. I don't remember what exactly happened but the pup was gone. Then we got a new dog, another beagle breed and named him Ozzie.

Ozzie was a pain in the butt. He wouldn't stay in the yard, we were always running around calling him, he chased the kittens from next door away and he didn't learn any fun tricks no matter how hard we tried to teach him. But he was ours and slept in our room every night.

So with a new baby, a half grown pup, 4 girls from 12 to 9 years old and a mate that worked two jobs while she worked one, Mom started packing us up to move in the spring.

I had my 13th birthday in the white house. I only remember I had a lovely deep royal blue princess cut high necked, short sleeved dress with real fur on the collar, around the sleeves and as pom poms on the end of the strings that tied in a bow at the neck.

In the spring, around April, we moved.

And the beat goes on

2005-10-10T18:39:00.000-05:00

Twelve was a big year. I guess you don't realize it when these things are happening, especially when you are a kid.

I got over the peritonitus and got out of the hospital after about a ten day stay. I was pretty pitiful for another couple weeks. I think my friend apologized to me for not letting me off hall duty but I really don't remember. I know I don't hate her. I even kind of still liked her as a person in high school but we ran with different groups.

I had been watching my sibs since I was 10-ish for the folks for short trips to town or the store. I was home with them one summer afternoon and we were all spread out doing out own things. We all knew the rules when the folks were gone. No friends over, no phone calls in case they had to reach us, no leaving the yard on foot or by bike and, way down at the bottom of the list, no tree climbing.

So our friends stood on the sidewalks and visited with us and mostly we followed the rest of the rules with no problem. Mom and Dad never left us like that more than about forty minutes. What could happen? (LOL the STORIES!) Most of what happened I could deal with - sibs fighting; not doing chores; not doing homework, small potatoes!

But this day I was just walking out of the front door when I heard Arr scream and then stop screaming. The screaming didn't rush me out too badly but when she stopped my stomach clenched up and I took off at a run.

I didn't have to go far. She was lying spread eagle on her back in the middle of the sidewalk under the best tree for climbing we had. I dropped to my knees by her head. She wasn't screaming and she wasn't crying but she was sort of breathing, or trying too. I knew she had had the wind knocked out of her clear into next week - what I didn't know was how to tell what else was wrong. And the big thing I didn't know was where to find mom. She was at the store but I didn't have the number.

True to form, all the sibs had come running at the scream of one of us. We might kill each other but no one else was allowed to whale on us! The two little ones started tearing up and screaming "Is she dead?' over and over at me. I was busy thinking and just let them waste their wind.

She wasn't dead but something might be broken. I knew I shouldn't move her. Then I was stuck. What next? Ambulances were expensive. So were doctors. I had heard the folks talking over the bills from my surgury and the big accident grama died in. I couldn't call them till I was sure I needed them...

Then the light went on in my head! The City Grama! She would know what to do! I told the little kids to hush, told Vee to stay by her and not let her move and did my best Flash imitation running for the phone.

I had her number down cold but the party line was busy! AKKK! I hung up out of polite habbit then snatched the phone up again and told them I had an emergency. I had to call my grama NOW, please. They were nice about it and hung up.

Punch four digits, ring......ring. ring.......ring. And grama picked up. I gabbled out that Arr had fallen out of the tree and that I couldn't find mom and she hung up on me. I stood there a second before I realized she was rushing over.

I raced back outside to see Arr, like a giant gingerbread kid, her arms and legs still spread out, slowly rocking and swinging from one foot to the next, headed for the steps to go inside. Vee was right beside her, Cee and theboy blasted past me, running ahead, for a pillow and a blanket for the couch.

"I told you not to let her move!" I snapped at Vee. She shrugged and flipped, "What was I supposed to do? Sit on her? She wanted to go inside! I told her not to move her arms or legs in case they were broken," she offered as a defense. THat's why she was walking funny!

We helped her make the steps and grama was running around from the drive way before we got her into the house.

Now the city grama was a little lady. Not much bigger than me at twelve but she bumped me out of the way to get to Arr and I stayed bumped. She was trying to get Arr to tell her what happened and what hurt and Vee and I were trying to tell her and the little kids came pounding down the stairs dragging the blanket behind them till they saw Grama, then they got it up off the floor fast before she saw them.

Our gaggle all gobbled and squeeked into the living room and got the girl on the couch. By now she was crying. I felt better then, because I was sure she wasn't dead. Grama tucked her in and chased us all out like the silly gooses we were.

Arr told her she slipped going between branches, caught one but couldn't hold on with one hand and fell. Then she didn't remember anything till Vee telling her not to move. She had knocked herself out and had the goose egg to prove it right in the center of the back of her head.

That took like 2 minutes with us peeking around the door edges while they talked. Grama sent me to make an ice bag up and sent Vee for another blanket because she was afraid the kid was shocky.

I don't think all of it took more than 25 minutes from downed kid to ice pack. Grama only lived about eight blocks away.

She had the little kids sitting down and watching TV, sort of, while she got the ice on Arr's head and told us to have a seat and keep quiet. You didn't give Grama any lip so we sat and sort of watched TV and Grama checking out the wounded victim for other damage. There was none, luckily for Arr, but she was dizzy and winded still.

Then my Mom came slamming in the back door, calling for us. I heard her drop a bag of groceries on the kitchen counter. She would have gotten home to see her mother's car in the drive way and known right away that something was badly out of whack. I jumped up to go answer her and Grama gave me that "What did I JUST tell you to do - SIT back DOWN!" look.

Then little Grama arose from the couch, stomped across the living room and met Mom in the entry way. She did NOT look happy! We were ferverently watching TV with our faces and the confrontation with out eyes slid as far sideways as they would go and our ears twitching.

"Valerie's MOTHER's Full Name HERE! What were you THINKING! Leaving these children without....."

"MOTHER! In the KITCHEN! Please!" our mom interrupted her with a big "SHHHHH!" on the end for emphasis, pointing at us like we were previously invisible.

They huffed and puffed out to the kitchen and shut the door but with a vote of all "eyes" four of us crept out to listen.

What we heard that day I think every child should witness at least once in their life. My Grama dressed my Mother down like a nine year old with a chocolate mustache who said she didn't eat the company cake. She even made Mom cry! We looked at each other when that started and beat feet back to our seats - pronto!

Grama come out and had us two older ones go get the rest of the groceries while she and Mom cleaned Arr up. Then Mom took her to the doctors office to have her head examined. We thought that was pretty funny.

Meanwhile, Grama got the two little kids to set the table while we put the groceries away and she made dinner. I don't remember what she cooked. It could have been boiled sawdust and we would have eaten it without a word. She made MOM cry! We never angered that Grama again if it was at all avoidable, not as long as she lived. The thought was too scary. Anyone who could take OUR Mom and make her cry with just words was TUFF! We didn't EVEN want to know what she would do to US!

When you are little your parents are the biggest and the tuffest adults you know because they directly affect you when they have something to holler about. To see one of them screamed at just like they are a little kid is food for many thoughts. The main thought we got out of this was "Don't cross Grama!"

Dad got home and she met him at the back door to explain that afternoon's excitement and I thing she put a bug in his ear about kids being alone at home, too.

She left to go home and make dinner for herself and her man. We all ate dinner quietly and were just getting finished when Mom got back. She started to jump on me for calling Grama and Dad gave HER a look and asked how Arr was.

Like most children, the sis had a tuff head and, aside from a headache, was fine. Mom got us all through the bath, jamies, and tucked in routine and came over to my bed before she left. "I know you did the right thing to call another adult in an emergency, Val. If it happens again would you call Aunt K? Please?"

I nodded my sleepy head and drifted off just glad no one had hollered at me like Grama hollered at Mom!

Before Carol Burnette

2005-10-04T17:52:00.000-05:00

Once I was in a real room again I thought I would be going right home. Mom popped that balloon for me by telling me I couldn't go home till they took the drainage tube out. Well, crap! I didn't like it here but I was too groggy to fight about it.

All my grandparents came to see me that day. They all brought gifts. My dad even bought me a pipecleaner poodle that could tell the weather by changing colors. The hospital wouldn't let my sisters and theboy in because they were too young but even they waved to me from the yard outside the window. My mom brought me my current book to read and a crossword book. I tried to visit with everyone but I kept falling asleep and I HURT!

Then I started to wonder why everyone was being so nice to me.....This was not normal proceedure. Of course, going to the hospital wasn't normal for any of us either, except Dad. So I sucked up the presents and slept and dealt with the pain.

I really don't remember much of the ten days I spent in the hospital except for bits and pieces. One thing I remember is that my sibs were allowed in to visit me. I didn't know at the time it was because I had acute peritonitis and at the time it was often fatal. All I know is that the little brats made it REALLY hurt when I laughted.

Before Carol Burnette, who is one of my favorite comics, there were my sisters. Now I don't know that we were a true laugh riot when we got going, we are pretty easily amused, but we thought we were right up there with Red Skelton, whom we stole many of our skit ideas from and modified to fit more actresses.

Kids, can't help it, they are just contrary. The nurse says they can come in for five minutes but to keep it quiet and NOT to make me laugh and tells me I have to lay still and behave while they are there and the next thing you know every thing they say is funny.

It was an accident. Maybe the little one wanted to know if it was true I could die laughing or they might have just asked why my face was all puffy like this and made a face at me. With the first chuckle the pain hit and I doubled over grabbing my bandages gasping, "STOP IT! Don't make me laugh!"

And it was off to the races! The tears ran down my cheeks and the pain grew with each deep inhale to laugh with them at their wise cracks. The nurse came stomping back in and dragged them away before I could pop my staples but we were all roaring with ribald revelry as they were removed from the room. I wish I could remember what we thought was so funny.

The second day after my surgury the nurse came in during the time they call morning and woke me up to take my vitals and change my bandages. This involved taking the safety pin out of the blue drainage tube, yanking it up through the muscle and skin that was trying to heal around it, about an inch, and putting the pin back in through the stiff rubber which felt like a whisk swiping around my insides. This must have been before it was common practice to tell me what you were going to do before you did it because that first time was a shocker! Every time they came to change the bandages after that I started crying as soon as they woke me to get a head start on the pain.

Then the third day the strange doctor came in to see me right during visiting hours. My mom and her mom were there and I was enjoying having a grown up conversation with them all to myself. He walked over to the open side of the bed, shoving them out of his way, and said something like, "yo ve up gut no!"

I had been straining to understand him when he spoke to the nurses and was getting better at figuring out what he meant.

"Not till after my visit!" I declared. "I have company now." I guess I expected him to just nod his head in agreement and leave because I turned away from him to continue talking with the mom and grama.

Next thing I knew he had me by the upper arm and was sitting me up by brut force. Now I was pissed! And it hurt to bend in the middle almost as much as it hurt to straighten out the middle. "Ow ow OWWWW! That HURTS!"

"Hup un movf is fer you gut! Vee Volk NOW!" he announced as he pulled my legs around and let them drop over the side of the bed. "Ma Ma vil go now, laddar wisit! Go ON, Ma Ma!" he said with a shooing motion.

To my utter dismay and shock they both abandoned me to this brut. Tears were leaking down my face, both hands grabbed my belly when my legs extended and then he put his hand behind my butt and slid me off the sheets to the floor. I started to crumple but he still had a firm grip on my upper arm. "Volk, gurl, ist gut!"

I could not stand up straight. I would not let go of my wound and I did not stop crying. He didn't have to be so mean about it! I hobbled about 3 steps holding on to the bed and he dragged me another 5 to the door of the rest room. "Up you klen and den to bet. Again ve tonat do, " he ordered.

I grabbed the door know with one hand and took tiny baby steps till I could reach the sink, grasped the edge of that and eased myself to the seat, still crying. I managed to rinse my face and smooth my hair with wet fingers, did some painful business and then shuffled back to bed all on my own this time without him dragging me off balance.

Visiting hours were over and Mom and Grama left without saying good bye. Hateful, nasty doctor ruined my life!

In a way he had. They never replaced the nasty staples with stiches. The muscles in my stomach healed with a big, wide line down the middle and never held my guts in right again. I never had a flat tummy in my life and I hated gym class changing periods because I didn't look like all the other girls. My scar makes doctors think I have had a c-section for twins. They think the scar from the drainage tube is my appendix scar. Stupid doctors!

I missed my tight flat tummy. I took years to get used to my body always looking fat in the middle. I was too young to believe I would really have died but they all thought I would at one time. That is why they let the sibs in - to say goodbye. Now I am glad I wasn't dead and have learned to mostly accept my scar and round place but it sucked all through my teens and into my twenties. If I hit the lotton I would have them cut down both sides, take the fat out and put it back together, layer by layer, neatly, with little tiny stitches, even at my age.

Coming around

2005-09-18T17:45:00.000-05:00

Where I was Mom answered easily, I was in the recovery room. Why?

"Your appendix ruptured about four this morning. The doctor had to come in and do surgury to get all the pieces out of you. They had to cut you open and used ether to keep you asleep so that's why you don't remember it happened."

Wonderful! Due to the wise decision to wait and see the nurses got to see me fly awake about four a.m. with a bursting appendix. I'll bet that was some noise!

I felt terrible. I had to go to the bathroom. My throat was sore, my chest hurt, my stomach still hurt, something stank and I felt pretty quesy. Come to find out, ether has several side effects including potent emetic effects with an unpleasant pungent odour, irritant to the respiratory tract and explosive nausea.

"I need to pee.' I whispered to her. Mom called the nurse and they got me on the bed pan, nasty thing. It hurt to move but I had no choice - it was move or mess the bed like a baby. But the moving made me dizzy and then, before I was done at one end the other end went off. I managed to turn my face to the side but I still got some on the bed.

I started to whimper then, I hadn't made a mess like that since I was just little. I felt terrible and now I was getting sleepy again. That was the LAST thing I wanted - to wake up all strange again, I was going to stay awake and keep an eye on things!

The problem they had now was a very infected apendix had blown loose in my abdominal cavity. I had poison everywhere. They had opened me up bigger than a C-section, clear from my belly button to my pelvic bone. They picked pieces of apendix out for a long time. Then, instead of stitching me up neatly, they put in a drainage tube, it was about half and inch round made of blue rubber with a big safety pin through it and then stapled me together.

This really sucked for many reasons. These were not like the staples you use at the office. First, the staples seemed huge and held me in just spots. Being afraid of having to go back in they wanted to be able to do it easily and these seemed to be the right way to go for them. Second, the little tips caught in the gauze of my bandages and when they changed my dressings they got yanked around. This hurt. Third, there was only a staple about every two inchs. They didn't hold the skin or the muscles under it together right. And everything under the bandaid itched!

They got me cleaned up and Doc came in. He fixed my bandages, I had messed them up pretty good. He thumped me gently on the chest and listened to my heart and lungs, then told Nurse to take me back to a regular room.

Roll the dice

2005-09-16T11:49:00.000-05:00

Dad had only been there a few minutes when Mom and our doctor came back in. The results were that they didn't know for sure what was wrong with me and wanted to keep me overnight for obsevation.

Now things get hazy here. I think they must have given me something for the pain. If they did it was a Micky Finn because I don't remember it. I was NOT thrilled about not going home. With 4 more kids there at least one of the folks had to go and with both of them working to make ends meet they were both tired. I believe what went down was that they both left and Mom would be back later after dinner and to get some books and things to bring me.

That would leave me lying on the cold table alone with the nurse and still not sure what was going to happen. I know they moved me to a regular bed but it wasn't a regular room, it was an observation room. There was a big window anyone could look in. They didn't have all the fancy remote computer attachments yet so the nurses would be in and out.

And they wouldn't let me EAT! And no drinking! Now that put me in a fit! I could only suck on ice. They did give me popsicles. It wasn't mashed potatoes and gravy. I know Mom made it back because I remember her telling me she would stay, that the latest sitter would come by in the morning to get the kids off to school. I was wondering if they would have popsicles for breakfast. So I must have been drugged a little.

The pains continued to hit and get worse but they still stopped, too. Later I found out that the doctors had had a boy with the same symtoms I had come in about a week earlier. They diagnosed and did surgury for appendicitis and it wasn't. There was a law suit. So they wanted to make sure that was what I had.

What are chances of two kids in two weeks presenting the same symtoms with different problems? It was strictly bad luck that he got there first. The result of this little snag was the observation part. They would wait and see if I had what he had (stomach infection) or if it was my apendix. Stalling.

And after all their diddling around I get to wake up in the recovery room very early the next morning not remembering a thing with a hundred pound weight on my tummy. I was groggy and something tasted terrible in my mouth, my chest hurt and I could hardly breathe with the pressure on my stomach.

The first thing I did was try to get whatever it was off me. My hands didn't work very well but I finally caught what felt like an edge and started to try to slide it off. It was stuck. My foggy brain finally figured out that meant I had to pull up on it and tip it off. When I pulled it hurt and I must have made a noise because the nurse came rushing over crying, "No, no honey! Don't pull your bandage off!" She grabbed my hands and started to tie them to the side of the bed (in the old days all beds had restraints, I guess) and I went off like a fire siren!

"Let me GO! Let me GO! Get these ropes off me NOW!" I may have been groggy but I was still claustrophobic and not going to be tied down. People stared in from the hall and she relented quickly, unhooking whatever the things were on my wrists but making me swear to leave the stuff on my tummy alone.

Well for cying out loud! I didn't know they were bandages! I didn't even know I was hurt. I didn't know where I was, how I got there or why I was there. I groped after memories but all I got was Mom tucking me in and leaving me a book to read myself to sleep with. It was a brand new Bobbsie Twins my Grama S had sent for me. Mom - THAT was what I wanted! She would fix this!

"Where's my Mom," I inquired?

"No one can see you yet, we have to make sure you are ok first." She spoke as if it was written in stone, no appeal.

Well I might be only 12 but that dog wasn't going to hunt. I KNEW how to get my Mom from anywhere. Drugs or no drugs, "I want my MOMMY!" screeched at the top of a healthy, young voice with lungs developed over years of getting the little kids to listen to you over their fights will travel through walls, floors and ceilings.

I put it at emergency volumn, auto repeat and added tears. Mom was there in under two minutes. Stupid nurses. Ignorant doctors. She should have been there when I woke up and we could have skipped all the confusion.

She carefully slid an arm under my shoulders and brought her face down beside mine lovingly. "Stop that screaming right now, young lady!" she snapped in a whisper. Then she gave me a hug. I snorted to a quick stop and asked her, "Where am I?"

Wha'd he say?

2005-09-14T05:44:00.000-05:00

Now I knew about hospital gowns, I was going to learn about consulting doctors and the English language.

Dr. Unus did not keep us waiting long. When he burst into the room he resembled a caveman in a white jacket. He was short, bulky, thick and strong looking. Every where his skin showed there was black, stiff hair sticking out. His arms were coated, his neck even had hair on it. He had a thick beard and mustache but a big bald spot on top of his head. Even his eyebrows were stiff and bushy looking.

He spoke quietly with my doctor for a moment over by the door then came striding up to the table where I watched aprehensivly. He was big and a little scary looking. Then he spoke to me. "Und hos dis grul, she don fel gut?"

I stared at him. Probably my jaw hung open. He may as well have been speaking Klingon, I would have had a better chance of understanding him. He reached out and put one hand on my tummy. "Dar ist pan?"

I just stared again, until he curled his fingers into my guts. "OW!" I shrieked and tried to slide away but Nurse was holding my shoulders now and I was stuck!

"Ah,ah,ah, mowe nut!" He admonished me mysteriously as he moved his hands around and poked different places, several of them making me scream. By the time he finished I was crying.

"Viv mama ve spek now, ja?" He said as he took mom's arm and led her and our doctor out of the room again.

I just laid there in shock. How was he supposed to help me if I didn't know what he was saying? I didn't even know what language it was! Maybe he was an alien!

Then my dad came in the door. I looked and the clock and realized he had just gotten off work and must have come right up. I could smell the oil, smoke, greasy garage scent of him and it comforted me.

"So wha'dja break this time, kid?" He said as he walked over to the table. I was hurting just then and couldn't answer him but I tried to smile at him to show I knew he was just teasing me. He took one of my hands that was pressing on my stomach and held it. This was like the President calling you up to have dinner with him. While we played and romped and there were hugs and such, Dad was not usually demonstrative with affection outside the home. I felt better right away and then I got even more scared. What had the doctors told him that made him all mushy with me? I would have bet I was dying then, beyond help.

The pain in my gut let up but all the rest of me started to shake. I was really getting myself worked up now! I was the one sick and no one would tell me anything!

This won't hurt a bit

2005-09-13T17:58:00.000-05:00

Mom loaded me right up in the car and headed for the emergency room in the next town. The doctor would meet us there. This was in the old days where you had one doctor that could set a broken bone, do surgury, tell you you were pg, test for vd, pull a fish hook out of your foot, treat hypothermia, and fish the pea out of your sister's nose. AND would leave his home or office to meet you at the hospital in an emergency. I miss that doctor. And yes, it was the same emergency room where I had my hand x-rayed when I was four.

Eight years is a long time and I guess they had forgotten me by then because they let us in with no problem. The doctor must have called ahead because a nurse met us at the car with a wheel chair. They wouldn't let me walk at all even though it wasn't hurting now.

They wheeled me into an examining room, back then they had real doors and only one gurney per room, no sharing with the old guy dying from a heart attack, it was private and you didn't pay extra for it. I started to get on the table when the pain, skipping the build up, went through my guts like a hot prong through a marshmallow. I bent over so fast they thought I was falling.

Mom and the nurse grabbed my shoulders and my feet and slung me up on the cold steel covered with plain white wrapping paper. I remember wondering if they could see me at all or if I matched the paper so closely that I was invisible. I curled around my belly like a catapillar around a finger and moaned.

The doctor walked in just then, of course. So I looked sick to him, too and there was no way out now. No saying, "It doesn't hurt now," and going home. I just knew he was going to poke and thump and prod and measure me till I was all bruises. Then he'd stick me with a needle. I started to tear up.

"What's the trouble, Val?" he asked in his "get down to business" voice.

"My stomach hurts really bad and then it stops. I feel a little dizzy then and I look like a ghost and I'm too warm," I rambled on to him.

He put his hand on my forehead, then on my shoulder and gave a little pat. "Let's get her in a gown, Nurse, and Mama, come talk to me while she gets changed." They left the room.

This was my first experience with the thing medicos call a "gown". It won't keep you warm, covered up or comfortable and it's always too big or too small. The gap can't be closed no matter how you hold it and some part of you touches the cold table no matter how you lie down on it. I hated it then and hate them now. All the complaining I have done over the years and they have not redesigned them at all, what a waste of whining.

The pain was going away so sitting up and getting out of my clothes was only embarrassing, not painful. "Nurse" folded them up as I took them off. She slipped the gown over my head as I took off my shirt so I took the rest off under it.

I was surprised to see that I was white all over, not just on my face. All my scars and bug bites stood out like dark marbles on a white floor against the pallor of my legs and arms.

(When I had my heart attack last year they asked me if I had ever been abused. I was so taken aback that I almost didn't answer. Then I said, "Yes, by my sisters when I was little. They always ganged up on me." Between the bugs, the bushes, the bonfires, the creeks, the motorcycles, bicycles, unicycles, ladders, trees, chairs, stairs, football, frisbies and general crashes off swing sets I am scarred all over my legs and arms. Back then it was just a few chicken pox left overs and bug bites.)

I felt dizzy again so I laid back down. Nurse went to the door to let the doctor know I was ready and Mom came back in with him.

Now the fun started. Doc got out the fancy lights and looked at my eyes, nose, ears and then grabbed a flattener to see past my tongue and down my throat. He put the cold round thing on my chest by my ribs and then moved it to other places before it could get warm, a nasty trick. He even put it on my stomach. I never had a doctor listien to my stomach before.

While he did that nurse did the pump up thingy, held my wrist and stared at her watch then popped a thermometer in my mouth as soon and the doc pulled the flattener out. They were all quiet except for the "hmmmmm...." and "hummm" noises all doctors make when they are thinking.

He stood back from the table while Nurse fished the temp thing out and said, " 103, Doctor."

The Doc looked right at me. "I want to check your abdomen for tenderness, Val. It's going to be a little uncomfortable but you're a big girl and I don't want you to cry unless it REALLY hurts, OK?"

This was his way of letting me know he had heard about the episode with the hand and that he wouldn't put up with any the hat tricks from a twelve year old girl. I nodded agreement.

First he just placed his hand spread fingered over my tummy. Then he just wiggled his fingers a little bit. That was ok. Then he pushed down with his thumb. 'OW!!" It was a cross between a scream and squeek. I was trying not to scream but it HURT and that one got by me. I pushed off with one foot and I almost snaked right out from under his hand and off the table. Mom glared and Nurse was right behind my head so I didn't get past her. I slid back down, looked right at the doc and told him, "That HURT!"

Then he started using both hands and pushing into my stomach all over the place. It hurt really badly in several areas. He wasn't pleased. "Mrs. P., can I speak to you outside please.

"Hey," I interrupted, "may I get dressed now?"

"Not just yet, Val, we'll see when I get back." He looked pretty serious when he turned to leave with Mom. I didn't like it one bit!

There isn't much more boring than laying flat on your back in a white room with a white ceiling and nothing to read. Your brain just flies down the road of "what if". What if I'm going to die? Will I go to heaven? Would I see Grama there? Does God mark down for shutting your sister in the closet? Will I go to hell because I said "he**" once? What if dead people are just the skeletons of themselves and not angels? WHOA! Scary! What if I can never eat again? What if they take me off Safety Patrol because I didn't go back to my post when I was told to by my Hall Leader? If I died Vee would be the oldest, the little kids weren't going to like that! What if I didn't die but had to walk bent over the rest of my life? Would my guts always hurt? I never even had a real boyfriend! I didn't want to die! I didn't do my homework for today yet!

Yup, I scared myself. I have always been really good at it. By the time Mom and the Doc got back the pain had been and gone once and I was in a real sweat, not just feverish.

"Valerie, I want to have another doctor look at you. He specializes in abdominal medicine. He is on his way now. Is that ok with you? I looked at mom for my cue and she narrowed her eyes and nodded. That meant you better say yes.

"Yes, I guess so," I told him, as directed. Mom smiled at me and gave me the "good girl" nod.
So we all waited for Dr. Unus.

It hurts when I laugh

2005-09-13T11:44:00.000-05:00

Twelve wasn't my best year ever. After dealing with the birthday blues and learning to get along without Grama and Grampa, because he sold the house and bought a camper for his pickup and went traveling, and the family in fighting about posession of tables and chairs and such I went on to have another bad day.

In school the 6th grade kids are used for Hall Patrol and Safety Patrol. You get a glow in the dark orange belt thing that runs over one shoulder and around your waist to wear. For hall patrol you make sure there is no running or fighting in the halls. Safety patrol was to help kids cross the streets. When kids don't mind you then you report them to the teachers.

Now hall patrol was an honor. Not just anyone got the job. You had to have good grades and no black marks for misbehaving and the teachers had to trust you. I was only picked the week before and it was still a rush for me to put my safety belt on and work the hall patrol.

I was on patrol one day, leaning against a post with my hands behind my back and my legs about shoulder width apart, as required, when my stomach started to hurt. I don't have a pain threshold, I have a hair line crack. I feel pain quickly and thoroughly. This wasn't an "I ate too much" pain or an "I have to go" pain and it didn't stop, pause or fade, it got worse and worse.

I tried to deal with it. I didn't want to have to be excused to go to the john, you were supposed to do that before you came on duty and I had. I was there with my hall leader, Rut, so she knew I had gone. So now what was I going to do? It was really hurting! Then, all of a sudden, there was a sharp pain, like someone stabbed me. It made me bend right over and wrap my arms around my stomach! OWWWWWWie!

That decided it for me and I hobbled down the hall, bent almost double and clutching my gut, to where Rut was standing. "I need to go to the bathroom, please. Can you cover for me? " I asked.

Rut had just been picked for hall leader that week, too. Her responsibities lay heavy on her shoulders. She wasn't really a friend or an enemy and we usually got along ok. I guess she thought she had to play hard ball or she thought I was faking because she looked down at me, her eyes narrowed, her chin stuck out and she looked me right in the eye and said, "No! Get back to your post."

I said, "I'm sorry, I can't!" and took off hobbling as fast as I could for the girls room. I ran into the closest stall, unfastened my jeans and slid them down with my panties and took a seat. I felt a little better then. I tried to do my business but there was just a tiny tinkle, nothing else and then the pain rammed me again and I bent over my arms, flat on my knees and cried out a loud groan.

Just then my favorite teacher came in, calling for me. Rut must have tattled that I left without permission and she was in charge of the patrols that week. She must have heard me groaning with pain because she sounded concerned. "Valerie? Are you alright? Where are you?"

"I'm here, Mrs. M, in the first stall," I creaked out past the pain.

"Are you ok? Should I come in?" she asked.

"My stomach hurts," I replied, "and I don't know why! I'll be out, just a minute."

I was panting and carefully sat up. I got to my feet, pulled up my bottoms and hooked them over my poor tummy. The pain quit. I didn't move for a minute because I was afraid I would make it hurt again. Then I unhooked the door and stepped out. Mrs. M looked at me and said, "My goodness! You're so pale, Val!"

I looked in the mirror across from me, she was right - I looked like a ghost of myself I was so white! It was spooky! And it scared me worse!

"My stomach just stopped hurting when I put my pants back on but I must really be sick!" popped right out of my mouth.

"I think so, too, " she agreed, "Do you want to go home?"

That was a no brainer, "Yes, I had better," I said shakily.

"I'll call your Mom and tell her you are on your way."

That was one of the things I loved about Mrs. M. She knew Mom and Dad both worked and that I would have to walk home but didn't act like it was a crime. Mom would be there when I got there and it was only four blocks to my house. She didn't make me wait around in the nurses office till a parent could come get me. This happened to be a very good thing.

While the rest of the the kids filed back to their last classes I walked out the front door, by myself again. I didn't bother to go back for my books or anything, I just headed for the house.

I made it about half way before the pain started again. It did just like before - twinge, pause, twist, pause, pause, GRAB GRAB, pause and I walked the last block all bent over and holding my tummy again. When I stepped down off the curb to cross the last street to my house it stopped again. I stood straight up, felt a little dizzy, then was ok and just walked home, up the steps and in the front door.

I went right to the bathroom, stood on tip toe in front of the sink and, sure enough, the ghost me was back! My lips looked like someone drew them lightly with pink crayon and colored over them with white really hard, my hair stood out where the bangs went across my forehead like fence posts across a snow drift and my brows and lashes looked painted on. My eyes were green but looked dark brown against the no lines and never been drawn on paper white of my face. It made me feel sick to look at me, so I ran out and laid on the couch. I was really tired all of a sudden and it felt right to lie down.

I heard mom's car in the drive and she came right to the living room to find me there. She actually gasped, "Hauu!", sucking breath in fast, when she got a look at me. I was that strange looking.

She slid her hip down beside mine and put her hand on my brow. "You're burning up! What is the matter with you?"

"My stomach hurts really bad and then it stops." I answered in a weak voice. "It makes me dizzy, " I added. (Now there is medical terminology for you! )

"I'll be right back," she stated as she rose and headed for the phone in the kitchen. I knew she was calling the doctor and there was nothing I could do now to get out of seeing him. I even looked sick to me!

I get it my way

2005-09-12T13:20:00.000-05:00

I found out later that Mom and Dad had talked it over and decided that if I was that dead set on going to class it was better to let me than have me sulking through the funeral. 12 year old sulks and the 11, 10 , 9, and 6 year old tears were just more than they wanted to deal with.

On the big morning I got up and was already bummed because there were no lovely chocolate cupcakes to go to school with me. I got washed up, brushed my teeth and hair, told my sisters thank you when they wished me subdued happy birthday's and got dressed in my favorite jeans and blouse. By the time I was tying my shoes I had almost cheered up because they were all going to have to wear dresses and I wouldn't.

I knew it was late when I went to bed the night before but Mom had said she would get me a treat and when I walked into the kitchen and there was nothing set out by the single lunch bag on the counter I started to panic again.

Mom was in curlers and wearing her slip and nylons under her pink robe, already at the stove and flipping eggs for the rest of the family. I had cereal because I had to get to school. "Mom, where's my treats?" I asked. Not hello, not good morning, not what is the plan for later when I get out of school but where's the treats. Cold, child, cold.

"The stores were closed last night, Val. I am going to give you five dollars and you will have to pick them up on the way to school."

I put the milk back in the fridge and sat silently in my chair. There was nothing else to say. I was so low in rank that I had to buy my own birthday treats. The fact that five bucks back then would buy 50 good candy bars and was a lot of money to a girl who got twenty five cents for an allowance every week went right on by me. I was all "woe is me" and depressed. I wasn't supposed to have to do anything on my birthday, especially a trip to the store which was a regular chore for me as the oldest.

Nobody loved me. Not one person cared that my birthday was ruined. Grama was dead and I would never see her again and my birthday was ruined and it was all her fault and I was a big girl now and shouldn't be such a cry baby, but the tears were dribbling down my chin and into my cereal. I made Eyor the donkey look cheerful, let me tell you!

And, of course, I had already bragged to my friends about the yummy cupcakes. So now I was a welsh or a liar, too. I didn't know how I was going to work things out with them.

Mom sat the platter of eggs on the table and ran to butter the next batch of toast as it popped out. She had seen I was crying and over her shoulder she asked, "Are you sure you don't want to stay home and go to the funeral with us? I think you are too sad to go to school."

"No," I mumbled through cereal and tears, "I wanna go to school." I wasn't rude, just firm that that was my decision and it had not changed.

She slipped the toast into the oven and onto the warm plate then came over to stand behind me. I laid my spoon down and she wrapped her arms around me, gave me a kiss on the cheek and whispered, "Happy Birthday" in my ear. Then we both started crying again. She gave me another hug and went over to the sink.

I snuffled to a stop, joined her at the sink and washed my hands and face, then went to the counter, picked up my lunch bag, found the five dollar bill under it, crumpled it up and shoved it in the pocket of my jeans, grabbed my winter coat and hat and went out the door, still buttoning up.

The snow wasn't heavy but it was cold and cooled my face off, lowering the swelling of my eyes and nose to an almost normal level before I got done with the first block. I slogged along, ho huming and poor me-ing, watching my feet, all the way to the store. I must have been a pitiful site. I was trying to be, anyway.

When I got to the store the heat hit me in the face as I opened the door and sweat started running down my neck. I was in this store probably at least once a day on errands for Mom. I knew it like the back of my hand and I knew the prices as well as the grocer did. It still took me ten minutes to decide to buy forty one bags of M & M's. A whole bag of regular sized was better than the mini bags in a big bag, I decided, and I still had change to give Mom. That gave me 36 for the class, one for the teacher and four to take home to the sibs.

The nice man behind the counter, Mr. M, commented on how much candy I was buying. I was still watching my feet but answered,"It's my birthday," politely. He wished me a happy birthday as I took the bag he pushed across the counter and headed for the door. I called thank you over my shoulder and kept moving. I was going to be late if I didn't get a move on.

School sucked. I was so depressed about everything that it was all I could to to be nice to my friends and classmates, much less be all happy happy joy joy about turning twelve. We did our work. My hand went up for the answers, same as always. The teacher wouldn't pick me because she knew I did the work, same as always. Blah. The bag of treats sat under my desk, taunting me because it wasn't cupcakes every time my foot bumped it.

Just before first recess the teacher announced the birthdays. I shared mine with one other student. Guess what they brought? No chocolate stars on top but cupcakes all the same. We handed out treats out to each desk and went back to our seats. Then everyone sang the happy birthday song. It was all I could do not to break into sobs of despair looking at that cupcake.

As we went out to play, treats in hand, all the "cool" kids joined the other birthday kid. I went to sit on the entry way flower box with my neighbor kids, the not so cool. Everyone ate their cupcake first. I was hurt again by the rejection from my peers off my treat. It was the best I could do but it wasn't good enough for them. (hard lesson to learn).

Then I realized that when we stashed our treats that were not so appealing in our desks for later or to give away because we wouldn't eat them that we were hurting the birthday kids feelings. It was the best they could do, too. So then I felt bad for doing that to other kids on top of my crappy birthday and crappy treats and my grama and aunt being gone forever.

It was just too big a load of grief and too many epiphanies for a just turned twelve girl. I left without saying good bye to my friends and ran back to the class room. The tears started well before I got there. I went straight to the teacher's desk and managed to gasp out that I needed to go home - before I couldn't talk anymore. My teacher was a man. He came out from behind the desk and said, "I think you should see Nurse first," took me by the hand and led me down the hall to the Nurse's office.

They all knew my Grama had died. He left me with the nurse. She had me lay down on the sofa, gave me a baby asprin and then put a cold rag on my head over my eyes and told me to just lay there a few minutes. I could go home when I was calmer.

It was quiet in there and she turned off the overhead lights as she went back to her desk. I got myself calmed down. I reached up and flipped the rag over to the cool side and lay there a little longer. When I could see again, through my swollen eyes, I put the cloth on the sink and went over to her desk. She smiled up at me. "May I go home now?", I asked.

"Is there someone there right now?"

I was stumped. It was about eleven o'clock by now. They would all be at the funeral. Usually when Mom and Dad were gone Grama was there for us. I teared up again but repressed it as hard as I could. "No," I told her truthfully, "But I babysit now and I can be home alone until they get back. I'm twelve now."

"I shouldn't let you go home to be alone when you are so sad but I think you would like to be by yourself for awhile, wouldn't you?" She was a nurse who could see more than visible wounds.

"I really need to go home, I can't stop crying today. I got my school work all done. I will be ok by myself."

She finally let me go but I had to call her when I got there and then call her again when my folks got home.

I got my coat from the hook in the hall and went out the front. It was strange to walk the empty hall and go out the door alone. Usually there were hundreds of us trying to get through. It was weirdly quiet walking home, too. No other kids to play with or pick on me, no little sibs to watch over.

I walked on the forbidden wall, stopped at the store and got myself some Fizzies with my last dollar, mom was only getting .80 cents back now. I had left the treats for the kids in my desk. I would have to get them tomorrow.

The house was quiet, too. No radio, TV or noisy sibs. No Grama. I quick, called the nurse and, using a very grown up voice, let her know I was home ok. I hung up as soon as I could and ran over to the chair where Grama used to sit and darn our sock and flung myself in it, curled up in a ball and bawled like a calf taken from it's mother. If I sniffed really hard at the back of the chair I could still smell the lavendar she kept in her closets that scented her dresses. I got up on my knees and I hugged the back of the chair like she was sitting there and I was on her lap. Then I cried all over her shoulder.

I know this whole post was filled with tears but you should have seen this batch. This is when it was real to me that there was NO MORE GRAMA. I wasn't loud for long because my throat was sore from so much crying the last several days. But the quantity of fluid I shed actually left me thirsty.

The funeral was no better. Our family mostly likes each other and lots of people liked Aunt Mary and Grama. They cried buckets. Then they went to the dinner. It was 4:30 before they came home.

No one remembered my birthday until they were getting ready to go home. They sent someone to the store for icing sugar and ice cream. They wrote Happy Birthday on one of the cakes that didn't get eaten and brought that home with them.

We put the candles in it and they sang happy birthday to me and my other grand parents gave me a card with money in it. I pretended I was having fun but I don't think anyone was tricked. They were all pretending that a birthday was as important as a dying day and I wasn't fooled, either.

I always think of my eleventh birthday as my last good one. This is my beloved Grama and Grampa and my sibs with me after the 11th cake and ice cream. We were watching whatever I wanted to on TV. You can see my choice didn't agree with everyone.

I love them all.

A real Meme

2005-08-29T09:53:00.000-05:00

Communication is the key to getting out the news that there is a family emergency. Some one had been on the phone almost every moment since the accident. They were either checking on Grampa, Uncle and Aunt or finding our when the funeral would be or offering condolenses or being notified of the mess. Mom got home and went right from hugging us hello to the the phone.

I apologize to all of you that want the world to be filled with sweetness and light. It's just not built that way. Pretending won't make it so. We are taught to deal with a variety of emotions in a socially correct manner as we grow up. We are not taught how to grieve and deal with loss. Everyone just fumbles through the best they can and kids watch how they do it.

For our house pain, loss or diasasters called for humor. Grim, dark, and bloody humor. Dad breaks his leg, "Half a pair of pants costs less." His mom dies, "Now I don't have to figure out what to get her for Mother's Day." Some of it is actually funny and we would laugh, then feel guilty for having a good time when someone else wasn't. Some of it was just plain gallows humor, barely funny and not usually socially acceptable, but ok if no women or kids were around. It was the way we learned to cope.

Everyone learns a different way. For most people it's repression, controling their emotions in public, keeping the old stiff upper lip. A few lucky societies actually have public grieving. Everyone gets together and cries and wail till the tears are done then they bury the body and have a big party to help themselves feel better. I don't know which way is right.

I have had different reactions to different deaths. Losing Grama and Aunt Mary was the first time I lost people I loved for me. At twelve I was just beginning to see myself as a self apart from my family unit. I was smart, quick witted, tender hearted and used to being a leader of at least the rest of the kids and the kids I baby sat for. I was able to put myself in another's shoes and relate to their hurts or upsets. I could handle basic first aid and knew when to call in the reserves if I was over my head. I learned that I could also be cold, hard hearted and selfish.

Mom and Dad were really busy handling funeral details and family notifications as Grampa was not doing well enough to take care of things himself. Then I found out the funeral would be on Thursday, my birthday. I was shocked. You can't bury people on someone's birthday! It will wreck the party! I couldn't belive they would do that to me.

I was so torn. I loved my Grama and I liked Aunt Mary alot. They had both been good to me in their own ways and Grama loved me back. Grampa loved me, too, and he was very sad right now. He needed us to help him feel better. But I was too upset to help him feel better.

It was my BIRTHDAY! It's supposed to be fun. Presents given and recieved, cake and ice cream, parties at school and at home and I didn't have to do any chores all day or share my new toys for a week! It only came once a year and was better than Christmas because it was all about me!

I went back and forth in my head debating what to do. Mom had PROMISED the cupcakes but she obviously wouldn't be able to do them tonight, she was still on the phone with people and it was almost nine o'clock. I could make them myself but my cakes still fell so they wouldn't be as good. We would have to get up two hours early to make them in the morning. I was starting to see it was not going to work out at all.

I didn't want to remind her about the baking while she was crying on the phone and did finally catch her between calls. I ran up to her and put my hand on her knee and asked, "Can we make the cupcakes now, Mom?" She looked at me like I was an alien, then her brain shook out the fact that tomorrow was my birthday and dinged next to the promise of cupcakes and she got such a sad look on her face, I knew I was screwed.

"I am so sorry, Valerie, I just won't have time. I still have to call 4 more people and then get all our clothes ironed for the funeral tommorrow. You won't be going to school anyway, so you don't need the cupcakes."

Well, that did it! She didn't love me anymore! I burst into tears of self pity. "I am so going to school and I am taking a treat because it's my BIRTHDAY, I stammered out through the rising flood of hurt and tears, "I HAVE TO take the other kids a treat! EVERYBODY does it!" I rubbed my eyes with both fists and tried to wipe the tears away so I could see but it was a losing battle. The loss I felt for Grama and the pain of being shoved aside for dead people was just too much and there was no stopping yet. And then mom started to cry.

"You HAVE to go to the funeral, it's for your GRANDMOTHER! It's how you show you loved her and everyone will expect you to be there!"

I took a deep breath and used her own words on her, "I am NOT everyone else and I want to go to SCHOOL!" and then I stamped my foot. That blew it.

"You get right up to your room, young lady and STAY THERE until I come for you," she shouted!

With a loud wail of total pain I ran up the stairs as hard as I could, stomping on each one, I slammed the door behind me and threw myself on the bed, almost in hysterics. I cried and cried. The other girls couldn't come up when I was being punished so there was no one to comfort me.

I wound down after a while and wiped off my face then brushed my hair. I laid back on the bed and started to try to work it out but it was too late now and I dribbled tears because I wouldn't have a treat.

Finally mom came upstairs. She came in and sat on the edge of the bed and took my near hand in hers. "You really want to go to school tomorrow?"

I nodded, afraid to try to talk for fear of bursting out with sobs again. I was repressing, ya know.

"You really should go to your Grandmother's funeral. It's where you say good bye for the last time."

That was a no brainer for me, "I said good bye when she left and I even said I love you, I don't want to see her dead! I want to take cupcakes like you promised and go to school!"

She looked pretty miserable. Then she said, "I can't make the cupcakes but I will get you a treat and you can go to school if that is what you really want."

"It is," I answered.

She left the room and sent the rest of the kids up for bed. We were emotionally wiped out and we slept quietly that night.

Birthday Parties

2005-08-26T12:04:00.000-05:00

With five kids it's hard to finance big birthday parties every year for all of them. We were a 10, 13, 16 celebration division family. You still had cake and ice cream but only with family. For a party with outside guests you had to hit a magic number. First double digit, first teen and sixteen were sort of standard with us for parties.

I have always had a problem with my birthday. I never have managed to celebrate it the way I would like to. When I was younger that meant a party where everyone came that I invited. As I got older it was the traditional drinking free drinks at the same number of bars as I was old and passing out singing with the band in the last one. Now it's all of the above only with a willing piano player and a group willing to sing along or listen while I run through the 400 or so songs I know till I pass out.

My 11th birthday I got a beautiful dress and a pair of rollerskates with a case for the rink. My Dad's folks were over, I know because there is a photo. I must have spent that year visiting them in the summer as usual and seeing them at the family reunions and such. I really don't remember.

I was really wound up tight for my 12th birthday. All the kids had been bringing birthday treats to school but they were lame or store bought. I was going to have really yummy chocolate cupcakes with chocolate icing and a chocolate star on top! NOT lame, NOT store bought, really good!

I was expecting a really excellent gift that year, too, as I had been really helping out watching the kids for Mom a lot and she and Dad kind of hinted around me about it. You know how kids are, it could have been a portable am/fm or new books or anything but it seemed big to me. I was primed to turn twelve!

Now my uncle, the drunken astronaut, had gone and got himself a girl friend a couple years earlier. I hated her because he wouldn't play with us anymore and he was always going someplace with her and not taking us, like to the lake swimming and stuff. She ruined our uncle for playing with. They had gotten married and he went in the army.

For the holidays they had leave and were visiting. That would have been Christmas, 1966. We had gotten to visit with them and uncle let us play with his cool toys, like the gyroscope and the real toy typewriter but he wouldn't come and play WITH us. It was kind of a bummer.

They had to go back to base after the new year. So in January, 1967, on the Sunday the 8th, Grampa and Grama with Grampa's sister, my Great Aunt Mary, the uncle, his pregnant wife and the TV they had received for Christmas all managed to get stuffed into Grampa's car and headed south. They spent a night in a motel and started out again on Monday the 9th.

My birthday was going to fall on Thursday. So here I was, all wired up for my birthday in three days. Mom was going to make the cupcakes Tuesday night and ice them the night before. We were cleaning the house because Mom's folks would be coming for dinner and Mom couldn't bear to be caught with her dusting down when her Mom was coming. It was busy busy.

We got home from school on Monday, did our chores, helped get supper around and were sitting around the dinner table enjoying it when the phone rang.

Now I don't know about you guys that grew up with phones as old hat technology but back then when the phone rang you RAN to answer it. If it was long distance you SCREAMED for whoever the call was for and RAN to get them. They RAN back to answer because it was expensive for long distance and it usually meant bad news. Even now I can NOT stand to let a phone ring more than 3 rings and two is annoying.

Mom, closest to the phone, jumped up and stepped lively to answer it. The phone hung on the wall in the kitchen right next to the dining room door. It had a long cord on the handset so Mom could talk to her friends while she did dishes and such. We heard her say "Hello?" and then a second later she poked her head out the door with the phone still on her ear and said, "Arr, it's your Dad, long distance. Come here NOW!" She didn't scream it, but she was commanding. Dad legged over and out of his chair without sliding it back and went through the door. They were out there at least five minutes, then we heard the reciever slammed down and Dad started cussing and Mom started to fuss at him and cry at the same time.

We were round eyed and apprehensive and dead silent around the table. We couldn't hear well with the door shut but they were getting a little loud. It was something to do with rain, a semi-truck and the Pennsylvania Turnpike. We knew it was Grampa on the phone and we knew he was taking uncle and aunt back to base. I thought it might be the car broke down or something but didn't voice an opinion.

We were all near tears hearing Mom start up and when Dad started ranting a few ran over our cheeks even though we had no idea what was going on. It got quieter. Dad stopped swearing and Mom was sniffling but not sobbing...the door opened. Now we were ready for anything, we thought. It was long distance, Grampa traveling and Mom crying while Dad cussed. When they told us there had been an accident Grampa, Uncle and Aunt Cry were in the hospital and that Grama and Aunt Mary were dead we all burst into genuine tears of grief.

We had practically lived with Grampa and Grama for every new baby or group illness and when Mom went to work Grama came to stay with us. She was always there. This was a huge loss to the family and we all knew it. And even though we were young, we knew Dad would be sad and so would Mom. This made us even sadder.

Great Aunt Mary was more like a friend. I stayed overnight several times and we played cards, made fudge and cookies and just in general had a great time. She was my Dad's Aunt and Grampa's sister. They had 11 siblings. Even in a group that large she would be missed. She was just nice, not cranky, not out standing, but a really nice person.

Mom called her mom and Grama came right over so Dad and Mom could go to help with the car, the hurt ones and make arrangements for the funerals. They would be gone two days. It would be late before we all got in and out of the tub and settled down to sleep that night.

I was actually on my way to bed when it hit me! Mom wouldn't be home to make my cupcakes! I was all set to panic when I remembered who taught her to make cupcakes - Grama S! And she would be with us so I was ok for bday treats. So Mom and Dad rushed off into the night with what clothes they could grab and what cash they could scrape up and we said our prayers with tears running down our cheeks that night.

Tuesday at school was strange because everyone knew our Grama died. Grama S had told Mom's brothers, Dad and Mom called Grampa's brother, Uncle Star who told the rest of the family who told their friends and before we had tucked in the night before cassaroles were in the oven* Kids were quiet around me and class just kind of flew by. Mom called that night to tell Grama S what was going on and she assured Mom she was ok, we all left at the same time and she got home right after we did by about 15 minutes.

See, Grama worked, too. She was a seamstress and then a cutter at Richardson Mills. It was not quite a sweat shop by definition but is was by lack of fans. So she got us off to school and went to work then came home and fed us, made us do chores and homework then bathe and get to bed early so we would be "fresh" in the morning.

It really wasn't that bad, despite our whining about over work and no time to play. With five of us chores took very little time but it seemed like forever when we were kids.

During dinner I asked Grama S if she would help me make cupcakes for school. She didn't see how she could but didn't want to say so. So she put me off. I was ok, there were still two whole days before my birthday. Mom would be back Wednesday according to Grama S. Plenty of time.

Brave Girl

2005-08-14T09:07:00.000-05:00

All through school I killed spiders, moved snakes and put funny bugs in jars for show and tell. I handled all the stuff that scared the other kids I hung out with and never cracked a sweat.

Then I noticed the first sign of my weakness. It was when we were in the white house. One night, the folks were gone, we had a 15 year old babysitter. She was great fun and we liked her. She was not, however, very brave. She was afraid of lots of things. We'll call her Freaked out Francis.

We had a lovely black, sleek, male cat at the time. I think his name was Tom. Baby Lion had passed on a while earlier. He was an inside and outside cat, as most of mine are. We were playing race cars in the back room. It was getting pretty loud and silly. The little cars were shooting off the dog leg curve and flying into whoever was sitting there. Between bouts of bouyant laughter we heard the cat scratching at the door.

Freaked out Francis was closest and she reached over to pull the door open. That cat slunk into the room with something in his mouth! He stood right by the door with it, his head hanging low, protecting his kill, when one of the little girls squeeled, "Oh NO! Tom's got a BIRD!"

Freaked out Francis reached down to bravely rescue it from him. Then she screamed, stood up and ran out of the room freeking,"It's a BAT!", leaving the five of us, four of us long haired blonds, alone with it.

That lasted about 2 seconds. The cat jumped when Freaked out Francis screamed and lost his grip on the NOT DEAD bat. As it flapped across the room to land on the window curtain the five of us shrieked in loud unison, the cat skittered out of the room and we followed.

The other girls grabbed their hair and raced for the kitchen! The Boy started to cry. I had thought I was going to open the door and shoo it out with a towel, which was my first thought, when I realized I was screaming, had my hair wrapped around my hand and was running after the others. I couldn't stop myself, I was terrified! I was also surprised that I was afraid. When we hit the tile in the kitchen we skidded into a turn and headed for the further safety of the dining room with me bringing up the rear.

Mom had just finished bringing in the laundry before she left. One of the things we were supposed to do before she got home was put our clean clothes away. Like typical kids, we were putting this off until the last five minutes before they got home. There were baskets on three of the chairs in the dining room. This was just bad luck for the Mom.

I don't know where we heard about bats getting tangled in your hair but even the youngest girl knew it and was clutching her hair close to her neck. When we caught up with Freaked out Francis she had a towel over her head and was under the dining room table. She had stopped screaming but was breathing hard and sobbing.

Knowing a good idea when we saw it we all lunged for the laundry. We all took the first thing big enough to cover our heads. This meant some digging because the socks and undies were on the top of each load. Socks flew and undies draped everywhere! In under 20 seconds all five of us had our heads covered and were under the table with Freaked out Francis.

The screaming and sobbing slowed slowly when we realized the bat wasn't chasing us. We must have really interfered with it's audio as we screeched in the high decibels. Freaked out Francis talked us back to calm and we drew up a game plan.

She was going to get the broom, I would take the mop, the little girls would get fly swatters, The Boy would stay there and Vee would go call our folks. Gripping our tightly twisted assortment of slips, towels, and skirts to make sure our hair was covered, we moved out two at a time. Freaked out Francis got the broom, bristles up and I took the mop, also topsy turvey and we stalked toward the back room.

I was shaking and biting my lip to be brave in front of the other kids. I was really terrified! I knew bats could carry rabies and rabies shots were bad. Francis and I peeked around the door frame and tried to spot the bat. I could hear V on the phone and was reassured that Dad would come save us soon but the bat was still here now and there were only us kids to deal with it.

Freaked out Francis spotted him first, on the back door frame. She pulled back the broom like a ball bat and took two tiny steps into the back room. Wham! She missed, the bat fluttered in the air around the ceiling, she ran back to the kitchen.

I had kept my eye on it and now the little girls were on the other side of the door watching it, too. The bat landed on the window curtain across the room. I shuddered around the door, held the mop like an ax, lined up on him from as far away as I could and SWUNG!

Crash! The curtains came down, I ran back to the kitchen, the bat followed me! The other girls screamed and we all ran back to cower under the dining room table, gripping out hair covers firmly and leaving our weapons scattered in a trail behind us.

Various sorties were made by one and another of us with all taking a turn, even The Boy, now that he stopped crying and entered the spirit of survival that was motivating us. We learned we couldn't hit the side of a barn from the inside. The bat evaded us over and over again then chased us shrieking back to our bunker.

Dad and Mom got home about 20 minutes later. Talk about relieved! Poor Francis was so glad to see them she started crying again.

Dad saw us all crouched under the table wearing clothes on our heads and noted the scattered weapons all over the place then he started to laugh. He had a big "Ha ha ha ha" laugh in a deep tone. We felt pretty sheepish.

We watched as he went to the kitchen, got a towel and a canning jar, walked right up to the nasty beast where it perched on the kitchen curtain, held the jar under it and snapped it with the towel. He hit it right on the head and it dropped into the jar! Man, he was SLICK! And the whole time he was laughing his head off at us.

Now that the monster was caged we crawled out and Mom started directing the re-folding of the clothes, the replacing of the weapons and the washing of faces and brushing of hair that followed every upset in our home and helped Francis get calmed down.

Dad wandered off outside and let the bat go. They went back to their card game. We went back to racing slot cars. I didn't see the cat again till bedtime. Tom was hiding under The Boy's little bed. I could just see the tip of his tail twitching spastically still. He never brought another animal into the house - ever.

And I knew I wasn't "girl fear" proof. I felt like such a sissy! It took me a long time to get over the loss of self confidence it caused.

The Throwback

2005-08-02T17:13:00.000-05:00

School started! I buzzed through the halls till I located the boy from the farm. Then I scoped out his locker. NOW I had him! I knew where he would be at least twice a day for my viewing enjoyment. And, NO, I had never heard of stalking - I invented it. I was only in 7th grade when this started but we were in the same building as the high school then. So I was like, almost 12 when school started.

I was ready with the first note to be dropped through the slots in his locker. I spent days writing and re-writing it. I think it said "Hello Le, I hope you remember me from the farm this summer. I want to be your friend. Val" It was the first of many. I left him birthday cards, holiday cards, notes on things I noticed him doing....any excuse for contact.

Trying to drop a note and not be seen got tricky as I got older. He knew I did it, he never caught me. I used to get a hall pass for the ladies room or library then race through the halls, stuff his note in his locker and race back to where I was supposed to be. I did this till I was around 14.

I just was stuck on this guy. He was so.....Himself! Le Wonder was a throwback. It was the mid 60's and he dressed 50's style. He was the Fonz before there was a Happy Days. His jeans were always straight leg, tight and cuffed. His t-shirt sleeves were rolled in tiny cuffs with just enough left to flip over and hold a pack of smokes. His hair was cut in a duck tail. He wore black and white high top tennis shoes and white, over the calf socks. If he wore a jacket it was unzipped. I never saw him on a motorcycle but he had the leathers!

He leaned, if he was standing still, on a wall, a locker, a fence, a desk, he was just too cool to stand. And he always had a smoke dangling from one side of his lips, even while he talked. When he got down to the butt he would flip it about a mile. I struggled for hours to learn how to flip a cigarette butt like he did. I finally got it, years later, when I became a smoker.

Working in the hay gave him a great bod to hang all this on but he was a nice guy, too. He smiled with his whole face when he smiled at you. I did lots of stupid things to get that smile aimed at me.

When I found out he went to the roller rink I broke out my new skates, The white ones I got for my 11th birthday, and started babysitting for skating money. It was only fifty cents if you had your own skates.

They had different "dances" at the rink. You know them, grand parade, couples only and others. The one I worked out for was "Ladies Choice". I became a sprinter! Le Wonder was popular and I had to be fast to land him for this skate. It was SO worth it! He was one of those people who can make you feel graceful because he leads so well. Skating with him I was Lila Lightfeet instead of Sally Stumbles and I loved it! It was the only time all week I could have his attention.

I would come flying at him from across the rink and slide to a mostly controlled stop right in front of him. He would give me that smile and I would wordlessly reach out a hand to take his while I smiled like a loon back at him. We would start out side by side and then he would give me a little twist of his wrist and he would be skating backwards with me. Then we danced, swirling in the corners and gliding along the floor. I was in young girl heaven! Whew! He was good!

One time, on my way home from school, he was leaning against the store with some friends. I know he saw me coming. He stood up, flipped away the smoke he had been nursing and said, "Excuse me guys, I gotta walk this little lady home." then turned to meet me on the side walk and took my books for me. I never said a word to him the whole block, just walked on air next to him.

One of my girlfriends in 8th grade lived right across the street from him. I never dared go to his house but it was great to hang with her and keep an eye out. Sometimes I would see him working on cars with his dad or mowing the lawn and it made my day.

Like all things of beauty my love for Le Wonder had to change. It changed when I was in 9th grade. I will remember forever how crushed I was when I saw him walking with Dumb Donna Bigboobs after school one day. I knew in that moment that is was over for me. I couldn't compete with a real girlfriend who had boobs and everything. I left him one more birthday card and he never heard from me again. It hurt to much to lose my first love for us to just be friends.

Now, I was the only one having my first love and we had really just barely been friends because of the age gap. And I had boy friends closer to my age at the same time. But none of those facts changed my feelings. I was utterly betrayed for a woman of loose morals and large body parts. I hated her. Still do, because she broke his heart later and made me mad all over again!

I moped around school like a basset hound pup with a splinter in his paw for weeks. But Le Wonder was only the first boy I fell for. I knew he could never be mine. There were lots more out there. I got over him to the point that I didn't even send him a graduation card.

I ran into him, years later, in a little party store out east of town. He was, grimy, grey and old looking and had a beard but I knew him by his body language, he was leaning on the counter as he waited to be checked out. I said hello as he was leaving and he remembered me. I got that beautiful smile to crawl out from under the mustache and beard and his eyes twinkled the same but I wouldn't have wanted to go out with the man he grew to be. He was still buzzed from the night before but buying more beer on his way out of town. He was dodging the law for some reason. How sad.

Talk about feet of clay! What a let down. He could have been a jet pilot or a fireman and instead he was an alcoholic. God bless Dumb Donna Bigboobs! I could have gone on to mate with this boy in a year or two more if she hadn't snatched him.

Not everything bad that happens to you IS bad. Wait for the surprise ending!

In pursuit of happiness

2005-07-17T08:26:00.000-05:00

I was in love but it was only July, school wouldn't start for weeks yet! I worried daily that Le Wonder would forget me.

There were plenty of distractions for me. We had 3 or 4 family reunions, birthdays, weddings, and the rest of normal events to go to plus we were AMA members and the sis, Vee and I rode in the local hill climbs and dirt bike races for kids while Dad rode in the ones for old people.

Dad broke his leg the first time while we lived at the white house. He is not a very patience patient. There is a photo someplace of him with the trophy he won and his cast propped up on the handle bars of the winning bike.

There is no movie but the one in my mind of him riding the bike that way. He stood beside the bike on one crutch, kick started it, dropped the crutch and swung his cast up and on the handle bars, pulled in the clutch with his left hand, bent over and hit the shifter with his right, then sprung upright to drive it as it took off. I watched him go clear down the street, stop at a corner and pop the clutch to take off again. You could hear him going through the gears as he headed down the street. Silly Daddy!

Mom put the halts to it, of course. It was a totally unsafe way to ride as he couldn't watch traffic and drive the bike properly at the same time. Still, we were on Dad's side. We had, all five, had chicken pox recently and knew what it was like to have to stay in bed even if you didn't feel sick, really. Borrrrriiiinnnggg!

He healed fairly fast that time. He went on to repeat the racing regularly and the broken body parts twice more.

While I couldn't find Le Wonder anywhere even though I rode my bike all over town the last weeks of that summer I was true to him in my heart. We still hung with the neighbors but anything that smacked of almost dating or romance with anyone I avoided like skunks.

That would be our last year in town. Again, a landlord would sell a house out from under us and we would move. While we whined about it at the time it would turn out to be the best place we ever lived as a family.

Learning about Boys

2005-07-11T09:25:00.001-05:00

Boys! They made me crazy! I hated them, envied them, wanted to be like them and loved them all at the same time sometimes.

The first boy I remember calling "my boyfriend" was QT Grrrrr. He was a cutie! His face was narrow with high cheek bones and always looked tan. With large, wide set brown eyes, full eyebrows, a straight, narrow nose with just a hint of a turn up at the tip over a sensitive set of full, wide lips all peeking out from his straight brown bangs he was just as cute as an irish setter puppy!

We went to the same church. When we were older I would give him a black eye while singing "Deep and Wide". We would go to the same school in the fall. He was really quiet. I don't remember him ever playing with us much as we got older. His family lived about 4 blocks south of us. He rode to our house and gave me a ride on his tricycle handle bars. Then he bought me a candy bar for a nickle! It was the first candy a boy ever gave me!

I think this lasted a week. I don't know but I suspect he wasn't supposed to be so far from home at just five years old and his folks made him stay on his own block. We were friends in the lower grades but our interests went different ways in school and by high school, when he was REALLY cute, I would have had to stand in line for a date with him.

I was moony on and off with the neighbor boy, Jay, most of my younger years. He's another one I don't know the whole story on. Once, we climbed up the tree in the side yard and dragged a big box up behind us for a kind of club house. We balanced it across some branches, crawled into it and "kissed". It was just one kiss, lips banging together would be more accurate.

When we were a couple of years older we would repeat almost the same kiss underwater during swimming lesson at the lake.

We were just barely in our teens when Vee and I went with Day and Jay to get a malted at the A & W downtown. People asked us if we were two sets of twins! That was the closest thing to a date I ever had with him. It used to bother me enough that I would wonder about it but I think we spent too much time together as adversaries and cohorts to see each other as date material.

Once I got back from the Canadian adventure I never really saw him again until our 15th class reunion. We talked some but there were too many people to have a heart to heart so I still don't really know why we didn't date. QT wasn't there, I learned he had moved to TX.

Part of the dating problem was that I really wasn't supposed to date till I was 16. I had very few dates before I left and returned home. After I got back the boys all seemed kind of young to me. No one had done what I did so there was no way I could relate to most of the kids anymore. I grew up too quickly.

The other problem with dating me was that from the time I was 11 until I was almost 15 I had a true, but unrequited, love.

I walked out the door at my Great Grama's house one July morning. The sun was just clearing the trees in the east field. I had a picnic jug of well chrisp water and some plastic cups I was taking out to the men bringing in the hay.

Just as I stepped off the stoop and started for the barn a single, chance ray from the rising sun flung it's golden cloak across the naked shoulders of a tanned, sun blonde, child of the gods as he flung a bale of hay off the trailer and into the loft of the barn.

Every muscle in his chest and back was accented. The sweat on them glistened and glimmered in golden highlights as they flexed and moved with the effort as the bale left his hands and flew the twelve feet or more up and over into the loft.

He took a moment to hitch his tight jeans up with his thumbs, flipped his bangs out of his face then bent to hoist another bale as I stood, awe struck, and watched. It was effortless for him. The golden hair on his arms twinkled in the sunlight. The second bale floated up and into the loft where another, more mortal male, stacked them. The god child stood, hip shot, one hand on his hip, the other wiping the dewed sweat from his brow and brushing back his bangs in one graceful move while he rest for just a minute. The mere mortal moved them out of hs way, clearing the landing area in the loft.

The sun lifted it's ray from him and covered him with the glow of it's normal lighting while he waited. I fell into my first "real" love in that brief, fleeting moment.

I just can't convey how disconnected from the real world this was. It was almost a holy moment. It was like the sun blessed this boy with all of his beauty just for me to treasure. I was alone in the real world and he was from heaven. I should have known the most beautiful things are the most unattainable. I was only 11, though and hadn't learned that yet.

I started and shut my jaw. I realized he was a.) human, and b) hot and sweaty and c) that I had the cold water for him in my hands. My feet started to work again but my brain was still standing there with it's jaw hanging down in wonder. I got all the way to the trailer and couldn't say a word.

He had seen me coming and watched me walking across the yard. I might have been standing there yet if he hadn't strode across the hay bales to the edge of the trailer and crouched down to get the sun out of his eyes and speak to me.

"Hey, sweetheart," were the first words he spoke to me and my heart expanded in my chest with the pleasure of his voice and the kind words. I smiled till I thought my cheeks would shatter. "Is that for us?"

I still couldn't talk but I nodded and reached out to him. It appeared I was handing him the jug and cups. He took them from me and I notice he had strong, square fingers and that even his hands were tanned. My arms dropped to my sides as I got that floaty feeling you get after putting down a heavy load. I knew what it was but still thought it was because of my heart becoming lighter than air.

I just stood there and watched. He stood up, poured a glass of water from the jug and whistled for the other guys to come join him. I watched while he poured for everyone before he drank. I could see the satisfaction and relief they all felt as they drank the cold beverage. There was a round of quiet "aahhh's" as they took the second swallow. I only had eyes for Le Wonder. They gobbled him up. I noticed every little thing.

He was wearing Wrangler straight leg jeans, not too broken in. They gave slightly as he hunkered down so one cheek rested on the heel of his pointy toed boots and his other leg propped up the elbow he held his smoke in. The smoke he pulled out from behind his ear was a "Lucky Strike". He struck a wooden match with his thumbnail to light it. He drew in deeply and blew out smoke rings, flipping his bangs again as they fell over his golden brown eyes.

After a few minutes to finish their drinks the others started back to work. He flipped that butt about 25 feet away, into the gravel of the driveway and well away from the hay wagon. He stood up and stretched, ( oh, be still my beating heart), looked at me standing there and realized I was waiting for the jug and cups. He picked them up, walked back to me at the edge of the wagon, stooped down and passed them to me. I touched his finger when I took the handle of the jug. It jolted me to my toes.

His bangs had fallen across his eyes again. He casually flipped them back again and smiled at me. It smile lifted up one side of his mouth, it was kind of crooked looking in his square jaw. I was transfixed. Snake and bird, hypnotist and victim, raven and shiny foil fascinated by his eyes looking into mine.

"Will you fill that up again for us before we go back to the field, please, " he asked me. I just nodded again. He got up and started tossing bales again. After the second one he noticed me still standing there and gave anod toward the house.

I realized the wagon was almost empty. Then it hit me, I could see him again if I brought the jug again. My feet took off for the house and the rest of me followed. Believe me, I hurried!

I had two days at Great Grams to get to know this Hercules. I made the most of them. No haying crew ever had better service. I hauled water, lemonade, lunches, snacks, and more water. Those lunches had home made cake and cookies, fat sandwiches and chlled fruit in them, lovingly concocted by me with a little help from Grama. The lemonade was sweet with a big chunk of ice in the jug to keep it cold till I got out to the crew.

I always handed everything up to Le Wonder. He always smiled and called me "sweetheart". I finally started talking to him enough to find out I was doomed to failure. He was in high school, almost 17 and had a girlfriend. I was 11, still in 6th grade and didn't have the slightest idea on how to get a guy to pick me to be his girlfriend.

It didn't stop me from loving him, it just meant I had to love from afar. I got pretty good at it.

County Spaces

2005-06-27T07:29:00.000-05:00

I don't know much about how kids are relating to each other on gender issues now, 41 years ago there was still a lot of ingrained ideas about what gender did which things. I was never happy when I was excluded because I was a girl. In fact, I was down right cranky about it!

I could (can and still do) bat a ball where there was no one to catch it, catch a football, run, dodge and make a touch down, throw a softball from 1st to 2nd base, run, ride my bike, fish, climb a tree and anything else as good some boys. Not better than ALL boys but better than some. I didn't need to be the best, I just wanted to play. I would get really frustrated that I had to prove it over again every time a new boy joined a group.

I'd like to think that people realize now that anybody can do any thing any other body can do within the limits of their physical and mental abilities. It's your size, build, training and desire that "measure" you, not your sex, color or anything else.

Back then there was too much I was not encouraged to do "because I was a girl" that I really wanted to do. I REALLY wanted to be an astronaut. Enjoying sex in my teens left me with children before I ever got to see if I could be one. (Note to young females - there are many careers you can not do with a child to take care of - BECAREFUL or don't dream)

As I couldn't be an astronaut I have had hopes one of the grands would get off the planet. So far no takers.

We used to play a lot of games with our Uncle Arr. One of our favorites was "Drunken Astronaut" We would all climb up in the big tree at Grama and Grampa's house. Uncle Arr would go first and crawl way out on a large but flexible branch. We would climb up behind him and clamp on in a row behind him.

Lacking seat belts and oxygen masks we would immediately "Blast OFF!" for space. The branch would start shaking and bouncing and we would all hang on for dear life as the "pilot" got us past the moon and the inner planets and head for Mars.

But then, oh woe! The pilot became inebriated! Then the rocket would veer from one side to the other as he tipped waaayy to the left, recovered, slipped upside down, flipped back up, and just in general flopped all over instead of driving.

The last time we played we were all wrapped around the branch like hot dog buns with limbs when the pilot got to his feet and mis stepped on purpose to come down with all his weight on the branch to set it REALLY bouncing up and down.

It gave one lurch as his skinny butt dropped on it with all his weight but didn't recover.

CRACCCCKKKK! Five kids screaming and the ripping of the limb from the tree brought my Grampa running out from the barn. He got there just after the last flight to Mars landed in a shrieking, freaking heap under the tree.

Some of us had the wind knocked out of us momentairialy but when we could breathe again we were still laughing. What a ride! What a landing!

Grampa had more of a fit because we broke "his" tree than because we fell and could have been killed or broken. He chased us into the house where Grama made sure we KNEW we could have been killed and Uncle Arr had his seat of education warmed because he was the oldest and should have known better.

The tree was cut into firewood for the brick bbq stove in the back and we piled it up while Grampa chopped as punishment. There were no more games of Drunken Astronaut - there were no branches big enough for all of us to fit on. That must be how childhood ends....you run out of places you fit in to play on as you get bigger so eventually you become a non playing adult because all the things that were fun were dangerous and NOW you know better.

Fun for Four

2005-06-12T14:58:00.000-05:00

One day we were running around in swim suits. It was hot and we had played in the sprinkler most of the morning. We had run in for kool-aid and were sitting around in the dining room playing records as we cooled off. One of the albums was female singers and one of the songs was "Big Spender". We were singing along, as always, and really getting into belting out "Big, big spender!" It was making us laugh and snort kool-aid out our noses when Vee stood on her chair and hootchie-cootchied as well as sang.

Now, I think Mom told us to settle down, so we did. But we got talking about it and ended up running up stairs to our rooms and finding all our can-can half slips. We got towels from the hall closet, wrapped them around our heads to make turbans and pinned them the long way around our necks to make capes of them. Add 3 cancans apiece, a little of Mom's red lipstick and we thought we looked like this ->.

We raced back down to the dining room. The other 3 ran right outside to the porch. I hustled to open the front windows and start the record over before Mom saw me! We wanted to surprise her. I turned the volumn up fairly loud and joined the rest of the troupe.

We giggled, hiding down behind the porch railing, through the first song but when Carmen Miranda started singing we climbed up on the wide ledge that ran around the porch and started doing a can-can! A few neighbor kids rode over to see what all the noise was about and we shook those slips like maracas! We ended with the customary "turn your back, flip your skirt up move" then turned and took our bows!

The next song was "Big Spender". We must have seen the movie about Gypsy Rose Lee because we knew that dance, too. The turbans were peeled first. After a few sexy moves,for girls that were 8,9,10, & 11, the capes followed. We were bumping and grinding like pros! (ask us, we thought we were GOOD!) Next we started wiggling out of the slips. Vee even threw one to the crowd, to share between all 4 of them! They were laughing up a storm and we danced even more energetically.

Mom must have been on the phone or something because she only just got to the door as we started the last chorus. She did a lightning fast overview of the action and in less than 2 seconds she realized what we were doing, (strip tease) where we were doing it, (in front of God and everybody on a 14 inch wide ledge 8 feet off the ground) who was watching, (a girl and 3 boys from the 'hood) and that we were down to one slip apiece and our swim suits.

Now, I have sent grown men running when I shift into Female Demon from Hell in a Rage. It's only happened a few times in my life but I even impress me when I am rightously angry. I learned most of it from Mom.

There was that hateful, scraping noise from the needle being dragged across the record but it was drowned out by the "Voice of Death" screeching, "Get down from there RIGHT NOW and GET IN HERE!!!"

We hit the floor running and, from experience, sad to say, headed right for our rooms. Mom pounded up the stairs behind us. I don't know where the neighbor kids went but I know they were gone before our feet hit the first step!

Arr was last as her legs were the shortest and she slammed the door behind her in an instinctive reaction to the fear she felt. I screamed, "NOOOOOO, she'll just get MADDER!" and tore over to rip it open just before Mom cleared the last step. I got a good look at her face and almost slapped the door shut again, but freaked out and just ran to the far end of the bedroom.

You need to know we put on plays, puppet shows, circuses, talent shows and animal acts all the time when we were kids. We never had one end like this! We were all in a state of shock because we had gone from giving a prime show to being threatened with death in under 10 seconds. You just can't change gears that fast and not suffer for it.

She stomped in the door, looked at us all huddling in the corner in fear and then cut loose on us. "What do you think you were doing? Do you realize you could DIE if you fell off the porch? Where are your BRAINS!? What will YOUR FATHER SAY! Are you TRYING to make all the neighbors HATE ME!" She was so enraged she had to stop to breath.

I knew what came next, again, from experience. "Valerie MARIE, GET OVER HERE!" she shrieked as she pointed to the spot on the floor in front of her. I didn't go fast, but I went. My eyes were on my feet to see where I was walking and to avoid looking into the face of the "Goddess of DEATH".

Her hand yanked my chin up so I had to look at her and she brought her face down to mine. Right on cue, I started to cry. "What were you DOING!" she hollered into my nose. At this, the rest of the girls broke into sobs. They thought she would KILL me.

Through the sobs I gasped out, "We were just singing and dancing!"

Staring with the concentration of a predator and using the "stare of mind penetration" I could see the click in her eyes when she registered that I believed I was telling the truth. She released my chin and stood up.

Knowing she would get no better answer from any of us and that we couldn't hear her over all the crying her shoulders slumped under the load of "what the neighbors would say" we had just piled on her and she just shook her head really slowly, back and forth, for about a minute.

"I want you all to go DOWNSTAIRS, pick up ALL THE CLOTHES and TOWELS, then get BACK up here and STAY IN BED until YOUR FATHER gets home."

We went past her so fast her blouse rippled in the wind of our passage. There was going to be no DEATH!! We were still crying but that was because once you started it was hard to stop. I didn't have to tell them anything. We got every bit of our "props" and were back upstairs before she got to the first landing. We blasted by her again, streamed into our room and I dropped my load then closed the door behind the last girl in.

Now Mom wasn't really a monster, it just seemed that way when you were short and she got angry so quickly and completely. We had a real talent for setting her off till we learned all the invisible rules of life better.

The kids had all flung their loads anywhere and leaped into their beds. I stood by the door and saw the mess we had made. Somehow, I knew that wouldn't sit well with Dad. "Come on, guys! We have to put all this stuff away neatly or we will REALLY catch it when Dad comes home."

"Mom said to go to BED!" Vee challanged me with a glare. She was alway hardest to be older than.

"So? We will be VERY quiet, shake it all off, fold the towels and put the slips back AND THEN go to bed!" I insisted. "You know how Dad HATES a messy room!"

Everybody looked at everyone and the concensus was we had better do anything we could to lighten our punishment. There was a short rush while we helped each other get it all picked up and put away, then we went to bed.

First we all discussed what got Mom so angry. We did lots of singing and dancing acts. One of our best was "Ain't We Sweet". Vee said it was the stripping part but I told her we were wearing our swim suits! It was the same thing we had worn all day! We never did figure it out then, we just all feel asleep from nervous exaustion.

I just hate a story with a bad ending so I wanted to make one up for you. The real ending was we slept till Mom called us for dinner and Dad never said a word to us about our latest show.

I would guess that, once again, what Mom saw as a criminal act that would ruin her as a mother with the church and the neighbors Dad saw as his wild animals having a good day. He probably laughed his head off and was sorry he missed it! Mom would have spitted and sputtered at him but he would have said she handled it just fine. We were punished enough.

So we cleaned the room for nothing!!

Later in my life I was to try and explain to a 10 and 12 year old pair of females why it was OK for your boyfriend or neighbor to see you on the beach in your swim suit but NOT OK to model them for the boys in your bedroom. It made me dizzy and I KNOW they didn't get it.

I remembered the "Big Spender Day" and I understood Mom's point of view better. By then I was in my 30's. It is true that "You will understand when you are older" - at least sometimes.

White House Flash

2005-06-10T14:26:00.000-05:00

We are going to have to fast forward soon, as I have a friend I hope won't screw up her life as much has I did mine and I need to get to the year I was 15. I will back track and fill in as often as I can. For today we are going to have a special memory from the white house, a few more when I can find time, and then we will begin moving to the Red House. So 6 to 12 is going to be hard and fast.

One of the first things I remember from the white house is Mom sending me to the store one night just before dark. You could give a 7 year old a ten dollar bill and do that back then.

Every Friday, because by now both the parents were working, we had pizza and pop for supper. It was usually followed by popcorn and a movie, if we had been good, that we got to stay up late to watch.

I was sent for an 8 pack of pop in 16 ounce bottles, a gallon of milk, for breakfast, a loaf of bread and a bag of pop corn. Obviously, Mom wasn't thinking straight or she would have realized that I was going to have a pretty heavy load for a kid. I certainly never thought about it!

I trotted down to the little store, the kind with candy by the pound and that cut their own meat, got my groceries and went to the check out. The nice man there bagged everything but the pop and sent me on my way.

I started out well enough with the bag on one arm and carrying the 8 pack with the other. Then the bag started to get heavy. I switched them over, quite a juggling feat. It didn't help much. It was getting darker, my arms were aching, I couldn't walk too fast because of the load and THEN...I heard footsteps behind me!

The street lights snapped on and my shadow made me jump! The mystery walker was getting closer! I hurriedly put the pop down, got both arms under the bag, picked up the pop, quickly, with both hands and tried to walk faster. The stepper behind me walked faster.

My arms were giving out again! Now what! I thought about leaving the pop and coming back for it, there was only one more block before home. Someone (the walker) would take it and I would be in trouble. I couldn't go any faster and he was RIGHT BEHIND ME! Oh, cripes! I was in a panic and almost crying.

Then this nice voice behind me asked, "Can I help you with that, little girl?" His hands reached toward me.I almost peed my pants! I stopped and looked up to see an older, new neighbor boy. He took hold of the carrier of pop bottles and lifted it out of my hand. I got both arms under the heavy bag, gave it a heft to settle in and looked at him again. I didn't really know him but I always liked him after that. Still do.

I didn't know what to say. "Uh........," was how I started, "Thank you," was the middle and, "I just live over there," pointing with my now semi-freed hand, was how I ended.

Neither of us said another word. I lead us down the rest of the block, up the steps to the door and told him thanks again, just set the pop there and he did, then walked off into the dark. My second hero! (Dad's are always the first heros!)

I watched that boy in sports through school, saw his wedding notice, lived several doors down from him later in life, have even spoken to him in passing. I don't think he ever knew how much his small kindness meant to a little girl just trying to do a good deed for her mother. I'd really like to post his real name, but won't.

I will just wish there were one of those kind of boys for every little kid in a pinch!

Cycling

2005-05-31T09:05:00.000-05:00

After Vee and I got bikes the little kids got theirs about August, I think for Arr's bday. Once we were all riding we did a lot more together.

One of the rides we took most often was the road to grama's house. We visited both sets of grands on the bikes but the most fun was to Dad's folks. They lived further out of town which made it more of an adventure.

It actually was over the pond and past the fields, not over the river and through the woods, to get there. We used to pack a thermos of juice or kook-aid, pb & j sandwiches with a banana and some chips for a snack. Vee would carry them in her basket.

Riding single file on the right hand side of the road and using hand signals for our turns, we would swoop into the vallies and crawl up the hills to the flat lands. If a car approached on our side we would pull over and stop. We could see them in our mirrors. When a farm dog ran out to chase us all four horns would start blasting and we would scream at them to "git home, dawg!"

Dad taught us to ride safely. I wish more kids knew the road rules for bicycling. I would like to see more bikes with mirrors and horns on them. Not to mention generator lights on front and back as well as reflectors on the spokes.

In May the lilacs, flowering almond, honeysuckle and honey locusts were all in bloom. Their sun heated, heavy, sweet scents would fill our noses with their perfumes all the way along the flats.

About 3 miles from town, after a couple miles in the reflection from the pavement of the hot sun, we would stop on the side of the road under a big old oak near our aunt's place to catch our breath and eat our snacks. The shade would hit us like the air conditioner at the grocery store. Ahhh! We'd fling ourselves off the bikes and down into the tall, cool grasses to rest. From there it was about two more miles to grama's place.

There weren't any iPods and we didn't have pocket radios so we would sing while we rode. We knew all the songs off one "Sing along with Mitch" album and a lot of current music as well as lots of old country songs. We weren't bad and it was fun to see how many "bottles of beer" it would take to get from one turn to the next.

Once we got to grama's we would beg for her kool-aid pops. She would put the flavored drink in ice cube trays and stick popcicle sticks into them as they froze. The zesty frozen treats were very refreshing after a long ride.

Then it was another half mile to great grama's house where we could get icy cold water from her well and a cookie or two.

We'd visit with all of them, see how many new kittens were in the barn and check to see if the strawberries were coming on again yet. We might talk on the CB to our aunt for a while or ride back down the road to play with the girls that lived on the corner.

But finally, we'd be running out of daylight. We would give Mom a call to let her know we were starting out for home. When we arrived, dusty, tired and hungry, she would send us up to shower and change then feed us dinner. We'd be too tired to argue about bedtime. The parents must have loved the times we rode to grama's and back.

Unforgettable

2005-05-23T06:42:00.000-05:00

Unforgettable: Impossible to forget. See also: memorable, red-letter.

The sister, Vee, and I were out back playing on a lovely spring day. I was 9, she was 8 so it was 1964. It would have been the last of May or very first of April, a week before Vee's birthday.

Mom called us into the house in that, "Now you're in trouble!" tone of voice. I figured out when I was older that Dad was in trouble, not us, but at the time, we thought we were slated for death.

We reported in, front and center, promptly. "Yes, Mom, what do you want?" I asked while Vee stood behind me in the cowardly shelter of my body.

"You two girls go right down to your Dad's shop. He wants to talk to you right now!"

Oh, geeze! I looked around at Vee then back to Mom and braved it out. "Why," I asked.

"You'll find out when you get there! Now, get GOING!" she shrilled.

We lit out the back door like our asses were on fire! Once we turned the first corner, where Mom couldn't see us, we slowed down to a slow stroll.

"So what did you do this time" I asked Vee, "and why did you say I did it?"

"I didn't do anything!" she protested. "

"You must have done SOMETHING! IIII didn't do anything!"

"What about saying you were going riding and you went to the library to pay your fines last week?"

"Unless you told, they didn't catch me. Besides, that wasn't wrong!"

"Oh ya? You LIED!!"

"But I didn't do anything BAD! It was GOOD to pay my fines!"

"A whole dollar? That means you had four books FIVE DAYS over due. Mom would KILL you!"

"SHE doesn't KNOW unless YOU told!" I sputtered. "It's probably because you sneaked off to town to buy that necklace when you were supposed to be at Grama's house! I retorted!

"Nope, they were both gone when I did that, unless the little kids squeeled on me."

It went like this the whole five blocks to the shop. By then we had worked ourselves into a state of terror but we couldn't figure out what we had done to be in so much trouble that we had to see Dad while he was at work. Usually they waited till Dad came home to hold court and punish us. This was totally out of our experience and we were just about peeing out pants in fear.

Even around the corner and a block away we could smell the rich scents of oil, gas and grease mixed with exaust fumes that was the unique smell of auto repair shops. We went past the show room and around the corner to the work bay doors. The first one was closed, Dad's was the second one. When we peeked around the corner we saw Dad laying on a dolly under a car that was about 2 feet up on the lift. He was tightening something with the torque wrench.

We went into his bay and walked over by his legs. "Dad? Mom said you wanted to see us." I said bravely. My voice only quavered a little with my tears of fear choking me up.

"Uh huh." We heard from under the car. We stood there, shaking in our shoes, but waiting quietly. We knew better than to interrupt him when he was working.

He must have laid there laughing to himself for a whole 3 minutes. We looked at each other, looked at the big feet by our small ones, looked at the big, round wash sink with the bar you stepped on to make the water fountain out from the center post. We stared at the workbenches and at the other guys standing around working on other cars. We didn't dare move and we both wanted to sit down to protect our rears but didn't dare sit in the grease on the floor there.

Finally, Dad rolled out from under the car with his "sorry but stern" face on. He sat up and then stood up, looming over us.

"Did you make your beds this morning?" he grumumumble. Dad's voice was surprisingly soft and tenor. He was shy and talked fast and quietly. You had to pay attention and listen hard. grumumble is a good word for it.

I looked at Vee, she looked at me. I gave a little nod that told her I had made our bed even though SHE had run right down to breakfast. We faced him and nodded our yes.

"Who cleared the breakfast table?" he queried further.

"It was my turn. I did it," Vee answered while I nodded agreement.

"Are the dishes done and put away?" We looked at each other again. This was weird! Dad never asked us about chores. I spoke up, "It was the little kids turn for dishes. We put them away," I told him.

Right then he gave his biggest, "what a joke I'm pulling" smile and we smiled back in relief. "Then I guess you have both been pretty good today."

We nodded our heads, smiling still, in agreement.

"Well, come on then, I've got something to show you two, " he ordered. He started toward the front of the dealership. We followed right at his heels like two well trained pups. When we got past the car next to the one he was working on there were TWO BLUE GIRLS FULL SIZED BICYCLES!!!

We screeched and screamed and then tried to climb his body going, "OH DADDY! thank you thank you thank you" at the top of our lungs and right in his ears as he pick us up, one in each arm and gave us a squish.

While he had ahold of us he said, "Now look, it's Vee's birthday next week so she gets first pick and I don't want to hear any whining!!"

Well, of course, I thought I should have first pick because I was the oldest and I had waited longest but for a BRAND NEW BIKE I was NOT opening my mouth on that thought. "They're both BEAUTIFUL, Daddy! She can pick first, I don't care!" I lied convincingly.

He gave me an extra squish, "That's my big girl, " he approved and stood us both back on our feet.

Vee never looked a me but ran right to the one with the basket on front. That left me free to run to the plainer one. We were screeching again at each other, "We've got BIKES, we've got bikes!"

Dad was laughing at our joy and I noticed the other mechanics were clumped up and laughing, too. Dad's boss was standing in the door frame in front of us and smiling. I had NEVER seen him smile, he was always very poker faced when I saw him. I smiled up at him, too! We were smiling at everyone!

Now I looked at Vee and she looked back then we screeched again, kicked the stands up and started turning the bikes around toward the door. Dad was blocking our way. "I want you to go home up Pearl Street to Center. When you get to Bridge Street you get OFF and WALK across the street. And you BECAREFUL!! (not a typo in our family)

"We will," we both rang out on cue and we meant it. We didn't want a single scratch on our bikes!

"OK," he said, "go straight home and show your Mom first, then ASK her where you can ride! Got it?"

"OK!, Thank you, Daddy!" we shouted. We walked the bikes forward till the pedals were in the right places, hopped on the pedals and started out the door. Two good pushes and we got our butts in the seats. They were just the right size for us!

We stopped at the door, looked both ways and blasted out of there for home. What a ride! We were giddy with relief that we were not in trouble and riding on cloud nine because now we had our OWN bikes to ride and they were BRAND NEW never been ridden bikes all our own!

We checked, you could ride them with no hands! What great bikes! We got off at the main intersection and walked them over when traffic had cleared. The little girls saw us coming and started clamoring for handlebar rides before we were in the yard. Mom came out and admired the bikes inspite of her ire. She defined our limits and we rode all day. When it was time for dinner we put them up on the porch.

We spent dinner telling the family what all the kids thought about our new bikes and how fast we could go on them. We were impressed with how easy they were to pedal. It was great telling about beating all the kids except Day, who was older and bigger than we were. How the other kids came out and rode with us all afternoon. We said we gave the little kids rides, too.

After dinner was cleaned up we ran to get the bikes out. Jay, Mal and the other Val joined us in circling and criss-crossing our allowed blocks. We heard Mom hollering us in about dusk. No riding after dark, rule three already!

We watched a little TV till bed time. Vee and I could hardly shut up. We talked most of the night about riding to school on Monday. She offered to haul all our books in her basket and I told her thanks. We could hardly sleep. We wouldn't be able to ride again till after church tomorrow so we relived every moment we had ridden today.

I figured out later Mom was angry because Dad spent some of their tax refund with out discussing it with her first but she couldn't stay that way when she saw how happy we were.

What a day! What a joy! We had bikes! Unforgettable.

Poor

2005-05-13T15:08:00.000-05:00

The white house is where I learned we were poor. I never knew the concept before we moved. For us it meant we ate a lot of goulash, chili, boiled dinner, bean soup and other budget stretchers. We didn't know that was bad. There was plenty of milk, corn, on and off the cob, peas, peaches, apples and more from the farms or we might have been worse off. As it was, we all grew like weeds and were generally healthy.

What brought it home to me that we were poor, as in not having enough money, was when I asked my folks when I could get a bike and they kept saying later or pretty soon. I guess I asked one time to many because one day Mom told me to stop asking about a bike. I wasn't getting one because they couldn't afford it.

Now, part of the problem is that they couldn't afford four bikes. Those that grew up with sibs know that it wouldn't be fair for me to get a bike and have none for the others. Unless you asked me. I would have said "I had to wait till I was 9 to get a bike, they can wait till they are nine, too!" What a whiner. I hated that I couldn't do something till I was 12,or whatever age and the sibs got to do it a year or more sooner.

All the neighbor kids had bikes. They would even share sometimes but it meant we couldn't ride together - not enough bikes. I was ready to have my own, darn it! I could RIDE!

A bike was the ultimate possession for a kid back then. You could go all over town and back in a flash! You were free! You could sleep in a little later because you could get to school faster! You could race the other kids! Man, I just had to have a bike!!!

So I started learning about money and how to get it. I would get my OWN bike. I mowed lawns for all the relatives, watched little kids, ran to the store for people and put all the dimes and nickles in my bank for the bike.

It was my first attempt to save my money until I could pay for something. It seemed like I had very little for all the work I had done. It was going to take years for me to save up for a bike. I got discouraged but kept working at it all year. I was 8 and a half.

Bicycles

2005-05-12T15:54:00.000-05:00

I taught myself to ride a bicycle out at the farm on the Uncle's old steel frame 26" boy's bike. It wasn't the easiest thing I ever did.

The old wooden porch of their farm house ran parallel to the driveway. The driveway had a little rise and then a gentle slope toward the gravel road that lead to town. Across the road was the mail box, then a shallow ditch and behind that farmland that went on forever. There wasn't much traffic and a car raised so much dust in the summer that you could see them coming a long way off.

As I was only about 3 feet tall myself, I had to push the bike with my hands up over my head. The leverage and control left something to be desired. I'd wrestle it across the gravel drive over to the edge of the porch. I would turn it around and get it pointed toward the road but really close to the porch. This could take a lot of "backing and filling".

I had to balance the bike with one hand while I climbed up on the porch. I would get a hold of both hand grips, throw my leg over the bar, get my butt over the seat then gently push the bike up and forward from the edge of the porch with one foot. It had to be done just right; too hard and you would go all the way over; too gently and you fell back against the porch. Do it just right and the bike would stand up and roll forward.

If I got it right then I had to shift to whichever side the "up pedal" was on, stretch my leg as far as it would go and catch the pedal with my toes. My butt would slide off the seat as I shoved the pedal forward as hard as I could. When it was almost so low I was sitting on the bar I would give a little hop and catch the other pedal as it came up. Bobbing over to that side I would shove it down.

I'd be bouncing back and forth over the cross bar,pushing pedals a quarter turn because my legs were too short to reach. When the bike would reach the top of the little rise I could push a pedal one more time, hop my but up on the seat and let it coast to the end of the driveway. I would be savoring my success as the wind lifted my damp hair up off my neck and forehead. This lasted about 3 seconds.

The idea was that I would make a u turn and ride the bike back to the porch and dismount. Reality was I usually got about a foot short of the road, twisted the handle bars in an attempt to turn and got dumped in the gravel.

I would lay there a second, looking at the clouds and catching my breath. Eventually I would crawl out from under the bike, wrestle it up on it's tires, get a hold of the handle bar and the cross bar and push it back up the driveway to try again.

This kept me out of the way for a couple hours everytime we visited. Back at home, I would watch bigger kids riding their bikes and turning, trying to figure out what I was doing wrong.

When a kid decides it wants to learn something they can really show some spunk! I'll bet I landed on my butt in the dirt a hundred times that summer. Then POOF - one time I eased the handle bars to the right and THEN back to the left to make that turn, and, with my little bum right on the bar almost, I stood on the pedals, stretching the left leg all the way down and then the right one, bobbing like a cork, first down on the left then up, over and down on the right. I made it back up the hill! After I did it once it was like I had been doing it forever! I was riding

I made it clear back to the porch!! It was more like jumping rope than riding a bike, the way I had to pop over the cross bar to catch the pedals, but it was going and I was doing it!

I ran into the house all excited and asked if I could borrow the bike to ride to Great Grama's house, I can ride it all by myself now, PLEASE!! Grama must have said yes because I remember the way my heart pounded from excitment. I was going to REALLY ride the bike! I recall the hot, dusty smell of the gravel and the sound of it crunching under the tires. All I saw was the front wheel because if I tipped it over I would have to go all the way back to the porch to get on again.

I made it, slowing way down and pretty much falling off when I got there. It seemed like I was there in just a minute, I was going so fast (compared to walking!). I went in and told Great Grama all about it and she came out to watch me push the bike to her porch and set off for Grama's. She waved good bye to me but I couldn't let go to wave back, so I just smiled at her over my shoulder and kept riding.

I was smiling all the way thinking NOW Mom and Dad would get me my OWN two wheeler! I wanted a red one!

Boys, later

2005-05-09T10:22:00.000-05:00

I really want to tell you about boys and such but I have to go back to the other blog right now. That's the real world and it's distracting me too much to post here.

Be back in a bit!

Neighbors - bah, humbug

2005-05-06T09:54:00.000-05:00

Behind our house was a family with 3 boys and a girl. One boy was 17, the girl was 3 years older than me, the other two boys, Me and Mi, were about 5 and 3. The two little boys came over one day to play with us.

We had a new kitten, courtesy of the neighbors. It was a little tiger with a white bib. The day was rather warm so we all sat under the big pine tree by the side porch to stay cool. Cee had the kitten in her lap. Me asked if he could hold it. Cee, being nice to neighbor, said yes.

Me proceeded to pick the kitten up by the neck, very tightly! The kitten struggled to free itself by kicking and scratching at the hand that was choking it. Kitten landed a couple of good ones. Me screeched, threw the kitten down on the ground and then stomped on it! We could hear it's bones breaking.

It all happened so fast. There was nothing anyone could do. Cee and Arr started to cry, but Vee and I were angry. There were words exchanged and it ended with Me and Mi running for home and never playing with us ever again.

I went inside and told Mom what happened then asked her for a box. She said we could get another kitten and found me a shoe box. The sisters and I had a funeral for the poor little thing and buried it there under the tree.

The neighbor with the kittens let us have a second one, this one a yellow tiger we named "Baby Lion". He grew up to be dressed in silly outfits, toted around in wagons and strollers, rocked in cradles and generally loved by all of us. He was a very male cat but he let us do anything with him.

When I was older I used to babysit Me and Mi to make some money but we still never played with them at school or home forever.

The preacher's kid

2005-05-04T13:10:00.000-05:00

There really was a new pastor at the church and he did have kids. Mom made me and Vee go ask the new boy to come play with us. It wasn't really a chore. We might have waited till he was outside or something to check him out. Having Mom step in just meant we had to walk the two blocks to his place and knock on the door.

Guy was about our age but taller than most of the boys. On the walk back to our house we made getting acquainted small talk and waved Jay and Day to join us. Standing around making introductions and howdy's was boring. We started out playing rag football but Day had to leave and left us with an odd number of players.

We decided to golf with an old iron out of the garage and a few found balls. Being in town we couldn't really golf, something would get broken. We set up a target by stacking some cans on a cardboard box.

We let the new kid go first. He missed,of course. We ranged in age from 5 to 9 years old. None of us was really good at aiming anything! I got a swing and hit the box low and on the left. Jay stepped up to take his turn. I went to the right to brag to Vee about my shot. Guy was behind Jay and to his left.

Jay really wanted to nail the cans. I saw the club come up in a powerful back swing and clip Guy in the head. POW! Jay looked over his shoulder in surprise and carefully pulled the club down. Guy had immediately raised his hands to his head. He never made a sound, just grabbed his head. Blood ran through and over his fingers, down to his elbow and on to his shirt. I couldn't believe he wasn't crying!

It was instant panic! The blood flowed down his face so fast he couldn't see and we thought he would bleed to death right there.

I hot footed it to the house, shouting for Mom the whole way. As I have mentioned before, my parents were fairly expert in judging the severity of the situation by the pitch and volume level of a child's screams. Ma was out the back door before I got to the porch.

She raced over to the cluster of concerned children, with me right behind her. She took one look at the blood gushing out of Guy and sent us running. "Val, get a clean wash cloth and run it under cold water in the kitchen, Vee, go upstairs and get on of your dad's t-shirts, Jay - go home, it's ok! Cee and Arr get out of the way," she drew a breath, "Come on Guy, we're just going to get you sitting down in the house." She took his left bicep in her hand and led him carefully toward the house. Three of us dashed off on our assignments. The little kids followed her like a chain of ducks.

Inside, I had two wet cloths, ready. Mom pulled out a chair, sat Guy down and took them from me. "You have to let me look at your head, Guy, put your hands down." She stood, waiting.

Guy's hands moved about 3 inches from his head and Mom slid the wet cloth in quickly. The bleeding was slowing some but the cloth got red quickly. The kids crowded in the doorway, trying to see how badly he was hurt but he kept his hands over Ma's and they couldn't see anything. Neither could I!

I had run a dish pan of cool water without being asked because I knew Mom would need it. Guy was really a mess! I put the pan on the table and Mom told Guy, "OK, let me put a fresh cloth on it, Guy," and swapped the clean one out, dropping the red one in the pan. "Can you put your hands down now, Guy? I need to see how badly you're hurt."

Guy whimpered a little but put his hands in his lap and Mom lifted the cloth to peer under it. She had the blood cleaned up well enough to tell he was going to need stitches. He had a 4 inch gash JUST above his eyebrow over his right eye. A VERY near miss! I handed her the rinsed out cloth and she switched them again.

Vee came bounding into the room with a white t-shirt of Dad's she had found finally and landed by Guy. "Here, you can put this on and we can wash out your shirt before it stains."

Guy leaned forward and Mom pulled the cloth away from his head long enough for him to GENTLY take off his shirt, hand it to me, and slide Dad's on. He leaned back with his head tipped against the chair. While Mom rinsed the cloths out I trotted over to the sink to start on the shirt.

The blood had quit running, pretty much, and Mom made a pad of cloth for Guy to hold on his cut. "Just keep that there while I go call your Mother," she told him as she placed it over the slash. He put his hand over the cloth and mumbled a pitiful, "OK," as she walked out to use the phone in the dining room.

I felt like I was responsible because I asked him over so I walked over by Guy and said quietly, "I'm really sorry you got hurt, Guy. I hope you will play with us again, anyway, sometime."

Guy looked at me out of his uncovered eye and moaned, "I will. It was an accident. It's OK." I offered him the fresh cloth and we switched them again.

Mom seemed to take a long time on the phone. I guess being recently tricked by us about the pastor's little girl and then having to call and say, " Hello? Mrs. Z? .......I'm afraid Guy had a little accident........Well, I think he will need stitches. !!!!!..You might want to come pick him up.....You can see our Doctor......Yes, he's nearby. ...All right....I'll see you in a minute....Good bye." wasn't the most fun thing she had done. She was probably socially embarrassed forever that the poor kid got nailed on his first day playing at our house.

Guy's Mom was really nice about everything. No one hollered at Jay at all. He felt really badly that he'd hurt Guy.

The next afternoon Guy came to visit just to show us his black eye and the 12 stitches under his patch. It was really gross! It was black, blue and green and had just a little slit where his bloody looking eye could peek out - we were all impressed.

Guy never really got to be a regular at our place but he was really out of the area being a whole two blocks away. We stayed speaking friends till his folks moved on again in a few years.

Things like that just seemed to happen around our place. You think the fact that there was usually 14 or more kids playing in the yard had anything to do with it?

White House Stories

2005-05-02T09:46:00.000-05:00

I don't recall many "bad" days in the white house. There were some interesting ones.

One of the most fun pranks we pulled was on an October afternoon when we must have been bored. Mom had left me "in charge" while she was out for some reason. Aboy was 4 or 5 ish. He was not bothering anyone but we decided it might be fun to dress him up like a little girl to fool Mom. Halloween must have been close to inspire us to go for it.

There was a new preacher at the church and we would tell her they asked us to watch the little girl while they had a meeting with the decons. Woohoo! We were off!

We dug through Arr's clothes to find something small enough to fit him. We settled on a little white blouse with a simple collar and pink skirt with white knee high socks and black mary jane shoes. That was the easy part!

We dug into Mom's make up for the next part. This was, of course, strictly forbidden. We added a little powder to lighten up his skin, a little eyeliner to make freckles across the bridge of his nose and cheeks, some mascara to darken his lashes and a light smuge of lipstick to add some pink to his lips and cheeks. Oh! he was CUTE!

The hair was a problem but we found him a bonnet then took some of Mom's old nylons and braided them, cut off the toes and shredded the end then taped them inside the bonnet! TA-DA!

We told him his name was Mary and he was supposed to be shy and quiet. We didn't figure he could change his voice enough. He practiced looking at his feet with his hands behind his back and twisting one foot back and forth on it's toe for shy. We quizzed him till he would just shake his head for yes and no.

Oh boy, we were ready! We all went outside to play. Everyone was watching for the car so we could run back inside when Mom arrived. We always ran inside when Mom got home to see what she brought. There might be treats!

As almost always since she had started working, Mom was in a hurry. The car came flying down the street and whipped into the driveway. The five of us raced for the house and beat her to the door which I held open for her.

With her arms full of packages she strode to the kitchen and dropped her load on the counter. Then she got busy putting away groceries and such. The girls waited for me to time it. They watched me for a signal. When she was almost done I said, "Oh, Mom?" in my best "good girl" voice. " The new pastor's wife came by and..."

She interuppted me, "Oh, No! Did she come in?"

"No, she was in a hurry," I continued, "She had a meeting with the decons and asked us to watch her little girl." There, we were in it now!

Mom's head swiveled around and she fixed on the bonneted but bowed head of the extra female child. "Hello, what's your name?" she asked.

"Her name is Mary," Vee spoke for "her" quickly, " and she's kinda shy." I nodded at Vee, good job!

"Well, Mary, it's nice to meet you," Mom stated and she went back to putting things away. "You kids can go play now."

We rushed into the dining room, biting our cheeks or tongues to keep from laughing. Aboy was so proud of himself. " I twicked her!" he said wth a little skip. We all shushed him in a panic that Mom would hear.

"Now what do we do?" Cee asked. We all looked at each other, thinking.

"We be nice to the new girl and play a game with her," Vee suggested.

"She's not dressed for outside games," Cee agreed.

"Candy Land!" Arr chimed in with her favorite game. Aboy was just learning to count and he wanted to play Sorry. He was the guest!

We rushed to set up the board and climbed up on the chairs around the dining room table, box in hand. We really started a game but were whispering to each other to quite giggling and stop laughing the whole time we waited for Mom to come in.

When she finally did walk into the dining room we were all very obviously being "nice" to the guest and playing politely. "Where's Aboy??" She asked me.

"He got tired so he took a nap," I replied.

"Oh. When did Mrs. Z say she'd be back?"

I glanced at the clock, it was about 4:00 p.m.. "About 4:30," I answered her calmly. I scowled at Arr because she was tittering behind her hand. She made a somber face and hushed.

Mom got in "tidy up" mode and went off to fuss with the living room for the company she expected. We all clapped our hands over our mouths and stifled.

"It's your turn, MARY," I said loud enough for Mom to hear and we kept playing and giggling.
Mom must have needed a dust rag from upstairs a few minutes later because she went by us headed that way. The alarm in my head for trouble went off loudly.

"QUICK! Everyone line up by the stair door!" I exclaimed. They looked at me funny but they all knew I could guess ahead better than they could so they did it.

"Line up" meant get in order from tallest to shortest. I think every photo of us ever taken had us "lined up". It was also the way Mom inspected us for church or special events before we left. She would look for last minute smugging or crumbs and tighten any loose braids.

I knew Mom would check on Aboy while she was up there. It's just what she did all day, track kids by last reported positon. We waited all in a row in front of the stairs, hands clasped in front of us and giggles making our shoulders twitch.

"VALLLLLAURE MARIE!" I heard her shout as she ran down the stairs. That sobered us up! The death cry! Aboy looked worried so I shot him a grin and he smiled back at me. "Keep your head down!" I reminded him. He looked at his shoes.

The door was flung open and Mom screeched to a halt as she hit the dining room floor and saw us all waiting for her. "Where's ABoy!"

This was it. All the kids watched me. "I looked her square in the eye and said, "Right here, Mom."

Her jaw dropped a little and she stared ate me. "Right WHERE?"

My lips started to twitch, "Right HERE!" and I pointed to "Mary"

We all started cracking up. We had REALLY tricked her! She wasn't pretending to be nice, she was FOOLED!

While we laughed it up Mom got down on her knees in front of Aboy, took him by the shoulders and LOOKED at him. He raise his head and grinned at her. She yanked the bow on the bonnet and whipped it off his head then did a double take when the braids that had been hanging neatly down behind his ears came off with the hat.

Well, we all thought it was pretty funny and had tears running into our mouths we were laughing so hard. Then came the back lash.

"What were you thinking! NEVER Ever dress Aboy like a girl. Boys do NOT were dresses! We all stopped laughing at the same time.

Mom was using the hat to wipe the makeup off Aboy's face while he stared at her, in shock at her anger. " I expect you to know better than this, go to your rooms!" she raged.

We went flying up the stairs to our rooms and settled down to try and figure out why Mom didn't think it was funny that we tricked her. We had no clue. Maybe she thought Aboy was kidnapped and got scared. Moms were strange when you scared them, we all knew that. We sat and worried what Dad would do to us when he got home for about half an hour.

When Mom told Dad about it that night as he got home we heard him laughing and he came to call us down for supper still smiling but he never said a word about it to us. Aboy came to the table looking like himself except for a little mascara at the base of his lashes that would have to wear off.

That was how we learned that pranking the Mom was a bad idea. We didn't do it again for a long time.

We really HAD tricked Mom and she felt stupid for not knowing her own son and getting fooled by a bunch of little kids. Since Mom started working shortly after we moved into the white house she was sensitive about being a "good mother". I wasn't capable of taking that into account then, but I am now so I know why our joke backfired so badly. Then, it just seemed like she went off the deep end for no reason.

We all still think it was pretty funny!

Who we were

2005-05-01T07:56:00.000-05:00

This is the us girls just after moving into the white house. We were going to be in the Christmas play at church. Mom, ever practical, made our costumes to double as pj's later.

I have read over some of the earlier posts and see that our childhood is sounding idyllic. I am sure that, compared to other's lives, it was. I seem to have forgotten to mention a few points, probably because I didn't realize then or now that they may be important to some people.

First, we were poor. I didn't know that for several more years. We had family with farms and orchards so we had food. Dad hunted, worked a day job, worked out of his garage and played in a band to make money.

Second, my Mom could sew. We didn't look poor, except by choice. It was hard to get us to dress up because we thought we had to be ready to play with the boys and you can't do that in a skirt. She made us lovely, matching outfits often. Usually they were for Easter and first day of school but she might see something she liked and just make them for us.

She was resourceful, too. The year poncho's were all the rage she bought one fine blanket in one school color and cut it into four ponchos that were trimmed in the other school color, hand fringed and sewed to fit each of us. We loved them and they were warm! She could stretch one pound of ground beef into a filling meal for seven or 10 people. No one left hungry.

All the grandparents chipped in to keep us in nice clothes. It meant gifts for holidays and birthdays were school supplies, socks and underware a lot. ICK!

We always had what we needed and so we didn't know we were upper lower class economically. As we got older the other kids let us know it, one way and another, but it only made us more secure in knowing we were just as good and smart as they were even if we were poor. We may not have had money but we had self confidence!

I still am only lower middle class but I don't reach for more money, I feel like I have everything I ever could want and treasure my contentment.

Moving

2005-04-22T22:55:00.000-05:00

Jay, Day, Say and Ee lived across the street on the south side. Down and across the other way Dee, Vim and their brothers Doo and Uoo lived. We had enough kids for most games and they all had real bikes! Sometimes they would let us have turns. That was great!

We'd get better accquainted later, have fights, divisions, reunions, aplologies, and all the rest that a group of almost 20 has to deal with. Right now, day one, we only knew Jay and Day and sort of knew Say, Ee and Bay, their older brothers. Their dad was our mailman and Jay was the victim in the yo-yo incident.

At the end of our block was Way, an only child, I think. He didn't play with us very often. I never learned much about him, he was pretty quiet.

Across the street from him were May, Nay and their little brother, Quay. Next to them were an older boy Doy, his older sister La, sister younger, my age, also named Val, and a younger brother, Fee.

That was the neighborhood. We lived here till I was 12.

A New House

2005-04-19T09:36:00.000-05:00

The move to the white house was good for all of us in the long run. We girls got down to two in a room and Aboy had his own place. That cut down on bickering so Mom had less referree-ing to do. It was a little less crazy and that was good.

The yard was bigger, we had more kids our age to play with and we were still only a block from the store, a block from the church hill, and 3 blocks from school. It was 4 blocks to downtown and 5 to the library. 7 blocks to the river side park. 3 miles to the dad's folks farm and 4 blocks to the mom's folks apartment. It was our small world. It was good.

We didn't have any noisy neighbors, we WERE the noisy neighbors. Dad worked on race cars and motorcycles for himself and his friends after work. There was usually an extra vehicle or 3 around. One uncle/2nd cousin liked to enter the Demolishion Derby at the county fairs so there was a junker or two sometimes.

I had 3 motorcycles before I was 12 but only owned each till someone offered dad enough money to make him sell them. I hated that. I could only ride around the yard on them unless he trailered us out to state land so I guess it didn't seem like that big a deal to him. Having been told, "this one is yours" I tended to think I should be asked before he sold them, at least. One of them I really wanted to keep. It was a sweet little 125 cc Suzuki, medium blue original paint job, shiny chrome, good tires, started easy (kick start). I cried when he sold that one.

We had a corner lot with a church parking lot behind us and a kind of "strange but nice" couple next door to us. They had a million cats. One of their kittens was born with 5 legs, that was fascinating to us, we didn't understand about in-breeding then. They always let us play with their cats and they didn't holler at us for playing in the side yard. They were good neighbors.

This house also had a big front porch with a wide railing around it and 3 columns. You could dance on the railing, I know because we did! We could sit out there when it was raining and watch the storms lashing the trees.

There were several trees but only one really good climbing tree. We were only supposed to climb if an adult was home but, like most children, we figured what an adult didn't know couldn't hurt us.

So I was almost 8, that makes the others almost 7,6,5, and 2 when we started life in the big house.

Cabin Tales 3

2005-04-18T13:41:00.000-05:00

On a hot summer afternoon we would hang out under the maple trees by the fence and watch what we called "the horse races"

We used to really enjoy watching the cousins, Fum and Wu, try to catch Dusty, the horse. Dusty was nothing special as far as I know, as a horse. Just a dark brown gelding with a black mane and tale. The second cousins kept him for riding, they said. It looked to us like they kept him for chasing.

The horse was quick, limber and smart. The cousins weren't. Dusty could turn on one hoof. He'd raise up, stand on one hoof, spin, leap forward, land, raise up, put his weight on the other hoof and spin the other way. He would put his head down between his front legs, brace himself then leap backwards!

He delighted in running over by the shade trees, waiting for them to come at him from both sides and then leaping between them, making them back peddle to avoid being run over.

We were cheering for the cousins because we all wanted a ride but we cheered for Dusty because he was so good at evasive tactics.
***************

Mom's bro, Uncle Ar, used to come up and spent days with us. He would help get wood for the stove cut and fix things, like the car, for mom. It also gave her a chance to get some shopping done without the "horde" tagging along.

We liked Uncle Ar but he was a little daunting for such a small uncle. We learned quick that we couldn't trick him, he always looked under the beds if we were cleaning our room. He knew just the right way to sweep floors so the dust bunnies didn't run off as he ran the broom. He tried to teach me but I was a "fast" sweeper and never really managed to get the bunnies all corralled.

One time we were all going to the beach. Uncle bought us dogs and buns to cook on the way to the lake. Aboy got cranky and we left early for home. While mom was putting Aboy down, Uncle built a fire and got us all weenie sticks with his pocket knife.

We all sat there and ate the dogs that had been in the car for a whole day. Boy, what a mess 4 sick kids make for two sick adults to clean up. Cee still won't eat a hot dog!
****************

Dad came up a few times that summer and we were always glad to see him but he didn't stay long. We were told he had to get back to be at work.

One weekend he came up to help us pack up and go to the new, white house we were moving into.

I ran back into the cool, dark, empty cabin to tell it good bye while the rest were loading up the car. It seemed so sad to have us leaving that it made me sad to go.

By being "last in" I got a window seat in the car. I hadn't learned to not look back yet so I got up on one knee and watched as the cabin got smaller and smaller. The breeze made it look like the lilacs and the willow were waving good bye.

****************

Cabin Stories II

2005-04-16T09:54:00.000-05:00

We had lots of things to keep us busy that summer. There was a lake nearby where Mom would take us to swim on hot days. That meant getting 5 of us changed into swim suits, finding the swim toys, towels, and sunscreen and packing a chair for Mom. We would make sandwiches and Kool-Aide to take with us so we could make a day of it.

We loved going to the lake. There was a dock to jump off, lots of beach and the water was every temperature from cool and shaded to shallow and warm. There were other kids to play with, new games to invent and places to explore.

The lake life guard wasn't so glad to see us after the first few visits, sad to say. My little brother was most of the reason she dropped into a football blocker stance when she saw the car pull up.

I was a typical eldest helper girl. When we got there the other kids would break and run for the water but I would help Mom get the towels and such to the beach. I was supposed to keep an eye on all of them, as would Mom, but they were pretty quick.

Aboy would launch for the dock the minute the car door opened. He would run as fast as his short legs could go and shoot down the length of the dock to fly into the lake. This was acceptable behavior from most kids just getting out of a car after a long, hot ride. His problems were that he was just a little, skinny two-ish year old with no hips that couldn't swim.

Mom would turn from the trunk with an armload of beach paraphernalia to see Aboy's butt hanging in the breeze as his trucks shimmied to the ground while he ran. No problem there, he just stepped out of them and kept going. He was too far for her to catch now, even if she could try to reach speed by dropping all the stuff in her arms.

We both watched in resignation as he raced on down the board dock, passing laughing people all the way. There was no hesitation at the end of the wooden walk, he just kept running right into the air until gravity modestly covered him with water. Completely. The child sank like a rock!

The first few times this happened the life guard jumped right in after him and fished him out. He looked like a spastic frog, rubbing at his eyes, blinking, gasping for breath and crying. She brought him back to Mom, picking up his suit on the way, and depositing the crying child in her arms with his suit on his tummy.

The life guard would say something like, "I can see he is a quick one, you might want to watch him a little closer," while Mom shrank under all the "bad mother" thoughts that were being flung at her from every side of the beach that had seen the event. Not to mention her own thoughts of incompetence.

About our fourth time to the lake we had the problem solved. Mom put a draw string in the swim trunks and would tie them on tight before we left. Then, about a mile from the lake, she would have me put the new floats they came out with that little kids could wear on their arms on Aboy.

When the doors opened on the car I saw the life guard get down out of her stand and head toward the dock. Aboy achieved his usual rocket speed and went for the water. His little head was down and his arms were rocking from side to side but bent at the elbow to hold his floaties on.

The life guard stopped in shock. Aboy's suit stayed on, he cleared the end of the dock and jumped. His head popped up like a cork. He shook the water off his face and crowed his success then started "swimming" in a circle.

Mom and I carried the chair and towels to the beach and put them down in the shade. She dropped her beach robe on the chair, waded into the water and went to tow Aboy back to the shallow part of the lake in front of our stuff.

Now do take note here - While Aboy did get scolded for running off the dock, reminded the water was deep and he couldn't swim during the first dunkings, Mom didn't expect this to change anything.

We girls were all bigger, stronger, faster and more experienced than he was and this always caused a problem for him. He'd do anything to keep up with us! Mom didn't try to stop him from keeping up his way, she found a way to make his way work without getting him killed.

There were no laws enacted that made all children under 5 feet tall stay off the dock or anyone under three wear flotation vests at the lake. We were never barred from the beach. People expected kids to do dumb stuff and hired trained life guards to pull them out and do CPR on them. How else are they going to expand their abilities and become self confident adults?

There were kids who didn't grow up with me, they drowned, fell on the dock or dived and broke their necks, or had other accidents. Those of us that survived were able to deal with life better for our learning experiences. Maybe we weren't the fittest, but we learned to LEARN.

We learned wet docks are slippery, you should walk on them carefully, we learned to swim better, we learned that even keeping a three point stance in a tree you can fall on your butt, that your best isn't always good enough, that bad things happen sometimes for no reason. That a buddy system is best because usually one can run for help or a rope or tree branch to pull you back in with.

You can't keep everyone safe all the time, the system isn't built to accommodate it. It's supposed to be challenging to grow up so you have adults that know how to survive the variety of situations life throws at them.

Take your, "no riding in the back of an open pick up", seatbelt and helmet laws and shove 'em.

And, just to let you know I am not unaffected by the accidents of life, I will give you a heads up. Aboy did NOT grow up with us all the way. We lost him when he was 12. That story comes later.

I still believe we must have the option to experience life in the way we choose, not be legislated into being safe every minute of every day.

Cabin Stories

2005-04-11T12:49:00.000-05:00

Living at the cabin was mostly fun for us. We had chores but they were always done has a team so they went fairly quickly. We had lots of time just to play outside. We got to meet a lot of the family we didn't know very well.

We hadn't been at the cabin one full day when I went up the willow out back to see how high I could go. I got pretty far up there before a branch broke under my foot. I had a "3 point stance" for climbing but, when the one under my feet went, the one I was holding on to gave out when my full weight hit it.

I fell about 20 feet, trying to snag a branch all the way down but failing. I landed flat on my stomach. Talk about your belly whoppers! I just laid there for awhile, hoping someone would come help me up. I felt like I couldn't move anything, not a finger.

When I could get up I went in and told mom what happened. She doctored up all my scrapes but forbid us all the willow after that. It was a great climbing tree but we had to stick to hardwoods.

One day an Aunt stopped to visit us. She got right down in the lilacs to see what we were doing. Who knows what we had going on, could have been any thing from playing house to drunken astronaut...more about that one later. Anyway, this lady was little, only about 5 inches taller than me at almost 8. She had long, black, wavy hair that was really thick. She ended up teaching us how to whistle with a blade of grass.

Now this looks easy. You find a wide blade of grass that is as long as your hand from the base of your thumb to the top of your index finger. That can take awhile. Once you find it you pick it as close to the ground as you can. You put the widest end at the base of your hand near the thumb and catch it with the base of your other hand. Now, get ahold of the smaller end between your index fingers and pull the grass up tight between both fingers. Then you just put your hands up to your lips and blow through them and over the blade of grass.

Our way was like this. Some people just do it with their thumbs holding the grass. See which way makes the loudest noise. That's what we did for about an hour.

Then the little aunt tried to teach us to pucker whistle and tooth whistle. We made all kinds of noises but whistling wasn't one of them for a long time.

We were real country girls. You couldn't get us in a dress if it wasn't Sunday and we didn't wear shoes except to go to church or town. Mom despaired of ever having us be "real girls" because we wore shorts or jeans and t shirts because they were quick to get in and out of and didn't get hung up on the branches when we climbed trees.

One of our chores was to bring in the cows for milking for Uncle Gee. We liked doing that! We got to run through the fields, find the cows and then convince them it was time to go in for milking. They were pretty easy to herd, usually they were headed for the barn anyway.

One beautiful afternoon (again) we headed out to bring in the cows. With the four of us being so short, we were usually strung out a little, we needed to optimize our visual ability.

We had walked further than usual looking for the cows, they were way back on the south side in the shade by the swamp.

I was barefoot, as usual. We were trotting along briskly, now that we had spotted the cows, to get around behind them. The sisters were spread out on either side of me. My foot came down on something big, round and cold. I paused and looked down just as I felt it slithering out from under me. It was shiny, black and green and gold and huge!

"SNAAAAAAAAKE!!!" I screamed. All the girls screamed! The cows, completely startled, took off running for the barn without us. That was good because we were booking back for the house as fast as we could go! I think we all beat the current land speed record!

I went tearing in the house and told mom I stepped on a snake and she just said, "Did he bite you?"

I shook my head, no. "Maybe next time you will wear your tennis shoes."

A little later a grumpy Uncle Gee came down to tell us we couldn't make the cows run to the barn, they had to walk. They wouldn't milk well if you made them run.

Mom told him what happened and he sniffed, "Should'a known a bunch of girls would be scared of a little ol' snake. Make 'em wear their shoes next time," he snapped, "that's what they're for!" and went back home.

more later.

Cakes and Dogs

2005-03-30T17:37:00.000-05:00

Now we get into cabin stories. This is about the best one.

Aunt Lo and Uncle Gee lived about a quarter of a mile down the road from us. Uncle was a tall, broad, smiling, craggy faced farmer and Aunt Lo was a short, round, true believer, who put 110% into everything she did.

They had 2 boys, Woh and Fum that were in there late teens. The boys had a big old collie named, honest!, Shep. Shep was no pup, he was as big as me on all fours and as big as Mom standing up.

Aunt Lo had promised a wedding cake to a young couple in her church. That Saturday she baked and whipped and iced till she was covered in white dust but the cake was done and it was a beauty.

That cake was half chocolate and half vanilla, buried in white bakers frosting with trim all around it in pink and roses draped over the corners with a big sugar ribbon in the middle behind a small bride and groom. Their names and the date were sculpted under that. Aunt Lo had put tooth picks all over the cake and then covered it with layers of plastic wrap to keep it from the dust on the dirt roads they had to travel. It was so BIG a sheet cake that it took Uncle G and Fum both to load it in the back of the station wagon.

While Aunt Lo got cleaned up, Fum was cleaning out the car with the vaccuume. The doors were all open except the back loading door. Do you remember the windows in the rear of station wagons that could be rolled down? Well, they had one and it was rolled down.

Once again, it was a beautiful day for a wedding, sun lit blue skys with pretty little clouds drifting on a gentle breeze. One of those perfect days when nothing could go wrong.

Because it was such a warm, sunny day all of us kids were out playing in the lilacs. There was a great, empty space in the middle of them, just our size, that kept the heat at bay.Out of the clear blue sky comes this deep rumble followed by a big BOOM!. We were awed that a jet had gone right over our house and were getting out of the bush to look at it when this horrendous scream ripped through the air! Then another!

We bolted for the house but Mom had already cleared the door and was headed, full speed, up the road. We beat feet after her.We knew it was Aunt Lo screaming, she was the only other woman inside hollering distance.

We must have made pretty good time because she was still screaming and trying to kill Shep with her purse when we got there.

She's scream his name and he'd run toward her, like the good dog he was, then she'd swing on him and he'd duck and run away. If she hadn't been so purple it might have been funny but even at 7 I knew purple was the color you got just before you head exploded.

Mom ran right on up but we hung back, a little worried about the swinging purse. Come to find out, Shep was afraid of airplanes, especially the sonic boom kind.

When the boom went off, Fum was the nearest human to hide near. He had gotten to the driver's side of the front seat with his cleaning. Shep had been laying under a tree near the back end of the car.

When the boom rang out Shep spotted Fum, raced to the car, jumped through the back window, came down on the cake, then leaped the back seat and the front one to huddle under Fum.

Aunt Lo had just come out the door and was crossing the yard to leave. She heard the boom, saw Shep fly into the back of the car and started screaming before he got to Fum.

Mom had Fum and Uncle run the cake back into the house and sent us home. She and Aunt Lo cut out the spot where Shep's four feet landed. It was just like a diamond pattern, Mom told us later.

Being an experienced cook, Aunt had made an extra cake for her family. They trimmed a piece out of that one to match the hole, snugged it into the cut out, re- iced the area, minus a few roses and got it back in the car, all in lightening time.

Some how the dog had missed the center where all the special decorations were. All was well, the wedding went excellent and no one ever knew the dog had jumped in the cake.

I always make an extra cake for my family when I am fancy baking, even today.

Transitions

2005-03-28T11:57:00.000-05:00

My little bro was old enough to run well, probably almost two. He was six years younger than me, so that makes it the summer I was almost eight.

We were going to have to move. The landlord wanted to sell the little, yellow house. Some where in here my parents started having problems I was aware of, fighting, dad staying gone a lot and such.

I know I probably don't have the sequences right, memory fails me often. We spent that summer in my Great Grand's cabin "up north", I believe, and moved to the big white house in the fall of that year. Around '63. And that's how I do math.

The cabin was not really a cabin, it was just a small, single story house with that brown gingerbread tar paper siding on it. There was a kitchen with a single light bulb hanging by the wires over the table, a sink with no faucets and a couple small cupboards. There was a window by the table and a small window over the sink. A tiny refridgerator sat in one corner. I think we had a wood cook stove. I know we had a wood heating stove.

A little door lead into the next room, the living area. To the left of the door sat a big, wooden pump organ! We did love that contraption! Knobs to pull and pedals to pump made it a fascinating past time. It took two of us to work it, one to push the keys and one to pump with their hands. We'd play at it till we were too exausted to take turns anymore. (Then we wonder when Mom seems a little "off"!)

There was a couch and one chair, a trap door with a rope hanging from it that pulled the drop down ladder out. It lead to the attic, where we four girls slept. Off the living room was a little bed room where Mom and Aboy slept. On the wall by the kitchen door was a funny knob that looked like a baseball hat with two bills. It turned on the one ceiling light. By the bedroom door was another that you could turn it off with. Very tricky!

The cabin had a large lilac colony out front that shaded the two front windows. There were wind breaks of trees along one side and across the back yard. It always seemed dark inside the cabin to me. Thinking about it now I guess that coming inside from the bright sun would have made it seem darker than it was. I know we kept candles around. What little power we had went out with every wind or rain that passed by.

The pump was around the corner by the back wall of the kitchen. We had several buckets for hauling water to the house. It took at least 4 buckets to do dishes and keep the jug filled in the fridge for drinking. The water all had to be heated on the stoves for cleaning and baths.

I HATED bath days! We took baths by two's in a round tub to use less water. Makes my arms ache just to think about it. It wasn't that the buckets were heavy, it was that you had to pump forever to fill them. I could run the pump and keep my feet on the ground, mostly, but the little girls would do it by two's be cause the handle went up so high they had to jump to catch it. It was a team effort to keep the water running...lol, mom's effort to keep her team busy and out of mischief! Laundry was done in a nearby small town, bless their little laundry mat!

The out house was further back by the trees. Yes, out house.

For the really young out there it was a small shed far out back of the house with a hole dug under it. Their was a bench seat built against the wall with a hole cut into it for doing your business. There was usually a bucket of lime and a shovel near by. You layered the lime over the business every other day or so to keep the smell down. When it was full you dug a new hole and moved the shed.

Ours was a solo seater, pretty small even for small people. There was no light in it. Pretty scary even for big people. All kinds of critters lived in the back yard. There were moles, skunks, possoms, owls, snakes, mice, cats, stray dogs, coons and assorted invisible terrors that only made noises and were never seen. There were bats in the evening and barn swallows in the daytime. Every trip was an adventure.

At night we use "chamber pots" for the nessesary needs. That was a mess for me, too. Being the oldest and largest, it was one of my jobs to take it down the ladder every day and up each night. Totally ick! You did get used to it and it wasn't so nasty feeling, just another job.

What's really funny is that it seems like it was such a wonderful time while we were there, even looking at it from the present, when I understand more about what was going on.

School K to 6

2005-03-21T11:43:00.000-05:00

My first day I know Mom fussed me up cute, curly hair and ironed dress, so I would make a good impression on the teacher about what a wonderful parent I had. I would have worn shorts and a t-top.

We must have walked to school together that day because Mom was with me for the first hour or so. The teacher was wonderful, Mrs. Arnold. She was a little heavy for her height, had short, dark, curled hair and liked little kids. I was lucky to have her. She was wearing a dark royal blue dress with short sleeves.

She greeted us at the door and then walked us over to a poster on the wall. To get an idea of where her kids were on the learning trail she asked each child to read as far as they could the alphabet on the chart and a few small words at the bottom. Then she asked each one of us to count as high as we could. While there were no preschools then I began at the top of the class with a few others. We could count well past 100, read the whole alphabet and all the words on the posters.

Why was I so advanced? I'm not sure. Reading to us was something the grandparents did a lot of when we were little because you could do it with all of us at once. Fairy tails, Bible stories, newspapers, kids magazines, TV guide, Reader's Digest, and chapter books; I remember all of them and being on or near a lap, while we listened. I was watching Grama's finger move along the lines while she said the words in a Grit one time and I think I got the idea between the words she said and where her finger was.

I just couldn't stand chapter books as we only got one section a night. I wanted to know how it came out NOW! My curiosity would drive me to beg for another reading.

However it came about, I was going to the library for Dr. Seuss and more before I was 5. I know Mom thought I just memorized the stories at first but when someone gave me a new book one day and I was telling her all about it the next, she interrupted me to ask who read it to me. I told her I did. We are genetically related - she had me fetch the book and read to her from it. My pronunciation was off for new words but I showed her I could read.

The first several years of school were easy for me. Math wasn't much of a problem, except for long division. I was a "teacher's helper" a lot. I had a lot of practice in that at home. I tried to show other kids how to read and such.

I just noticed that there is nothing here about the other students, what Blank wore or how raggedy Blank2 was. Not only was this before I learned any of that mattered, I never learned very well to judge clothes as part of a person until I was much older and frailer. Even now it's just to protect myself from the people who obviously want to be taken for a negative stereotype that I use it unthinkingly. Most of the time I am banging myself in the head for EVER judging by appearances. I hate when I do that.

One of the best dressed girls in my classes was the sneakiest, meanest kid I knew. She could get you in trouble and you would never see it coming. One of the nicest girls I knew kept her hair short like a boy's and always wore jeans and t-shirts. Another nice girl was really plain and had a skin condition, yet another had a wine birthmark on her face. They were really NICE kids!

I liked to play sports at recess with the boys. We also had tops, marbles, Red Rover and cat's cradle around but I liked softball with the boys the best.

I can't really say that I had a lot of friends in school. Maybe, with 5 of us at home I didn't feel the need in my youth. It became more of a problem later.

School was close and we always walked, even in bad weather. Most of the time it was no problem. Sometimes we got annoyed or chased. Just before we moved from the little yellow house I was "wall walking", a forbidden entertainment, took a fall and broke my front top tooth off at an angle.

I didn't always get A's but I did well and my marks for attendance and behavior were always good. I liked school, I liked tests, I like quizzes and spelling bees. I liked story problems and reading. I didn't like history and geography when they came along but mostly I liked learning new things. I still do or I wouldn't be out here in virtual land building web sites and blogging.

If you can entice your child into wanting to know what happens next badly enough to find out for themselves they will learn their whole life.

Next, we move to a new house.

Yellow House Lore

2005-03-16T15:50:00.000-05:00

The little yellow house had a lot of things happen there. I guess the bad stuff just sticks better in a memory than the everyday good stuff.

Things I learned in the yellow house:

Don't leave your Teddy Bear where your sister can get it.
Now think about it, folks. My Mom did laundry for 4 kids and 2 adults outside with an old ringer washer and a tin portable double sink. You may remember ringer washers. They smashed the clothes between two rollers to get the water out of them. They smashed anything else you fed them, too. You had to be careful or the clothes would wrap right around one roller and make a nasty, tangled mess. And fingers? Eowwee!

Mom would roll the washer and tubs outside, heat water on the stove for the whites and fill the sinks with plain cold water in one and cold water with vinegar in the other. She would get a load going and then do other chores while it agitated.

Sister Vee was just tall enough to throw Bear in one of the tin sinks. I saw her do it! I don't know what she thought she was doing, she was 3 or so. Bear didn't need a bath! I grabbed both my cheeks, shrieked in disbelief then ran and told Mom.

She huffed out and pulled Bear from the sink and then ran him through the ringers as I stood powerlessly watching. I didn't cry that time, it wouldn't have done any good. Bear was full of water, bear had to go through the wringer. Then she hung him by his ears on the clothes line. My poor bear! What a life he had.

Talking Monkeys are Bad.
I had some pretty neat uncles. Mom's bro joined the Navy. They sent him to Italy once. He came home for the Christmas holidays and brought all his little neices big, stuffed monkeys. They were brown with shaggy fur and big eyes and ears. The one he picked for Vee talked and rolled his eyes when you pulled the string.

The big day arrived and Uncle Jay brought his gifts over. We got them all unwrapped and were dancing around with them, they were almost as large as we were! Then he told Vee to let him see her monk. He held it right in front of her face and pulled the string on the back.

The monkey made Monkey noises and his eyes rolled round and round. Vee made siren noises and ran to hide in Mom's lap. You couldn't pry her out of there with a crow bar. The adults all laughed and tried to kid her out of it but she never touched that monkey again.

Always get your Mom if someone is hurt.
I was always Mom's helper, fetcher, holder, finder, watch her, kid. I was aware of how tired she could get after a day of chasing us around. I got tired just helping her!

One night, Vee fell out of the top bunk in our room. No real surprise, she was always flopping around in bed. She wasn't suppose to get the top bunk but we must have made a deal of some kind. So she fell from the top bunk, no big deal.

I heard her land and start to cry. I jumped out of bed and started shushing her, giving her hugs to comfort her. She settled pretty quickly but kept saying her head hurt and reaching toward the back of it.

Well, I was a big girl and I knew what to do for that! You put a cold cloth on it. So I took her hand and led her off to the bathroom. We got there and shut the door then I turned on the light. I could see what she was pointing at now, the back of her head was bloody. It was all in her hair and everything, ick!

But I was the biggest so I didn't say ick, I said "You're OK, we just need to wash you up a little. I found a cloth and held it under the water till it was cold enough to hurt my fingers then started sponging off the blood.

When I wrung it out in the sink and she saw the red water running down the drain her eyes got bigger and she asked me, "Am I hurt really BAD?"

By now I had found the cause of the problem. She had a button stuck in her head. I reached down with the cold rag in one hand and ran it gently through her hair and over the back of her head again to get it real cold. I told her, "No. Here, hold this and I'll show you."

I passed her the cloth then parted her hair away from the button. It was a metal shank button off a pair of our coveralls. There were red outlines of blood around the little anchor and rope design on it. I took my tiny fingers and put the little nails right at the edge of the button in three places, like a little claw, then popped it out.

"OW! Owie!" she complained, but not loudly. It didn't really hurt now that it was out. I know, because she said, "That feels better!"

"OK, give me the cloth," I ordered. She handed it back and I used soap this time to get all the blood out of her hair. I rinsed the cloth out in cold water till it was all clean and washed her face. We were both sleepy again by this time and she just leaned with her hands on the edge of the sink while I brushed out her hair, careful not to hit the sore spot.

Having successfully completed the routine for her, I led her back to bed. I made her take the lower bunk and climbed to the top one myself. She didn't give me any lip about it, just fell right back to sleep.

What a wonderful child I was! Trying not to bother the folks so they could rest and taking care of the little sis! Right? Nope.

Fact of life: Your best is not always good enough.

When we got up in the morning and were having our cereal I casually asked Mom to please check the back of Vee's head because she fell out of bed and got a button stuck in it last night. I didn't get to the fishing for compliments part where I would have said, I took care of her all by myself!

Mom ran from the sink over to Vee and there was a great big goose egg on the back of her head. Well, fancy that! I didn't know heads could get REAL bumps like in the roads. We all looked at her bump, fascinated.

But that bump set Mom right off. Level two alert, kid down, possiblly fatal damage! She hollered up the stairs for Dad to come down and watch us while she took Vee to the doctor and had gone out the door, with Vee in her arms, before he could rumble down the stairs.

I was pretty surprised. I thought I had fixed her up just fine. I couldn't reach the peroxide but I had done everything else the same as Mom could have. I didn't know why she went so ballistic. I found out though, you bet!

After they got back I heard Mom tell Dad Vee was going to be OK, (see, I KNEW I had done a good job!) and then she said, "Where's Val?" Of course he told her I was in playing with the little kids.

Mom came in and said, "Val, come with me!" She took my hand and led me off upstairs to my room. We went in and she shut the door behind her. I had that "Oh crap now what did I do she's going to kill me," feeling from the moment she had said my name. I was right.

Mom pulled me over to the bed. She sat down and took hold of my shoulders and looked me square in the eye from about 3 inches away from my nose and said in her very serious, teeth grinding voice, "NEVER EVER do that again! !!!! You ALWAYS come and get me if someone gets hurt!!!!! Vee could have had a concussion or died!"

I was tear-ing up on cue with a triple lip quiver running. What the hell was a concussion? How could she die from a button? You bet I didn't ask her anything!

She popped me up and laid me over her knees then gave me several firm whacks. I put all the bells and whistles of despair into this cry. It not only hurt, I still didn't know what I did that was wrong. I thought I was getting spanked for doing a good thing.

Now I'm older and I know concussions are bad and for a head injury you have to keep people awake and infection can (especially back then) make you sick enough to die. It doesn't make me feel any better but I forgave my Mom.

Always turn the light on when you go to the bathroom.
I have always been comfortable in the dark. I used to (and still do) get up and just wander over to do my business, take care of it and go back to bed.

One night I pulled down my undies, hoisted my pj and sat down on the chilly seat in the little bathroom to do number 2. I just got started when there was a sloshing sound beneath my buns. I heroically locked it down, hobbled over to the round knob and turned on the light. I leaned over and looked in the pot.

I was so freaked that lock down was nooo problem! I just ran right out of my panties, through the door and up the stairs. I knocked on the door to my parents room then went in and around to Mom's side. I got right beside her and started whispering, "Get up, help! There's a monster in the bathroom!" I just kept saying it, over and over, till she woke up.
"What?" she whispered back.

"There's a monster in the bathroom, he's in the potty!" I whispered and whimpered at the same time.

"Well just use our bathroom, Val!"

"I will, but Daddy has to go kill the monster! It might get out!" I wailed.

Mom looked perplexed, I was not a tale teller. I looked at her and said, "Honest, but I gotta go!"

I ran to their bathroom and did my business. Behind me I could hear Mom.

"AR. Ar? AR! Wake up. Val says there's a monster in the bathroom downstairs!"

I heard my Dad give one of those dinosaur groans and then I heard his feet hit the floor. I cleaned up and ran out where he was waiting for me in his robe. "Come on," he grumbled gruffly, "Show me your monster."

I really loved him right then. I took his hand and started bravely down the stairs. About 4 feet from the door to the bathroom I froze up. He looked down and me, exasperated. I pointed to the cube of light coming from the little room and told him,"It's in there, in the potty!" and let go of his hand.

The end of the story involves cruelty to a dumb animal. For details, email me. When Dad didn't come right back up, Mom came down. I was still standing there in my jammies. She walked past me to where she could hear Dad cussing up a big storm, stuck her head in the door and said, "Well, what is it Ar?" Then she shrieked and jumped clear back where I was! She had Shrieked RAT!

It was a big one, too. Dad one, rat zero, Val no spanking, Mom, trip to the hardware the next day.

I had never seen one and that one was a river rat. OK, it was a farm rat, but it was bigger than I want to deal with even now.

So live and learn, see you tomorrow.

Bad Boys

2005-03-15T11:25:00.000-05:00

Probably the same summer my treasure was broken I had another bad experience on the hill. I believe it has shaped my view of males to some degree, sad to say.

Mom must have gone some place and Dad would have been at his day job, fixing cars. The little kids were likely napping and I was grabbing some treasured solo time down the hill. Grama El was watching us that day.

It was another day that seemed as if nothing could be wrong in the world. Warm, breezy, sunshiny; A great day to be outside.

I really can't remember what I was doing, probably nothing special, looking at shiny rocks could occupy me for hours. I used to look for "picture rocks". These had multiple colors and if you looked carefully you could see pictures of far away places. I found caves, hills, oceans and the rare face. There were also "story rocks" which were picture rocks with things on every face that you could tell a story about. What ever I was up to I was way down the hill playing in the shade of the old maple tree.

This was a great climbing tree. It was big and solid. I'm guessing it was quite old, 70 years or so, anyway. The trunk was "Y" shaped and only about 2 feet high before the split. This made it easy to get up into the fork, lean, belly down, against one arm of the "Y" and stretch tall to grab the next branch then scramble up. It also meant that there was lots of shade from the double crown. It was always cool there, even on the hottest days.

I was intent on whatever amusement I was involved with because I didn't hear the two bigger boys coming down the hill behind me. I know I was crouching down and looking at or playing with something on the ground in front of me. I didn't know anyone was there until one of them said, "Hey - Little Girl!"

Of course, I jumped right up and turned to face them in my surprise. I didn't know these boys. They wore the standard kid outfit that year, blue jeans and a horizontally striped t-shirt. I thought they were smiling kind of funny but I said a shy little "Hello" and waited to see what they wanted. I wasn't afraid. I had not learned to be afraid of other humans, yet. I was out-numbered and aware of it.

"You have to go behind the tree and close your eyes." The taller one told me. His face was all narrow and skinny. He had pointy eyes, a narrow chin, pronounced cheek bones, brown eyes and brown hair with an unruly duck tail hair cut. (his hair would darken along with his soul as he grew)

I was puzzled and probably looked it. "Huh?"

The other one, the shorter one, had lighter brown hair, dark eyes, rounder features but the same funny smile on his face as he explained, "We have to pee. You go around the other side of the tree and don't look."

Now I was enlightened! I knew all about boys and peeing outside. I had cousins and uncles on farms all over the state. I felt less threatened now, they just needed some privacy. I was a polite child so I said, "OK." and ran around the down hill side of the big tree then stood facing the back of the church.

One of them said, "No, you have to scoot down so we know you aren't peeking while we pee!"

So I slung my butt down between my knees and, for good measure, covered my eyes with my hands. It's just as well I did.

Some of you may have seen it coming, but I never did.

Those two boys, Junkie Human and Bowel Movement, lifted their little cocktail wienies and peed all over me - in my hair, down the sides of my neck and soaked the back of my shirt.

It was just like the window all over again. I was stunned. First I thought it was raining then I knew what it was. I jumped up and looked through the trunk at them as they shoved their weapons of shame back in their tiny zippers, laughing their heads off. I sucked in air to holler for Grama and there I stuck. So I took off running up the hill as fast as my short legs could go, getting purple and blue from not breathing, when about half way up I got the screams of rage and shame out.

Grama was Johnny-on-the-spot and came shooting out the front door. I loved her! She started taking names and flinging curses before she could understand what I was upset about. That lady was fast at the math, fleeing girl, two boys running and laughing = one angry Grama.

Once again I was crying so hard I could barely talk. Grama came to meet me, saw and smelled what the problem was and just picked me up anyway and took me in to bathe and put clean clothes on me. She was a big woman with a comforting, large breast area. I cuddled right down and sobbed out my shame.

I have hated those two boys ever since. To forgive you have to be able to understand the action. What possible reason did they have to mess with my day? Who taught them that would be funny? Did they pull this on other little kids? I told all my friends to stay away from the two bad boys, so they didn't get any of my pals.

My revenge is that they did nothing with their lives. They grew up to be liars, thieves, drunks, drug dealers and disease carrying males who had to pay to get a woman. I don't believe they have any off-spring. So yes, there is a creator.

I ran into one of them at my workplace once and when it was his turn I put his order down in front of him and said, "Pissed on any little girls, lately?" with my most evil, hate filled face on. He had the grace not to try and look like he didn't know what I was talking about. He just put his head down, took his stuff and left quietly. I could have killed him and his pal even those 15 years later.

Is the world not callously cruel enough to humans without us being cruel to each other?

Moving Right Along

2005-03-10T14:49:00.000-05:00

I could write 10,000 words on the childhood I shared with my sibs. Let's get a few fact into place and then hit the high spots so I can move on to my teen years, which is where my life as an individual really began.

We were blue collar folks with red neck leanings and aspired toward more. My Dad held several jobs in his younger parenting years but the two that are remembered by me are his job as a mechanic at a Chevy Dealership and his second job as a gutiar player/singer in a local contry music band.

Mom didn't work when we were little but had to start picking up the slack as we grew and worked for an auto manufacturer sewing car seats.

My sisters joined me quickly. We were all about 13-15 months apart. (Whew, MA!) This made us a very tightly bonded group. Mom held off a couple years before my brother joined us. He was 6 years younger than me. I got to be an only child my first year and 3 months, that was it. I craved being an only child often when I was growing up. I think most kids with sibs dream of it frequently.

There wasn't much gender differentiation in our lives until Ay, the brother, was added to the mix. We girls did whatever Dad was doing or Mom made us do. It doesn't take many brains to figure out that guys had it better than girls. We were struggling against gender boundries before we knew what they were.

It was a constant fight to get to play games and sports with the boys in the 'hood. We didn't just like sports, we were good at them. As an adult, any form of "you can't do ____, you're a girl!" still sends me crusading into the education of ignorant humans. It's the big, black button in my life and has caused many fights or debates.

We have all participated in many sports, softball, baseball, football, swimming, bare-back riding, track, wrestling, golf, tennis, bowling and just about anything else you can name.

I started learning to ride dirt bikes when I was nine. We two older girls rode in dirt track scrambles and hill climbing events. I took 2nd in state at 13, my 12 year old sis took 3rd. We would have taken first & second but we threw a climb because we were beating her boyfriend out of first and she BEGGED me to let him beat us so he wouldn't stop liking her. It stunk, but she was my sister. What's a girl to do?

This isn't to say we couldn't dress up as cute as puppies and lay the boys low with our charms. We did that well, too, when Mom could get us to wear dresses. We could even dance, a little. We learned standing on the toes of our brave uncles. We sang enthusiastically.

We could diaper a baby, cook a meal, fix a button, iron anything, clean a house and do laundry by the time we were each 12 or 13. We knew basic first aid. That was OJT, mostly ( on the job training).

We could also adjust a chain, change a bike tire, check the oil in a car, pump gas, fish, baiting our own hooks, (most of us) and cleaning our own catches. We could run off snakes, pick off blood suckers, milk cows, feed chickens, fetch the eggs, feed a baby, a calf, bunnie or kitten by bottle, weed a garden and keep from getting caught in a strawberry patch.

Dad taught us gun safety with a .410 rifle. We had targets and did pretty well. Uncle taught us archery. I missed the 3 stacked hay bales and put an arrow through a knot hole in the barn wall. The arrow smacked into the loft ladder my Grampa was climbing down. That got me restricted from the bow for a week. I consoled myself stealing a few fat, ripe strawberries.

So there's an overview. Back to the nitty gritty tomorrow.

Kid Games

2005-03-03T07:34:00.000-05:00

The little yellow house was great for kids. It had big trees. You could climb up and play space pilot or, if the wind was blowing you could ride the bucking broncos. If you leaned against the trunk from a large branch you were perfectly perched to read a book. When you were really quiet up there no one could find you.

The large catelpa tree had beautiful blossoms that could be strung into leis. We would make two apiece and then wrap towels around our swim suits and hula all over the yard. My Mom had an Aunt in Hawaii that sent us what we called seed bead necklaces and such trinkets. We loved them. It inspired us to learn about faraway places and the hula.

The garage roof was a permanent point of contention between my parents and us. A retaining wall held the side walk away from the garage. This meant that there was about a two foot gap between the edge of the roof and the sidewalk. The gap was probably about a 6 foot drop to the ground.

The danger didn't seem severe to us but Mom always thought we'd get killed there. The gap wouldn't have been a problem but we loved to sit on the warm, tarpaper roof or lay there and sun bathe. That meant crossing the gap and that meant making the Mom angry if she caught you.

You could bounce down the rock wall and get banged up or slide down the garage wall and get splinters. Of course, you might miss them both and just drop six feet and get the wind knocked out of you.

One sister was on the roof, slipped, and managed to grab the edge of the eaves to hang full length (about three feet, including her arms) and then drop. That created a whole new game for us to play. Sort of like Tarzan we would run up to the edge, lean across, grab the edge, swing by our arms and then drop down just to run up and do it again.

We had tricycles, clamp on roller skates, a wagon, whistles, balls, real sleds that steered (sort of), a tobbagan that we only used when Dad and Mom went sliding with us, dolls, teddy bears, of course, and a troupe of three to start with that expanded to four when Ar got big enough to play outside with us.

Our repertoire of games and entertainments was extensive. Inside, outside, in the car, at the farms, we always had something to do. If we didn't have a game for the occasion, we made up new ones. They were new to us, anyway.

For the car there was singing; Henry the 8th; 99 Bottles of Beer; Side by Side; Old Mill Stream; You are My Sunshine; We had rare harmony but frequent enthusiasm. We had " I see something you don't see, a guessing game; Road ABC's, find the alphabet in order from signs on the road; Button, Button, Who's Got the Button, with 8 hands to hide a penny in this could go on a long time.

Reading aloud and storytelling were also favorites in the car. Dad could screw up any fairy tale and make us laugh. Like "The Three Bears" where Mama bear had cinnamon rolls for breakfast and Baby bear jumped into his bed so hard that he and Goldilocks went crashing down. He did this one at home once and jumped into the baby crib to demonstrate. He leaped the rails like it was a race car and it did come crashing down. Mom didn't laugh. Dad fixed it later.

For the farms we would visit Loft Leaping was a big favorite with all of us. First, you had to make a big pile of loose hay. (note: bales WILL NOT work! V. O. E.) Then, you had to clear a path to the ladder that was safe for little kids. After that - climb up, jump down, rake hay back up and repeat till exhausted, sweaty and your shirt and hair are full of hay crumbs.

Catch the kitten was a great barn game for us. I am not sure how the kittens liked it. We have several pictures of us with the wild felines, so we won at least once in awhile.

Outside games were fairly common; Statues; Red Rover; Simon Says; jumping ropes, climbing trees; marbles; yo-yo's, of course; hop scotch, Keep Away; Dodge Ball; Hide and Seek are the ones I can remember.

Don't forget sports! We played all of them. Don't you dare tell us girls can't play, either. If you did we messed with your game till no one could play! I was scared to death of getting tackled in football and could catch fairly well - great advantages for a receiver! Softball was where I could shine. I could "hit the hole", which meant I could put the ball where there were no players 9 out of 10 times, and I could hit hard enough to get a few home runs in my pocket.

It wasn't all skill and talent, there was a little luck involved. At school one day a boy hit a major pop up. It went miles into the air. I ran back and watched it and ran back and stopped.....Then I just KNEW it was going to thump me right on the noggin' and I threw my arm up over my head - mitt up! It dropped in - just like downtown! Too sweet a memory, what a thrill!

For inside we had some board games but, most of the time, we played card games. We learned them from friends and out grandparents and a few Mom or Dad taught us. It was cheap entertainment and worked for lots of kids at once.

Our imaginations were vivid and we put on skits and plays that were almost as dangerous to us as crossing the street. We made puppets and stages, used our dolls and pets for actors, contrived our own clothing for costumes and generally could spent most of a day putting one together.

I'll fill in some details tomorrow.

Wayback, the end of the worst day ever

2005-03-03T07:18:00.000-05:00

While we sat in a row in the green and tan waiting room on the hard chairs Dad told us his part of the story.

He had quieted the kids, fed them breakfast, fixed the window, got the mess from the door and the wall cleaned up and patched the door. We didn't have portable phones back then so he had Vee stay near it incase Mom called.

When she did call he was angry at first. He said he got right over it. He knew if it wasn't really important Mom would not have asked him to get to the hospital so he did what most boys do when they have a problem and called his Dad.

His Mom, my Grama, answered the phone and said Grampa was out plowing a field when Dad asked to talk to him. There was no way around it, he had to tell her I was hurt and at the hospital and I guess she got a little excited. She hollered for Dad's little brother, the Uncle that gave me the gift, without remembering to put the phone down first and got Dad right in the ear!

Uncle was sent to fetch Grampa while Grama got all the details from Dad. Grama wasn't a fluttery woman by any stretch of the imagination but, back then, being in the hospital meant you were dying. She assured Dad that as soon as Grampa could get in from the field they would drive into town and watch the little ones while Dad used their car to come to the hospital.

That problem was all taken care of, now all he had to do was find the bear. The little girls were napping in the playpen by then so Dad asked Vee to come upstairs and help him look for my Teddy.

If you remember, earlier that day I had searched for the stick horse. That means I had dug under the bed and in the toy box and closets. I also ran out of the house without making my bed. Vee got scared awake and hadn't made hers, either.

When Dad told Mom about the state the room was in he was HOT all over again. We were taught to take care of our clothes and toys. He said it looked like six kids hadn't done a thing but play in that room for a month. He said Vee started right in making her bed. Then, Dad said, he rememberd how helter skelter the day had started and told her to stop.

They had to find the bear. They would look in my bed first, then start picking up toys till they found him. It was a good plan. Vee told me later they found him in less than 15 minutes. He was under HER bed. When I got up he must have gotten tossed off the covers I flung off that morning and slid just under the edge. She found him because one paw was sticking out.

Now everything was ready and they just had to wait for our Grands to get there. Dad told us he took Vee into the kitchen to fix a little lunch. They were just going to have a glass of milk and peanut butter and jelly sandwiches. (this was before pb&j, which is much shorter to write) Dad got everything ready and they decided to eat in front of the t.v. like it was a little party just for them.

They sat the plates on the old, tin, t.v. trays we had and tuned into "I Love Lucy". Dad got one bite of his sandwich and the phone rang. Worried it was the hospital again, or Mom, he jumped right up without thinking and over went his tray with the milk on it, right into the carpet, all over the center of the room. It made a big blobby spot.

Those tin trays are noisy when you tip them over. The the little kids woke up, crying, of course.

In all this confusion Dad answered the phone and watched Vee trotting to the bathroom and coming back with the dark blue towels. She had most of the spill cleaned up before Dad got done on the phone and the babies quiet. Not bad for only a little over 3 years old. Dad said he only had to rinse out the towels for her. With four kids Mom had trained us early in Basic Clean Up.

The call had been Grama calling to say they were leaving right then. It would only be about 20 minutes and he could join Mom and bring me the bear. Dad and Vee just had time to finish their lunch before they arrived.

And there we sat. He finished up by saying he had better call them to give them the latest news and got up to go find a phone. Then the Nurse came out and called for Mr. and Mrs. P. Mom got up, leaving me with a look that said "Sit, Stay!" and went to see what she wanted.

She and the Nurse went to find Dad. They all went down the hall we had come out of after the X-ray. I sat alone and, finally, quiet, with my Teddy holding my head up for me.

Another Nurse came out with a small bag wrapped in a white wash rag. She brought it over and sat down beside me. I looked at her. "Val, this is only ice. I wrapped it up so it won't drip on you. All I am going to ask you to do is hold in in your sore hand. It will make it feel better." Then she waited.

I knew what Mom would tell me and Dad would be right behind her. I raised my head, lowered my Teddy to my lap and took my first real look at my hand. The poor fingers were missing a lot of skin. One of my finger nails was black. The whole thing was about twice as big as it should have been and red all over like hamburger. I was grossed out. I turned to her and took the ice in my good hand then GENTLY eased it under the still curled fingers. I couldn't really hold it, I just held my hand palm up and let it rest there.

The nice Nurse smiled at me and said, "Good girl, now just relax. It will be better in a few days." "Not a chance," I thought, but I picked up my bear and cuddled him to my cheek. She got up and went back wherever nurses come from.

The clock on the wall of the waiting room said two twenty five. Dad and Mom came back looking almost happy. They came over to get me and Mom said, "I don't know how, but you didn't break even one bone. We just have to keep ice on it and let you rest for a few days and it will be all better!"

Dad picked me up and we went out to the cars. I rode with Dad so Mom could stop to get some Epsom Salt from the drug store. Dad put me down in the front seat and strap my lap belt. He got in on his side and started the car. We pulled out of the parking lot and headed for the house. I don't remember another thing after that. I have always fallen asleep to the sound of wheels going around and if ever a girl was worn to a frazzle it was me that day.

I imagine Dad carried me up to bed when we got home and Grama would have tucked me in, she was great at tucking in. I slept till the next day.

I know a few days later my nail fell off. I saved it to carry in my pocket. I showed it to Jay along with the naked finger and grossed him out good. I don't recall how I apologized to him or made up for his black eye. (yes, I officially blacked his eye. Tough girl!) He didn't buy me another yo-yo, either. We were neighbor friends for years after that so we must have worked out something.

Our room got cleaned up as soon as I was mobil again.

Dad put my horsie back together and patched the hole in the wall so you could hardly see it.

They never used the stick from our horses to hold windows open again.

Life went on and I never had eight hours that bad again for years and years.

Wayback, Early Afternoon

2005-03-02T10:12:00.000-05:00

Needless to say, this had been going on WAY too long by now. Everyone was tired, annoyed and getting hungry. Mom was trying to deal with me and worry about the houseful of screaming kids she left Dad with at the same time. She was ready to crawl under a rock in shame, too. Apparently she made a decision. She walked over to me and took hold of my top knee and squeezed until I looked at her. "You stay right here on this table and don't you move!" she growled with a shake of her finger at my nose.

I had heard that one enough times to know she meant it. I nodded and curled back up. Then she left the room. I guess she asked the nurse to stay and watch me because I know she wouldn't leave me alone. I really don't remember anything but the dim room, the cold table, crying helplessly forever and a day and the pain in my hand.

She must have gone to a phone someplace. I can imagine the conversation. The phone would ring in the house with a hole in a wall, a hole in a door and a window stuck at the top of the frame. Three girls had been calmed down, dressed, put in front of breakfast and told Mom and Val will be back later. Val is fine. Mom is fine, eat your cereal! They would be watching cartoons in the living room with a Dad who was worried about how badly his oldest girl was hurt and how he was going to pay for a doctor.

Ring...Ring! Hello? Mate? It's me. I'm still at the hospital. She would have to explain that I was totally uncontrollable and wanted my Teddy Bear. It will be in her bed under the covers somewhere.... I know I have the car.

Dad would be grumbling over every option for getting a teddy bear to a little girl with no car and no one to watch the little kids. Mom would be trying to be calm and explaining why in h--- the bear had to be brought and, finally, she would break down and tell him I had not stopped crying and every time they touched my hand I screamed and what if she loses all her fingers...Oh, mate, please, find a way to get over here with the bear, we need you. Then the (real) operator would have broken in asking for more coins and Mom would not have had any so she would have had to hang up and start praying.

When she came back in the room I knew it even though my face was away from the door because the light from the hall sprayed into the room like a flashlight beam. The nurse left to get her lunch. Mom came over to me and started rubbing my back and telling me everything was going to be all right soon. Just be a brave girl a little longer. She had a whole list of nice things to say that I guess she learned from her mom.

The tears still would not stop but they were slowing and had lost considerable volumn. The rejected Panda stared at me from the chair where he had been forgotten. The eye of the storm, you might call it. We both rested while we waited. The almost peace couldn't last. The doctor came back.

I suppose I could be remembering him a little harshly but, I swear, when he came into the room and shut the door it was darker. There was no smile on his face this time. He looked at my mom and I could feel him looking at me, huddled over my mangled hand. I just KNEW he was going to be mean to me. My tears picked up some of the lost speed and I whimpered and snuffled loudly. He announced, "Mrs. P, I want you to leave the room while I take the X-Ray. Val will be just fine with me. He was trying to emote "firm" but it came across to me as menacing. "I'll have the nurse in with us so there's nothing to worry about," he continued, to placate my Mom.

I panted a little faster. I knew what he was going to do. If she left me alone with him he would mash my hand on that plate! To give Mom credit, inspite of her embarrasment, previous tears and stress she looked him right in the eye and explained, "I couldn't leave Val alone in a strange place, Doctor. She's too upset already." I wanted to cheer. It didn't last.

I guess he expected that answer because he gritted out between his teeth, "Then we will attempt to get the hand on the plate only ONE more time. If it can't be done you will both have to leave."

Mom and I looked at each other. Waves of tears stood in my eyes just waiting for their cue to flood my face. Mom wasn't doing much better. She explained very slowly, for the umpteenth time, that the plate was in front of a camera that would take a picture of my bones to see if they were broken and needed to be fixed. The tears cut loose but the sobbing held off. I just hiccupped now and then while she continued to tell me that it was very important to see if they needed mending. I HAD to put my hand flat on the plate to get a good picture or we would have to do it again and it would hurt again. Would I try again, like a good girl?

I nodded helplessly. Again, they put my bed by the machine, brought the plate down where I could reach it and squared it up. I knew what was coming and I started gulping back cries as hard as I could. Squeeks kept sneaking out between my teeth. I slid my legs under the strange table. My right hand moved down and rested on my lap. I twisted a little sideways so my armpit was at the edge of the table and slowly brought my crumpled hand over plate on the end of my crimped elbow.

The nurse went into the small room in the corner. My Mom stayed behind me, rubbing my back. The Doctor was across the plate from me. By minute particles I moved my hand closer to the plate. When there was about a half inch to go I started to un-curl my fingers v-e-r-y----s-l-o-w-l-y. I was crying again. I don't know how. There shouldn't be a tear left in my body anywhere. But, Oh, how it HURT!

I was almost there when the Doctor's hand shot out like a hen's beak after a worm and grabbed my wrist. I had been watching my hand and concentrating on carefully unfolding it. He startled me and it HURT! I was back at full speed, full volumn as quick as a wink. He was hurting me. I couldn't pull my hand back!

Mom shouted, "DOCTOR!" in an admonishing tone. He snapped, "Mrs. P!!", I screamed over both of them as they glared at each other.

Then the Angel of Death came for me on a glittering path of light.

I was almost right. The door was flung open. I had tears going full blast and when the door opened into the dark room it look like the light was glittering. And my eyes were squinted up in pain so it looked like a big, black angel backlighted in the door.

It was my Dad. He had one hand on the door knob and in the other he held my bear. I guess he would have heard me clear from the waiting room and might have gotten a little worked up on his way in. I must have sounded just about as bad as I had when the window first landed on my hand.

Dad strode three big steps into the room. He looked at the three of us with his "What is going on here!" face. He gave a second look at the doctor who quickly let go of my wrist. He moved Mom and leaned over behind me on the table. I looked up into his face and knew he was angry. I also knew he wasn't angry with me. Dad was angry with the Doctor! I wasn't in trouble, now, the Doctor was. I sighed with relief.

"What's she supposed to do?" he growled into the face of the Doctor.

The Doctor was suddenly quiet, polite and considerate. "We want her to lay her hand flat on the center of the plate so we can take an X-ray," he stated in a voice like a teacher's. "I guess it is quite painful for her, " he finished.

Dad knew I wasn't stupid, not by a long shot. He usually talked to me just like I was grown up. I was crying more softly now and my hand was clutched next to my chest again. "Val," he said, "is that right?"

I looked at him above me. His face looked funny upside down but I didn't even grin. I nodded to him. He pulled my good hand gently to the right, stuffed my wonderful Teddy into it and let it go. I hugged Teddy - hard! "They can't make it stop hurting till they get the picture. Here's your damned bear. Put your hand on the plate."

I twisted and laid my bent arm across the plate and put each finger flat one at a time. My face was buried in my bear while I screamed into his tummy. The Doctor did NOT grab me this time.

The nurse did something that hummed and clicked and the doctor said, "We will have the results in about an hour, come back then. He went out, leaving the door open behind him.

My ordeal was over.

Dad picked me up and I calmed down a lot. All that was left of my 5 hour freak out were the hiccups and the mess.

We walked a little way down the hall to a lady's room door. Dad put me down and told us, "I'll meet you in the waiting room."

Mom and I went in to do the routine. I could have done it but Mom did it for me. She ran the water till it was good and cold while she got some brown paper towels from the dispenser then soaked them good. She laid one on the back of my neck and used the others to wash my face and hands and arms and knees and legs. Cooling down was part of the routine.

Using some dry ones she went after the mess on my shirt. It was pretty much hopeless but we both felt better for her trying. She got a comb out of her purse and worked carefully through the rats nest it had become. It took a while. I just stood there with my hand hidden under Teddy and my head hanging low.

When she finished I gave a great sigh and turned around to look at her. I must have still looked pretty pitiful. She dropped right down and hugged me carefully as I leaned my right side against her. "I'm really sorry, Mommy," I mummbled into her hair.

Then I told her everything, how the gift yo-yo got broken, about how it hurt my hand to slug Jay on his face, how it made me feel so bad inside that I hurt him and that I didn't know what to do to fix it. When I got through to "and that was why I wanted my horsie." I just stopped.

She had held me the whole time. Now she stood up. "When we get all done here and get things straightened out at home I will call Jay's Mother to see when you may go over and apologize. Dad will put your stick horse back together. It will all work out." and she reached for my good hand to lead me to the waiting area.

A load lifted off my chest that I hadn't realized was there. Now Mom would help me fix the mess I had made. What a wonderful thing a parent is!

It was about 1:00 now. Stop back for the final installment.

Wayback still, yes it's all one day

2005-03-02T10:02:00.000-05:00

We lived in a small town about 10 miles from anywhere. My Dad's folks had farms about seven miles south of town. My Mom's people lived in town about 10 blocks away. There was a doctor in town we saw when we needed attention. His office was about 7 blocks from the house. In those days he might set a broken arm but he didn't have any fancy machines. They cost too much money.

Inspite of the panic, Mom and Dad decided I had to go to the emergency room at the hospital in the next town. They knew I would need to have an X-ray. That meant that for 14 miles I kept crying and Mom tried to calm me while she wheeled down the roads like a ridge runner with my sirens reverberating in her ears. I was too short to see out the windows but I could tell by the trees that we were going FAST!

I cradled my wrapped hand next to my chest and protected it with my other hand. It throbbed and tingled and ached. Sobs shook me. I could NOT stop crying. I had reached the point where the tears perpetuated themselves. If I had been a baby I might have fallen asleep but I wasn't tired so I just kept sobbing. I couldn't hear what Mom was saying over my own noise so I could only sit there in my misery and bawl like a lost calf.

When the car screeched to a stop Mom jumped out, ran around the car, un-buckled my lap belt, lifted me up in her arms and ran into the hospital. Being moved made my hand send pain flairs clear to my shoulder. I was back at full throttle, full volumn in under ten seconds. Let me tell you, they don't make you wait in line when your kid is screaming like I was! We were showed right to an examining room and they made SURE the door was closed.

A nurse followed us in. I would guess she asked all the same questions they do now when you show up at emergency. While Mom answered her I huddled in a forlorn pile on the table where she had put me, shuddering with the force of my tears. I had no idea what we were doing. I only knew that I HURT and I wanted someone to make it STOP! When the nurse left Mom tried to hold me next to her and rock me but that hurt, too, and she quickly resorted to rubbing my back and crooning in my ear.

The real fun began when the doctor joined us. He spoke with my Mom a moment then stepped to the table and tried to talk to me. I was old enough to be ashamed to have snot all over my tear soaked shirt like a little kid and my hair every which way. I tried to hear him but I still couldn't stop crying and that was scaring me. I had never cried so much in my whole life.

When I managed to understand he wanted to examine my hand I moved the protective one down about 2 inches and tried to hold my hand out to him. Unbending my elbow sent arrows of fire ripping from my hand all over my body and I burst into a helpless, pathetic repetition of "Ow, ow, ow, owwie, OW!" through my tears. I will give him credit for trying to be understanding but I know he had never been in pain as totally encompassing as I was dealing with that day. I also knew he didn't have any kids.

I knew I had only hurt my hand but I hurt everywhere. My head throbbed, my eyes stung, my nose was swollen shut, my chest ached and my whole arm was frozen from pain.

The Doctor wanted me to let him MOVE the fingers on my hand! Every time he touched it I jerked it back and curled up around it. He and Mom would coax me back upright and I would try to cooperate again only to end up with a fresh scream bursting out of me when he touched that hand. He was getting upset. I remembered he said, "Mrs. P., If you can not control your child you will just have to take her ELSEWHERE!"

Completely stumped and frustrated, they decided to just get an X-ray. A nurse came in and pushed my table and me down to a funny smelling, dark room and left me there with my Mother.

I craved comfort and freedom from pain more than man in a desert craves water. I latched onto the idea that my Teddy Bear would make me feel better. I tried to tell Mom but now I had the hiccups as well as the endless tears. Understanding a little kid is hard most of the time and even my Mother had trouble sorting out the words from between the hiccups and the sobs. I knew she wasn't getting it so I just said it over and over. " I want my Teddy Bear." She finally got it and looked at me like I was nuts.

"Teddy's at home, Val. You can have him when we get home." she told me in an exasperated voice. I wanted him now.

The doctor came back in. He moved my table over by a big square plate and told me he wanted me to put my hand down flat in the middle of it. I understood, I tried, I cried and I failed; several times. I could get my whole arm over it with the elbow still bent, I could lay the whole arm on the plate, I just couldn't get the fingers to un-curl. It hurt too much.

After about five tries he took my wrist and tried to PUT my hand flat and I brought up emergency octave number one to full volumn. That had done it. Finally, I was afraid of him and his supposed to be firm but really mean and scary tone of voice and I curled up on my side and screeched, hiccupped, cried, "I want my TEDDY BEARRRRRRR!!"

He didn't know what to do. My Mom was in tears by this time and completely embarrassed by my behavior. No parent likes to see their child hurt and she KNEW I was in real pain. She also knew we had to have an X-ray to see how badly I had ruined my fingers but she couldn't stand to make me scream. I don't know what she said to the doctor but he went away and, in a little while, a nurse came back in holding a Teddy Bear in her hands. Mom had been rubbing my back and shusshing me again and I was a little calmer, like a tropical storm instead of a hurricane. I looked up when the nurse came in and knew instantly what she was trying to do. TRICK ME!

Did she think I was STUPID!? THAT thing wasn't my bear! It was a brand new, never been hugged PANDA bear. MY bear was a little brown flannel bear! I must have said all these things out loud because the nice nurse looked thunderstruck at my protest when she was trying to be kind.

Mom took the bear and brought it to me. "Here, Honey, here's a bear."

I managed to get one breath clear of any hiccups and shouted in despair, "NOT MY BEARRRRRRRRRR!" I collasped into fresh torrents. I am sure they were all amazed at my stamina and determination. I still had untapped tears that flooded down my face in a white water channel past my nose to run through my saturated shirt and into the waist band of my shorts even though I must have been crying for several hours.

It was almost noon. Stop back for the rest of the story.

From the Wayback Machine (continued)

2005-02-25T13:18:00.000-05:00

For those of you who may be landing from a search engine - Please read the previous post before continuing. For the rest of you, apologies for leaving you hang so long!

I walked over closer to the window to make sure the stick propping it up really belonged to my stick horse. I couldn't really believe my parents had taken my horse apart just to hold a window up! There was no doubt. The chipped brown paint matched the brown mane on my horse's head.

I didn't reflect on what might happen, I was only almost five. I just reached out and grabbed the stick with my right hand and braced my left on the window sill. Now, I wasn't especially tall for a 4 and a half year old girl, so I could only reach about one third of the way up the stick. It did not give me much real leverage. I gave a test tug on the stick; Nothing. It was in there and well anchored. I leaned back with my weight on my right hand and gave a little bigger tug; no results.

I was getting frustrated. I wanted my horsie! looked the problem over and thought I saw how to make it work. I had to push up about an inch to get the bottom of the stick to clear the sill and then pull it out. "OK, I can do that," I thought.

I tossed my hair back out of the way to see better, brought one foot up to the mop board on the wall and got my toes on the edge of it. I braced the other foot right where the floor and mop board met. I shifted my grip on the rod and wrapped my left hand over the inside edge of the sill. Jumping from my floor foot to the toes of the foot on top of the mop board, I pushed up, hard, on the stick. My right foot came up off the floor and, for a second, I was up there only on the toes of my left foot, and my left hand. The window rose a little bit. I took a deep breath and pushed harder with my right arm and felt it raise a little more. I looked down to see that I had the end of my horse clear of the sill and yanked the stick out of the window.

I must have been more balanced than I thought because I had the stick clutched right in front of myself when the window made a horrific noise, slapped down in the frame at the speed of light and trapped the fingers of my left hand between the sill and the window. I was still perched on the mop board. I know because I had to step down before I could try to pull my hand out.

(I hate this next part. If any of you have dealt with this so it doesn't completely panic you I would like to know your trick. )

It went like this, jerk stick, bad noise, window falls, tried to step back, realized I was stuck. Shock hits. NOW I feel the pain burst and spread like a huge firework went off in my hand. I took a deep breath to scream and couldn't scream and couldn't breathe. I felt like I had a great big plug of air caught in my mouth and nose. I probably turned blue from not being able to exhale and inhale again. It lasted impossibly long. I kept trying to breathe. I started stomping my feet in my panic, one, then the other, as fast as I could trying to shake my breath loose. It was useless.

Then, suddenly, for no apparent reason, the scream I was striving for burst out like a siren and I had no control over it whatsoever. I screeched at the top of my lungs forever. Then I was panting, sobbing, screaming, running in place and, finally, breathing just to scream again. But nobody came.

In a family with (eventually) five children you learn to distinguish between annoyed shrieking, angry fighting screeches and intense pain screaming reliably by the third child. Believe me, this screaming established a new high for screaming in pain. It threw my parents into emergency overdrive.

My mom dropped Ar, 9 months old and Cee, almost 2 years old, into the playpen in the dining room as she flew from the bathroom and raced up the stairs. She was headed for the room I shared with Vee.

My Dad jumped out of bed, pulled on his jeans and slammed out the door of his room to run down stairs. That woke my sister Vee up and she joined her startled cries to those of the little girls down stairs. We were NOT in harmony.

"Where is she?!!" Dad shouted.

"I don't know!!" my Mom wailed back.

Mom was running to look where I should have been. Dad ran out the back door where it sounded like I was. Not finding me, they both ran back the way they came and started banging doors open all over the house to find me. They looked in the closets and the basement and Dad had run all the way around the house. I was no where to be seen, but, they sure could hear me!

If you go back to the first Wayback entry and look at the picture you will see that the garage sat back from the front of the house. The window I was trapped by looked right out at the garage wall. The echoes went over to the garage from the glass I was screaming against. It made my screams sound loud through Dad's upstairs window just above that one, like I was outside. The sound was stopped at the solid wood door to the room I had closed behind me to avoid discovery. I was being muffled by the door. My folks weren't incompetent, they just couldn't get an audio fix on me.

It seemed to take hours for someone to find me. When Mom finally threw the door open it flew so hard that the knob made a hole in the wall. She ran in and started trying to raise the window with me screaming and dancing relentlessly below her. She hollered to tell Dad where I was as she struggled to get the window up and comfort me with words as best she could at the same time.

Dad ran in, grabbed the door and slammed it shut behind him, which is when I noticed the hole in the wall. That scared me because I thought I would be in trouble for the hole, too, and I took my pitch up an octave. That scared them because they thought I was hurting worse, if that was possible.

Believe me, my Dad was a strong man. One time, he and a pal were working on a Volkswagen Beetle. His friend was working under it when it fell off the jack! Dad just grabbed the bumper, laughing the whole time, and held the car up while his buddy put the jack back under it the right way. I knew HE could help me.

Dad moved Mom back, stepped up to the window and put all his strength, with both hands, into trying to shove the sash up. Mom was trying to comfort me and hollering at Dad to get it up and he was hollering at me to hush and hollering at her to shut me up and get out of his way. My fingers must have been just chubby enough to really wedge the window and he could NOT get it to go up. Now I was really scared! Dad couldn't save me! The screams went into a syncopated rhythm.

Three kids crying, one screaming under his feet; wife hollering; He lost it. Dad stepped back from the window and turned like he was pitching baseball. His fist went up over his head and all the way around, just like "Around the World". It came back up as he stepped forward and slugged that window right in the center of the cross bar! His arm went around again, Mom snatched me back before the window could fall, and he put that same fist right through the solid oak door! BAM!

Things get fuzzy and blank for a little bit after that. Mom had scooped me up but was hollering at Dad for breaking the door and something about the Doctor. I remember being VERY impressed because the window had stayed up. Dad had rammed it till it wedged right at the top of the frame and then I think I passed out for a little while, probably for lack of oxygen.

Next thing I know I am in the front seat of the car and Mom is hollering at me to stop screaming. My fingers were wrapped in a cold, wet rag and hurt like I could not believe!

I don't think it was even 8:30 yet but it seemed to last a lifetime for me...

Stop back, the day's not over yet.

From the Wayback Machine

2005-02-25T00:47:00.000-05:00

I used to call this my worst day ever. I thought I got it out of the way young and nothing would ever be worse. Like most children, I was wrong. It is still very near the top of the list of my bad days.

When I was little we lived is a faded yellow two story house with a small garage near the back. It was at the bottom of one hill and across the street from the top of another hill. There was a big catalpa tree and a big box elder on either side of the front and 2 more big trees out back. I drew this picture so you could get an idea of the layout.

Across the street a dirt path ran through several rock piles, down to the big trees and over to the back door of the old stone church on the next block. There was only about 6 feet of "hill top".

One day, my Uncle, who was 9 years older than me, gave me a blue glass Duncan Yo-Yo. For those of you that missed that yo-yo craze, this was a class A number One gift - especially for a girl only 4 and a half years old. Duncan was top of the line - the coolest yo-yo you could have. The glass ones were the fastest and smoothest spinning you could get. (just remember, I was 4 going on 5, NOT a reliable source for reviews). I had only owned this treasure a few days but I had lived with it in my hand practically every minute. It gleamed in the sun and sent blue flashes every where when you flipped it down in the light. I loved it. Really!

I woke, one day, to a bright, sunny morning. I was the only one up. At that point in my life this was my favorite time of the day. I decided right away to do my favorite thing. I dressed quickly and ran outside. I was all by myself, no little sisters to watch! That was joy. I hopped down off the porch into the yard and walked over to a sunny patch on the front walk. The dew on the grass left streaks on my sneakers and the world's freshest scent in my nose. The sky was spotted with puffy, white clouds and the sun shone on all the world. I stood in the sun working on "Around the World". I might have done better if I wasn't trying to see every blue star flashed against the house from the blue glass wonder in my hand.

"Hey, what'cha doin'?" I startled. I heard the voice but saw no one! I looked around and spotted my neighbor boy, Jay, climbing up the path across the street.

"Nothing," I answered, "just playing with my yo-yo."

I flipped the yo-yo into my hand easily and strolled across the yard, and stopped at the curb. I very carefully looked both ways and listened for cars from the top of the hill behind me. Street crossing 101 was enforced vigorously by my parents. I was ALWAYS careful. I saw no cars and heard no cars so I crossed the street to meet him.

Look what I've got!" I said as we met just below the top of the hill. There were no trees over here to block the sun and I flourished my marvelous yo-yo with a twist of my wrist to make the blue flashing stars dance on the rocks and grass around us.

Jay's eyes got round and his hand slid out, palm up, all by itself to ask for a turn. "That is so neat!" he exclaimed.

I tossed it a couple of times, to show it was my toy, but the second rule I learned as a child was "Share nicely!" so I handed it to him and told him, "Here, have a turn."

Jay was taller than I was and could yo pretty good, for a boy. He popped it up and down a few times then tried "Walking the Dog" but it was too rough on the dirt path for it to work very well. Next he tried "Rocking the Baby" but the yo-yo wrapped itself around his arm and smacked him in the elbow. He made his face stay still, mostly, but he winced a little around the eyes. I knew it hurt.

Untangling the string, he rewound the blue marvel and the light flashed in my eyes once. "One more trick, then it's my turn again, OK?", I requested.

"OK. What do you want to see?" He asked it like he could do any trick in the book. I, quite predictably, asked for "Around the World" as it was the one I was trying to learn. So, Jay dipped and retrieved the glistening glass yo-yo three times to get the string tightened back up and went for it.

For those of you who don't yo, this trick sends the yo-yo out from your hand to the end of the string, then you give it a fancy jerk and it is supposed to make a full revolution back over your shoulder, past your leg then back up in front of you, in a big circle, before you snap it back into your hand.

He started out OK. It went out, it went up and it went over - but it never made it back to his hand. CRASH!!!! There was a rock about knee high to us and a foot around just behind his right foot. Now, most yo-yo's would have been fine. They might have come apart at the spindle but you could fix them. That's not the program with a glass one. Little, brittle shards laid about that rock in a starburst pattern and all that was left on the still swinging string was one tiny piece on each side of the spindle.

Jay's mouth was hanging open and he looked horrified. I am sure my face echoed his dismay. We couldn't believe it. I felt my mouth turn down, I started to tear up and Jay cried, "Oh, Val, I'm really sorry!" I knew he truly meant it but then, I thought, "Uncle gave me that! I'll never get another one!" It was a shriek inside my head, then I just got angry. Right NOW!

This all took just a split second or three. He no more than got the words out when I wound my arm up like Popeye and nailed him a solid one, right beside his nose. His mouth made that open rainbow shape, his hand jumped to his face and he started to cry. I was already crying. I couldn't believe I had slugged, not slapped but SLUGGED my best friend.

Crying, I snatched the string out of his other hand, screaming at him the whole time that he was mean and did it on purpose because he didn't have one. I knew I was lying even as little as I was. He turned and ran down the hill for home with me shouting mean things after him. Stunned, I watched him till he was lost in the trees at the bottom of the hill. I turned woodenly and ran up the hill for home.

Tears were soaking my shirt and I could hardly see with my face screwed around to cry my heart out. Still, I stopped at the top of the hill, looked as best I could and listened for anyone coming down the hill before I ran across the street. Up the walk, up the steps, across the porch, I stumbled, still crying loudly. I yanked the door open, let it spring closed behind me and ran up the stairs to my room.

I mourned that lovely gift but my real hurt was that I had hurt Jay. I had never hurt anyone before. My hand could still feel where the knuckles hit his nose and cheek bones. I knew he would never talk to me again. I cried over that for a time and when the sobs finally subsided to whimpers I went to the bathroom for the routine.

Mom always had us wash our face and hands with cold water then brush our hair after we cried. I don't know why, but even now it seems to put me back together after a cry. So I did the routine, walked back to my room and decided I needed my stick horse. He was my favorite toy before the yo-yo arrived and I wanted the comfort of him. We would ride the range and rescue wagon trains. We would forget all about this bad thing I had done.

My mom had made us all stick horses for Christmas that year. They were bi-colored men's hunting socks with button eyes, yarn manes and embroidered mouths. We all loved them. We rode everywhere, the back yard, the hill, the front yard and around to the side of the garage. I couldn't find mine. Well, where could he be? He wasn't in my room, not anywhere, even under the bed. I started to look for him. Not in the bathroom, not in the hall; I went downstairs; not in the kitchen...hmmm. Living room? Nope.

Well, he wasn't in my room, not anywhere. I started to look for him. Not in the bathroom, not in the hall, downstairs - not in the kitchen...hmmm. Living room? Nope.

I could hear Mom in the downstairs bathroom getting the little girls dressed. It was safe, so I went in the little girl's bedroom off the living room. I looked around , under the beds and still didn't see him. I turned to leave and THERE he was - but just his head! It was on the floor in the corner by the door. I was horrified! I searched around for the rest of him frantically.

This was an old house back then. It's hard to believe it still stands today. The windows wouldn't stay up without a prop. There was something broken inside them. We always had a stick or something holding them open. I was gazing out the window at the side of the garage after looking in the closet when I realized that the brown stick in the window on a diagonal was the rest of my stick horse!.

This is all before eight o'clock in the morning on a beautiful day. I'll have to continue the rest of this day tomorrow, it's late.

Outside?

2005-02-24T13:09:00.000-05:00

What is outside? I hear this question a lot from younger people. Outside is the place between you and the car, you and the bus or you and the school. It is not just for walking through. There are fascinating things to be found or done outside.

Why would we be outside? Wasn't it cold and dirty? Where was the Internet, the Nintendo 64, X-Box, Game Boy, Play Station and the T.V., VCR and DVD?

There was no public internet at that time, not even dial-up. Our telephone was black, square and had a dial on it you had to spin to dial a number. Our phone number was 318. Yes, only 3 digits. Our ring was two short and a long. It was a party line. That meant that up to 5 families used the same phone line. They all had a different ring. You had to pick up the handset and listen for a dial tone. If you heard a voice talking you hung up and waited till later to make your call. If it was an emergency you could ask them to hang up so you could call the doctor or the police. They would know if you lied because most of them lived on the same street as you did. You can forget a dial up net connection!

Forget about satelite or cable connections through the T.V. The large, wooden case for the T.V. had a small screen in it because larger ones were harder to make. The screen was a big vacuume tube. You had to walk over to it and turn it on then turn a knob to the correct channel. No remotes. "It's her turn to change it!" was a common whine back then.

When you got it turned on, without blowing a tube or a fuse, you had to wait for the inside vacuume tubes to warm up. A little blue dot would show in the center of the huge picture tube to let you know it was on. You could count to ten or fifteen before it would suddenly expand into a large, white, snowy screen that would begin to have voices on it before it showed a picture.

Once you could see the picture you turned the rabbit ear antenna to get a better picture. There were THREE channels to choose from, even though the knob had more numbers on it, and they all had to be tuned in differently. So no Internet through the T.V.. There was hardly any T.V. through the thing! It would not run any game systems, either.

Electronics was a new field for science. As for all the fun toys you have, they weren't invented yet when I was little so we went outside to play.

Outside in town and outside at the farm were two different places with completely different rules that had to be followed at all times.

In town you had to:
Never talk to strangers.
Never get into a stranger's car.
Stay away from the street.
Stop, look and listen before crossing the street.
Never run into or across the street.
Never throw a ball toward the street.
Never throw anything toward a house.
The last two limited throwing games severely.

If a toy went into another yard you had to walk over, using the sidewalk, go to the front door, knock, and wait till they decided it was safe to open the door. You then said "Hello Mrs. Neighbor Lady. May I please get "your toy here" out of your yard?" If they said yes you could walk in their yard around to where the offending item landed and pick it up. You had to go back out to the front walk, say good bye if they were standing there and use the sidewalk to go home. This was called "respecting your elders and respecting other people's property". They were free to say no or ask you to send your parent over if there was a serious problem with repeat offenses. You did NOT want that to happen!

Outside at the farm was a whole different ballgame. You couldn't cross the road, really, there were only fields over there. You did have to stay on the right to walk or ride down to the Great Grama's house. The "strangers rules" and "throwing anything at houses" were the same here but there were different ones that were more important.
Never chase the cows.
Don't scare the chickens.
Stay out of the pig's pen, the tool shed, the strawberry patch.
Walk between the rows in the fields.
Don't play with the tractor.
Never get in the field with the bull.
Watch out for poison ivy, oak and sumac (pronounced shoe mac).
Ask before getting Uncle's toys out.

In addition to remembering all that I could not let the little kids break any of these rules. I was the oldest. I'll cover that more, later.

First Warning

2005-02-23T15:50:00.000-05:00

This blog will cover the parts of my life I can remember. I will strive for more or less cronological order. I am going all the way from the time I was small to the present. There will be kindness, cruelty, adventures, meanness, active sex - mine and others, drugs, drinking, smoking of assorted kinds, and probably some foul language. Will you run or will you stay? Your choice. Do NOT whine if you are offended.

From the original child to my early teens when I lived as a rural farm girl just learning about sex we will continue to the months I spent as a runaway, my return as a "hippie" and the conflict it caused. The second exodus, that lead to self sufficency, will cover to pregnacy, married with children and extend excruciatingly through destroyed ex-wife and mother. We will then follow the wandering accoustic entertainer/hitchhiker through the US, several relationships and one more marriage that topples before we reach my currently stable and content life.

It was an amazing trip.

Herstorical Notes

2005-02-23T15:44:00.000-05:00

I have begun excavating my life for posterity. There will be no editing for socially acceptable phrasing or actions. If you can't deal with reality or are easily offended by grapic depictions of life I suggest you move on to a more gentle blog.