Childhood

I’m coming up on another birthday, which always starts me thinking back on my childhood. (It’s still a week away, so there’s no need to start sending along birthday wishes. Yet.) As the years march on and the distance between “then” and “now” increases, it is easy to succumb to the temptation to add some spit and polish to those days gone by. Did I have an idyllic childhood? I don’t know. Here are the facts, as unpolished as I can make them.

Good things happened.

Bad things happened.

I was the youngest of six children and the only girl in my family.

I got dirty.

I cleaned up in a claw-foot bathtub. (No showers in our home.)

I climbed trees (a lot).

I laughed often.

I cried sometimes.

Me, in the center of my kindergarten class

Alice Kelly and me in the sandbox.

My mom was my kindergarten teacher. 

I got both mumps and measles in kindergarten.

I walked to my elementary school.

I liked school.

I didn’t like having my hair brushed.

I liked playing in the sandbox.

Once, I buried my hairbrush in the sandbox.

We had horses, and I rode often.

I liked the smell of leather.

I loved the smell of horses.

We went to church every Sunday, except when there was a trail ride.

Loving a cat

Early days on a horse

I took things apart, often without permission. Most never worked again.

I built things, with a hammer and nails and scraps of wood. (I am sure I am the only one who could have identified them.)

I loved the smell of the lumberyard.

I had many pets over the years, mostly cats, dogs, guinea pigs, rabbits, and fish (and horses, if they count as pets).

I had a good deal of heartbreak, when those pets died.

I had a recurring dream that all my fish who ever died were suddenly alive in my fish tank.

I was in 4-H.

I took things to the county fair, including my horse.

I learned to sew in 7^th grade. I mostly loved it, except when I hated it (like when I made huge mistakes).

I learned to swim “well enough” but not well.

I still loved to go to the swimming pool with the neighborhood kids.

I rode a bike everywhere.

I still have scars from a major bike wipe out. I was riding double after being told not to do that.

I liked blanket forts and chair trains.

I insisted on trying to nurse injured baby birds back to health. They never lived.

In our neighborhood, we played flashlight tag after dark. We caught fireflies. We would lie on our backs in the grass and look at the stars.

I remember my mom using a wringer washing machine.

When there was a snow day, my mom would throw "blizzard parties."

My mom made hot chocolate from scratch.

My mom made (almost) everything from scratch.

My mom never used a timer. She just knew when things were done. (I have never developed that skill/talent. When I fail to use a timer, things burn.)

I remember the wonderful taste of warm milk, fresh out of the pasteurizer.

I played the flute, starting in the summer after third grade. We had lessons in the summer as well as lessons during the school year, all provided by the school district.

I took many years of piano lessons but never learned to play well.

Coming down with a "smile" on my face.

My brothers taught me to play guitar.

I sometimes took my guitar to my piano lessons, so I could prove I could play something well.

I was sometimes told, “Go upstairs, and don’t come down until you have a smile on your face.”

I liked singing hymns.

I became an aunt at age 12, and I thought being an aunt was THE best thing in the world. (Still love it, and all my wonderful nieces and nephews.)

Here I am, reading to some of my nieces and nephews.

Good things happened.

Bad things happened.

Childhood happened, and it happened a good number of years ago.

Polished or not, I think it was pretty wonderful.