MPT #13 11th and 12th grade: where do i go from here?

here is my senior portrait...mighty class of 1990...i really don't like this photo...i don't like what i'm wearing, my perm or my smile...i feel fake and made up for someone other than myself...which i'm sure i was...i am probably even wearing a little make-up which i still don't know how to apply and never wear now...i didn't have a "theme" for this last post in my journey through my childhood...nor do i have time to adequately write all the ideas competing in my head...so true to form my procrastination is going to require i write a pseudo partial post now and follow up with more details in the next few days...and i don't forsee reading anyone else's posts anytime soon so if i happen to have any readers/comments i'll have to reply much later this week...ok, with all those disclaimers i'll write a little about the next few photos and supplement say wednesday night...

this photo i believe is from my 16th birthday but it may be my 18th...my birthday is february 15 so president's day weekend usually fell on my birthday (my husband's is the 12th--lincoln's birthday) and people were often out of town and couldn't attend my parties...i actually look happy here...a little sun-kissed...i have always loved the sun
i chuckle every time i see this photo taken in my parent's side yard...not sure what i was posing for...i feel very dopey and not attractive but with all my other problems body image remained ok so i'm posting it for that alone...
this one shows a little more of my depressive, reflective side...i didn't show this to many people...not sure what i was thinking or trying to depict when the photo was taken but it feels more authentic and true to "me" at the time...
i have many photos from graduation and many stories through the 4 years in high school if i can just find the time...i've enjoyed the journey if i don't get much more than this up...off to start a co-operative preschool for my youngest, story, not quite 3...

i didn't write a theme for this post because the thought in my head was "where do i go from here?" both the unknowns and lack of direction from high school and where do i go from taking this journey of recording my childhood? thanks for following me on mommy's piggytales MPT...not sure if we have a "post-high school" post or not but i'll probably write something about the journey and where i'm at now with resolution or what i've figure out reflecting on my past...don't expect that for another week or so, though...

thank you, janna for an awesome opportunity...i may participate again some time when i have more time to write more reflective/detailed entries...

one last idea...i felt my obsession with one guy, kerwin, defined most of my high school experience and was interested to learn that several of the people on my 20-year high school reunion planning committee didn't even know...i think we were all too self-absorbed...we probably are all still too self-absorbed...hoping to put my focus more on my children who, by the way are climbing all the way up on my shoulders as i type :)

MPT #12 9th and 10th grade: search for meaning and identity

this was my 9th grade ID card...i actually liked it better than any other year...in between the feathered 8th grade hair and super curly permed hair of later high school years (photo below)...i was always on a quest for meaning and trying to figure out "who am i?" analyzing myself, life, what mattered...i always remember reading pop psychology books, personality books, philosophical idealistic books, anything i could get my hands on to figure out who i was...i always felt like i needed to deal with the "deeper" side of life which isn't really the focus for most people in high school...i was also quite social and the counselor or confidant to many (gave guys i had crushes on advice on how to get the girls they were interested in)...

i also spent way too many hours of my life writing in journals...analyzing myself, my motives, my dreams, my interests...so self-absorbed writing all the minutia of what i thought about instead of what i did...

i was trying to find my tattered and torn copy of "please understand me" which summarizes the meyers-briggs personality test into every day terms...unfortunately it was so over used and missing so many pages i finally tossed it and haven't replaced it...i am an ENFP which means i'm Extroverted (like people), iNtuitive (make decisions about life based on my inner sense rather than reality), Feeling (follow my heart over my head) and Perceptive (like my options open instead of set and structured). i found a book on temperament which summarizes my type as the "advocate"; an idealist who focus on the growth potential in themselves and others and wants a part in the process...always seeking to know who i am, the search for my "true" self...integrity is the foundation of my self-esteem (oh boy...i was always betraying myself in high school...giving in to gossip or saying what i needed to say in any moment to be liked by people i probably didn't even like that well...i hated how i was such a chameleon changing to fit my environment)...

i'm going to quote out of this book as it was so true for me "desperate to please on one hand, yet fiercely guarding their integrity on the other, they must skate on the razor's edge, no easy feat. they can never be sure they are real because their integrity is more important to them than their sense of reality"

"...their mission in life is to have a mission in life, thus putting missions just out of reach...they try to be spontaneous so spontaneity eludes them...they consciously avoid self consciousness and so are all the more self conscious. they wish to be in touch with their feelings, only to lose the very feelings they want to experience more intensely..."

oh, man, i'm feeling depressed just reading this. i definitely suffered from depression in high school. only my family really needed me to be ok, happy all the time, no conflict, no sadness...so i gave them that outwardly and internalized too much...sorry for the therapy moment...i think by the end of this week i'll be ready to reflect on what i was hoping to gain from this adventure to my past...i think i've learned how far i've come and how i have an opportunity to allow my children to LIVE their life instead of always stressing they aren't doing it good enough...so many regrets from high school i analyzed everything instead of doing it...i would have dated, taken risks...allowed myself to love and be loved...

i should add one other personality test i took informed me i was "melancholy-sanguine" which to those of you who know a LITTLE about this know it was quite the polar opposites together...i was basically intense, depressive yet social and outwardly happy...

i wish people knew me better. i wish i let them. i wish i knew my classmates better. i wish i had more time to write about this but my son needs me in this moment and that is more important...

i've joined mommy's piggytales MPT recording my childhood a year per week...by the end of the week i'll have finished up high school...check back tomorrow for more details...

MPT #11: 8th grade lucky to have my dad

i'm obviously not 13 going on 14 in this first photo...but it is our last post before christmas so i thought i'd focus much of this post on how we celebrated xmas...specifically memories of my dad...today, december 18 is his birthday...he would have been 70. he died 4.5 years ago just after his 65th birthday. i had hoped to take him on a harbor cruise or at least out to dinner by the bay here in san diego where he could watch the parade of lights (boats decorated with lights that create a parade on the water) for his 65th but late planning didn't allow this so i always have regrets he never got to do that even though he was always just happy to spend time with us and didn't care the "what"...he was always my cheerleader and would literally shout out "hip-hip-hooRRAYYYY" type cheers with his fists in the air and a huge cheesy smile and i'd roll my eyes and be embarrassed but he was our advocate when we needed him and junior high was definitely a difficult time!

i forgot in seventh grade to write about being pulled into my teacher's office to hear my dad had been in a serious car accident right after dropping us off at school and he had broken his neck and was transported to a nearby hospital. he had some disease as a child so he always had a stiff neck but wearing a halo and going through the recovery was yet another example of his "many lives" he weathered with no complaints...

[i'm doing a bad job watching my 2.5 and 5-year-olds right now rushing to get this out...plus trying to work on xmas cards...so i'll hope to edit this post later and probably won't read yours until the middle of next week when i visit my mom and she can watch the kids...so i'll be brief...]

this next photo again shows my horrible feathered hair...i'm holding my little cousin ally i was telling you about last time...the one who is in her 20's now and engaged!
this next photo makes me laugh in part because i can tell i "tried" to wear make-up and my curly feathered hair and semi-formal set-up but the main reason i get a chuckle out of this photo is my mom was SO intimated my the woman who hosted these parties...her name was kay bayor and she was like bree on the desperate housewives...always put together with the perfectly created homemade items for any occasion...all details covered...my mom would always say she could never have this woman over to her house because she could never pull that off and i reminded her the lady probably enjoyed entertaining and having people over so i always strive to allow visitors even in the messiest of circumstances...
ok kids are taking over the computer so more later...i'll leave you another photo again not from 8th grade but with the xmas theme of me and my sister...

i'm recording my childhood a year every friday through MPT (mommy's piggytales)...thanks for joining me!

MPT #10 7th grade: misunderstood and what didn't happen

oh man, 7th grade was rough for me...one of the roughest of my childhood years...i'm not sure if it was all the hormones and puberty stuff (mine were late to kick in remember) but everything was so dramatic and i was so emotional and heart broken over things...cara was still my best friend (here you finally get to see a better close-up of her)...we had one of our biggest fights complete with pages and pages of lined 3 ring notebook paper notes trying to explain ourselves and i remember it ended with her not wanting to be my friend anymore and me running out of the classroom sobbing and so i got a drink of water at the drinking fountain to calm down and when i came back in she said something like "you aren't really upset, you just put water on your face to look like you were crying"...i felt so misunderstood which was a common theme through most of my childhood and life...i'm sure i wrote some really mean things to her, too...i know once she had boyfriends i always told them like the worst things i could think of about her because i was jealous...honestly we were such close friends it felt like we "broke up" a few times! or maybe it is because i never had boyfriends...i was quick to become the confidant or adviser to the boys...the perpetual "friend" instead of "girlfriend"...

i also have a very vivid memory of the "in" colors for the couple years i was in junior high...anything florescent! i'll have to dig up some photos of these...and "feathered" hair...this was NOT an attractive style on me...remember i was already awkward being so tall and not growing into my big size but a late bloomer...no period until high school...no first kiss...no boyfriend...i think this year was more marked by what DIDN'T happen...i'll be curious to read the other posts!

i also remember the "cool" or "in" crowd definitely became a lot more pronounced this year...cara and i were kind of off on our own though there were lots of guys interested in her...

school became challenging for the first time for me...i always enjoyed learning and still do but i remember having to work at it for the first time this year...i had a wonderful english teacher, ms. taber who taught me a LOT about grammar (sorry you can't tell that in my posts!)...

here is a family photo from that time...those horrible collars make my sister and i look like quakers or pilgrims or something but you can see we both had the feathered hair...

i've never been good with style...currently i'm fairly ecclectic and "hippy" in throwing together comfortable and colorful clothes but back in the day the way you dressed and how you did your hair and make-up really mattered...so i definitely failed at all of those. i remember cara was good at both and would give me advice and/or do my make-up...i suppose i eventually rebelled or found my own style by NOT wearing make-up...or more likely because my mom would say things like "you would look so much prettier if you wore a little make-up"...sure way to get a teen to NOT wear make-up...

i only had a couple minutes to write something so i'll try to edit this post and write more over the weekend...finally wrote 6th grade if you are interested...i really want to go back and read all yours...just haven't found the time...i did start keeping a really regular journal in 7th grade so it would be interesting to put some of the things i wrote about in here...now to find it....

i'm recording my childhood one year every friday through MPT "mommy's piggytales"...thanks for joining me!

MPT #9 6th grade: loss, guilt and training bras

in sixth grade i had ms. fund as my teacher...things were definitely looking up from 5th grade though i notice the polo shirt which probably had a matching pair of baby blue pants with a pink horsie...oh how to avoid those trendy "cool" items with my own child who is already telling me what the kids like and don't like...speaking of baby blue...it was 1983 and 1984 and baby blue was THE color for eye shadow and eyeliner and even mascara...i remember experimenting with this using those magic crystals that grow...my best friend cara and i took them from our class and put them on our eyes in the bathroom...i remember sharing a lot of secrets in those bathrooms, whispering, passing notes trying to figure a lot out during these pre-teen years...i was still very awkward...most of elementary school i remember being too big for my self-confidence...i was one of the tallest girls (or children for that matter) in my grade but quite insecure so i walked in a clumsy way and tripped over my long limbs so-to-speak...i was also a very "late bloomer" wearing training bras when i had nothing to train...

i could check with my mom to get the specific dates/years correct but i'll go by memory about my her parents...i believe my grandma had a heart attack and was in the hospital and then her husband called my mom up in the middle of the night and said he couldn't breathe so my mom said to sit up and she would be right there...she found him dead (i was too young to understand all these details at the time)...that was maybe june of 1983 the end of 5th grade and then they didn't want to tell my grandma he had died because they thought with her heart attack she might not survive the news...i don't remember who told her or how but sure enough she died the following may...here is a photo of them with me and my mom...
i'm not sure if i already mentioned how my mom's mom had more or less resigned herself to never marrying when she literally bumped into my mom's dad going around a corner in the hospital where she worked....he fell in love at first sight and pursued her despite her bitterness and pride and brushing him off for some time and my mom thinks she was a mistake since her mom had her at age 40 or so which was unheard of old at the time...so needless to say they were both born like 1901 or something so they were 73 when i was born and 84 or so when they died...i felt like i never got to know either of them in part because they were both private people who didn't share much of themselves but possibly also the fact that we were really different from one another and didn't understand one another and i was young and hyper and too much for them to handle at their age. anyway, i felt like i really let me grandma down and i remember the day she was buried i wrote her a long letter that i poured out my guilt and sadness over not being a better grandchild...details i still remember like how i wished i'd learned how to sew from her and appreciated the sewing kit she gave me (that lay unused and unopened in my closet)...i tucked this note into one of the flower bouquets on top of her grave and somehow idealized when God came it would still be there and she would read it. i chuckle reading this now but i spent a LONG time feeling so guilty and ashamed and didn't know who to share this with or what to do with these unresolved feelings. i'm sure my parents had no idea. i resolve to encourage my children to share how they feel with me but i'm sure this could happen to them, too. anyway, it is interesting because after my dad died 4 years ago i had similar guilt feelings...why didn't i hug him that last day, conversations i wish i'd had, etc. even though i always tried to live without regrets with him knowing he had a heart condition and could die anytime...this theme continues with other people who have died in my life and i wonder where all the guilt came from? i know one other contributor in group 3 wrote about this if i can find the post maybe we can brainstorm on it more...

so on to lighter brighter memories...i remember being in the school parade...the first purple clown is our friend sarah that we babysat after school...next is my sister and the girl looking the other way with the green around her neck is my dear friend cara...i have the white face and too big smile next to her...

i went over to cara's house a lot and she came over to mine...some specific memories i have through elementary include going up and down the laundry shoot from our 2nd floor to the basement laundry room...climbing through the garbage shoot (my parents had a hole cut in a cupboard so that the large garbage can could fit in the back and you could take the garbage out from outside...nice IDEA but super disgusting dirty inside...i think i was forced to do this when we locked ourselves out one day)...i think i already wrote about riding down the hill leading to our house in a little red wagon using the handle to steer, we also were active in gymnastics and swimming every year and still taking piano lessons without practicing or enjoying it...funny, i LOVED gymnastics even though i was way too tall for the sport and not that good at it...later in acro-sports or whatever it became called they wanted me to be a base instead of climbing up on top and that is about when it was no longer fun and i quit...

here is my dear dog snowflake (i named him) on our front porch...he looked like benji only white...i just learned recently this may be a breed of some sort but as a child i always thought he was a mixed mutt from the pound...
i'm losing steam on this post...saying goodbye to elementary and wishing i had more memories or that i had shared more or that i had done things differently or not been so insecure or appreciated my youth...my dad was always very upbeat, optimistic and seeing the glass half full or the donut instead of the hole or however the saying goes so he did help me appreciate much...i guess i'm thinking about loss and guilt and how those feelings spill over into today and feeling extra sad without my dad right now...this last photo reminds me a lot of him because he loved to walk...i want to say he walked every day (when he wasn't swimming or doing some other exercise that was low impact but moving as quickly as he could with his arthritis and stiff neck from some childhood illness)...i often walked with him and was proud i could walk faster than him from an early age...in part because i had such long legs...anyway, we would take a dirt road up behind our house to the "water tower" with our dog snowflake...here is photo of part of that walk...
life is a journey so i know i have a lifetime of opportunities to appreciate all the little things and make more memories...thank you for sharing these records of my childhood with me. i'm going to try and read all 21 MPT 6th grade posts in the next 24 hours...

i'm recording my childhood through MPT mommy's piggytales writing one year at a time every friday...this friday i'll write about 7th grade...

MPT #7 5th grade: inclusion, exclusion and isolation

well i waited until the last minute for 5th grade...probably because it was another difficult year for me...i had mrs. seagul who was an elderly woman who said she had never had a class as challenging and mean to her in her entire tenure (she retired after our class)...i wasn't mean to her but i felt like i was one of the only people of my friends in the "uncool" class...lots of troubled classmates all in one class...

this was the year when a lot of cliques and clubs and ways of segregating "us" and "them" formed...for example, i vividly remember "the unicorn club" which was a brand of clothing that was cool in that grade...you could only be in this cool club if you had a label with said unicorn on it...they tended to make like hot pink pants with a purple unicorn that matched a purple shirt with a hot pink unicorn logo...i remember these colors were cool because i had gone through a growth spurt and got a new set of clothes...within a couple years i was not growing and then it was early 80's and fluorescent colors were in when i had a wardrobe of hot pink, turquoise and hot pink.

on this free associating journey i also remember loving the song "flashdance" by irene cara and wearing let warmers and shirts off the shoulder to go along with her video. "what a fEELING...feels believing...i can have it all if i dance right..." don't have time to verify this recollection of the lyrics...i did some sort of gynastics number to this...

one of the most painful memories from this time period was the friends who used to rotate as my "best friend" decided we needed to have a very important group meeting nearly every lunch where they would in all seriousness tell one another things like "i think you should know you have a very ugly nose" or just disclose to one another all the horrible things we thought about one another under the guise of being a good friend to "help" one another...it was horrible...

i'll have to write more late tonight...

this is post #7 of 12 recording my childhood through mommy's piggy tales (MPT)....

MPT #6 4th grade: back to normal

here is my school picture from 4th grade. i was in mrs. lorenz' class...she was a sweet, gentle, kind woman who i always had great respect for and thought fondly of in my adult years. she always remembered me and would stop to chat. i couldn't come up with a theme for this year in my life...it was sort of the calm before the storm or peace after unrest so i just went with "back to normal" since i was relatively happy. this is sort of funny to me now that i'm back the next day thinking about it because i always had an issue with "normality"...i always either felt like i was special, different, destined for greatness or definitely crazy and had shameful secrets about myself and my family i should be hiding. so i suppose 4th grade was "normal" for me and not normal in the general sense.

i really had a hard time writing my 3rd grade post (still haven't finished it...perhaps because i'm still not happy with my present day "resolution"?)...i'm sorry i ran out of time and energy to write it and to visit your third grade years if you are joining me on this MPT journey...i intend to read all your 3rd grade posts next week...

anyway, cara (CJZ) was on and off my best friend as she would continue to be until she left for boarding school in 10th grade. i believe at this point julie (JCW) and i were best friends...all three of us wore jelly shoes...i remember i had light pink and light blue and wanted hot pink and red and a lot of other colors...rainbow shirts that went from one arm all the way to the other arm were in style:
and here is a photo of my social butterfly daughter sea with her kindergarten friends to characterize us all being friends at this age (haven't had time to dig up photos of myself from this age)...
this was the year we generally played well together without too much drama (future posts and future years will have plenty of that!)...i believe i also went off to camp that summer but i'll see if i can dig up camp photos to post next week...here is a photo of sea with her "best" friend since i also had one of those most years at this age...
i was gobbling down my daughter's halloween candy while i was typing this which reminded me of my crazy sweet tooth all through elementary school. i used to sneak off campus to buy "fun dip" or some other all sugary treat and eat it all day long...

i was reading through my baby book and found this entry i added myself at age 10...i had forgotten how i made "i's" with a circle instead of a dot..."s's" with a slant..."e's" with the same slant...
the story on breaking my arm is i was showing off on top of my swing set at home "look at me! look at me!" doing the "death drop" which is where you swing backwards and catch your legs and then swing off and release your legs (like the cherry drop only you start out sitting on top of the bar instead of just swinging)...only i was so desperate to show off and do the trick quickly that i forgot to hook my legs and went flying off onto my arm...it had a horrible "S" crook in it and i remember looking at my arm with a very grave face and saying in all seriousness "my arm can't stay like that...they are going to have to amputate" not even thinking about the pain or it being broken...yes, dramatic at a young age!

finally, i got chicken pox the end of the school year...
i may come back and add more but i have to publish this for MPT (join me in recording my youth one post per week...) due in 1/2 an hour...ahh...procrastination...

MPT #5 3rd grade: the world doesn't revolve around me

here is my 3rd grade class photo...i'm the 5th person from the left on the top row...

oh man, my 'procrastination, wait until the last minute sabotage' style of doing things that are important to me is already shining through in my "late" details of third grade. i've been trying to figure out why i waited so long and didn't come through on this...i suppose it is because up until 3rd grade my life was pretty idyllic and sugar coated and i was an optimist who believed my world was perfect. nothing really that traumatic happened to me (and now i feel badly for those who did read my lack of post and commented their interest was piqued!) but as i thought back to the major theme from this year, this is when i first remember experiencing depression. and anxiety. and disappointment. and feeling left out. and that my dreams might not come true.

contrast this with my constant need for attention (and successfully achieving it) along with the belief that i was special and important and going to do something big in my life...my narcissism began early thus the idea "the world doesn't revolve around me" which i didn't believe, but it was my first taste that my life might not work out the way i'd dreamt or believed...allow me a little free associating and analysis here...i suppose it is symbolic and noteworthy that part of what i was taught growing up was the importance of APPEARANCE...in how i look outwardly but more importantly in my family, to appear happy as more important than actually experiencing happiness...that sounds harsh and of course that was never explicit but i just felt like sadness or anger were never acceptable emotions and from an early age i learned to pretend everything was alright and bottle my negative emotions...

...so to connect these dots, i suppose i don't even want to address these negative memories and feelings in this post even though that is the most vivid memory i have from this age...

i'm rambling around the idea i'm trying to get at...basically what i recall most distinctively from third grade was that i didn't like the teacher very well and she didn't like me and would single me and my friend cara out. cara's mom was much more confrontational than my parents (remember my family liked to pretend like everything was alright or avoided conflict whenever possible) and ended up pulling cara out of this class. so my memory wasn't even about not liking the teacher; it was the trauma of having my best friend and security moved to another class...i would watch her laughing and making new friends and felt very abandoned and rejected and like i had "lost" someone very dear to me...i was desperately looking for someone i could attach to, connect with, feel understood and loved and then i felt like i "got" this in 2nd grade and lost it the next year. this happened about the time my study in psychology shows depression might show up anyway, so i'm not making this causative per se...

hmm...i think maybe i should have labeled this post more about depression instead of about the world not revolving around me...i guess even though i had a younger sister born when i was 3, i managed to still get most of the attention anyway. my neighbors 5 years or so older than me really built me up to be so brilliant and have so much potential and i felt adored, loved, special to so many people before 3rd grade...i guess the loss of my friend cara was the first experience i had of not being able to control everything in my life. that i couldn't manipulate everyone into giving me my way or creating the life i imagined.

this was also the year i got a "C" in art ?! sorry, i'm still upset about that...i have always loved art and though i never thought i had a talent in it per se, it was such a blow to get only "satisfactory" instead of "excellent" or whatever i believed i should have gotten at that age. really i don't think art should ever be graded...fortunately i didn't let my love for art go because of this. i think i would have gone into an art field if i'd been encouraged, though...

it is late and i've lost my ideas...i'll try to finish this post tomorrow night and appreciate your patience if you are checking back!

**11/07 update: i still don't have the energy to write more about 3rd grade but did add a little present day perspective in today's post...i won't make any promises about finishing this but may be inspired the day i'm writing 4th grade! :) **

this is the 5th in a series recording my childhood through mommy's piggytales (MPT)
i'll be writing about 4th grade the end of next week so i need to finish these ideas up in the next few days! thanks for your patience as i deal with these psychological hang ups i obviously still haven't sufficiently worked out!

MPT #4 2nd grade: the kissing machine

i believe this is my 2nd grade school photo but honestly i don't remember anymore...when i was reflecting back to what i remember of 2nd grade, the first thing that came to mind was that i was given the nickname "the kissing machine" because i used to chase the boys around (and never really kissed them, though apparently i loved to threaten it at this age when they thought girls were gross) but specifically because i pinned robbie perez down in the classroom and gave him a very wet and juicy kiss "with purple yogurt all over my lips"...not sure if that was supposed to be like lipstick...you can imagine how horrified he was and i can still remember the look of shock from the whole class like "you didn't really just do that, did you?!" and just feeling confident and proud of myself despite being misunderstood. i had a crush on robbie since we started school and this continued for much of the grades...i included a close-up class shot from third grade below just so you can see how cute he was...i'm the top left girl (remember i was probably one of the tallest children much of elementary school) and he is the top right boy...
he was one of the most athletic (at least fastest runner) boys in our class and also quite bright...he was one of the people i used to compete with during my "look at me, teacher, i know the answer"-high-hand-raising-waving obnoxious age period (this lasted quite awhile)...i specifically remember debating with him how long a second was...of course we were both wrong because we were trying to show off how fast we could count instead of the actual speed of a second...

but back to the idea of feeling confident and not caring what people thought after that juicy kiss...2nd grade was probably the last childhood year where i strongly believed i was meant for greatness (remember i had older neighbors...two girls about 5 years older than me... who used to build me up and say how smart i was and how brilliant i was going to be when i grew up) and that no one could stop me...i believed in myself and didn't care if i was understood. i was going to try to summarize this idea for the "theme" of second grade which i remember very fondly (i also liked my teacher a lot, mrs. sheldon) but i thought "kissing machine" would stand out more and i suppose on some level it also depicts the wild, care-free "throw-caution-to-the-wind" stance i took to life...considering my first boyfriend was at age 24 (who is also my ONLY boyfriend and now husband), i was quite far from really a "kissing machine" as i grew up...much more on that front later but for now let's focus on how much i enjoyed this year and some of the other positive things i remember about 2nd grade...

i think i've already told you what a "daddy's girl" i was and would continue to be...i regret i got so literal about finding age-appropriate photos for this post that i didn't put any of my dad in...many more of those for later posts...anyway, one thing i remember from a young age though i'm not sure it was 2nd specifically is walking down the halls of "west hall" which was my dad's building on the university where he worked...the walls and carpet were all done in dark reddish wood color and it was noticeably SILENT in there with thick, locked doors on every side...i would walk slowly and quietly (odd behavior for me usually) almost tiptoeing on my way to my dad's office where i always felt so safe and PROUD of him...he was a psychiatric social worker who HELPED people...FIXED them...made them better and in my mind, made the world go round...i believed deeply in him and believed he believed in me and i could do anything...

this was also the year that i became best friends with cara...we were in one another's weddings and crazily enough, she just moved to within a couple miles away here in san diego so our friendship has gone through a lot and gotten stronger in the 30 plus years we have known one another...again, i regret there is not a photo of her here, but there will be many of them since we continued through elementary school until she left in 10th for boarding school...we had many playdates and were inseparable from this age on but for much childhood drama in later years that i'll share in later posts...

i also want to throw in something about writing. i have a very vivid memory from a school open house...of course in my narcissistic mind i believe it was first grade but watching my daughter just learning to sound out words in kindergarten, it was probably several grades later...anyway, the memory is that the teacher asked us to write a story for our parents on that light tan paper with huge lines and a dashed line in the middle (where you practiced handwriting) and my memory isn't even about the content of my story so much as the fact that it went on and on much like my free associating writing style now...so much so that it was taped up higher on the wall than all the other stories and they were laminated so mine continued in a roll down onto the ground so you had to roll it out and step on it to read the whole thing...that makes me laugh because it was so ME and so dramatic and verbal and like i had so much to say i couldn't stop....

i also have fond memories of reading a lot at this age (mostly my parents would read to me but i was learning how to read)...this passion continued throughout all of our lives...i named my child "story" if that tells you anything...

i'm already enjoying having less photos...in part because there really are less photos of me from the grades but also because it forces me to think of actual memories instead of using photos to jog memories or direct where my thoughts will go...this one was in my previous post but i never went back to share any of the yosemite stories...the two i wanted to share (i believe i was 6 or 7 so that would have been 1st or 2nd grade) will follow after the photo...
1) i remember packing a watermelon in our car and driving a LONG time in HOT weather on lots of WINDY roads to get there...the watermelon was making gassy sounds and when we arrived that night my dad declared the heat had been too much for it and it was rotten. so he threw it in the garbage can next to our cabin. early in the morning we woke up to the metal cans being knocked around and into one another and there was a BEAR trying to eat the watermelon...crazy part of the story is that we all marched outside like he would be more interested in that than us and fortunately he was...the way my dad would tell this story (remember we named our son story in part because my dad love to tell tales) the bear became more or less intoxicated on the rotten watermelon and was swaying and falling down a lot...funny visual in my head though i remember the drama of my dad's version and getting people to laugh more than the actual experience...son just woke up...more later...ok i'm back the next day...
2) i remember staying in an a-frame cabin complete with all sorts of bright 70's decor...long red shag carpet going up the stairs to the loft...we would feed wild deer in the morning and touch their velvety antlers...cook and eat together with some friends who traveled with our family...i loved these times...they were actually quite adventurous for my family...we are thinking of buying an rv to have similar adventures with our children...next we have my sister and i dressing up with our dog snowflake (more stories about him will come in future posts)...
a photo of my mom with my sister and me...i wanted to add that i started taking piano lessons about this time. my mom is a very talented pianist but she was painfully shy so even though she performed a lot as a child she couldn't go as far as she would have if she hadn't been doubled over with stomach aches and fear...this led to her hoping my sister and i would live out her musical dreams and we ended up hating playing/practicing the piano even though we took lessons most of our childhood years...i still have very little to show for it and would love to take piano as an adult where i would do it because i want to and not because i had to or was trying to fulfill something for my mom (more on this issue in future posts, too)...

nearly every summer we would go to the east coast to visit my dad's relatives who mostly live in virginia and maryland...here, from left to right TOP ROW: my dad's BIL bill, his sister nancy, his nephew wayne, his mom in bright yellow, his sister amanda, his dad in light yellow, his nephew fred, his sister margaret ann, his BIL fred, my dad and then my mom looking down

i'm in the middle standing, also in light yellow...holding on to my favorite cousin jay (he was 8 years older than me and i had quite the crush on him)...my sister marci is looking up at us...aunt elizabeth and cousin hollie looking up at my mom...my dad was very much from the south...he kept his accent most of his life and had "virginia is for lovers" shirts and said he'd always be a virginian at heart...there are many influences from the south on my life that i'll touch on through these posts...
i'll leave you with one of my sister and me after going trick-or-treating (my dad says pretty much by the time i was talking i said "daddy, do you have to go with me? i want to go alone" which makes me so sad to think about!)
i hope to keep up this childhood innocence, freedom, love of life, care-free, naive, child-like play-based perspective on life in myself and my own children for as long as i can!

this post is the 4th in a series of 15 posts recording my childhood through MPT "mommy's piggy tales".

MPT #3 1st grade: embracing independence

ahh...procrastination...can be my motivator but when i have two children having meltdowns and not napping, i really need to take on this blast to the past project several days before it is "due"...here is my 1st grade school picture...again, naturally stick straight hair curled to my mother's liking, she sewed my raggedy ann dress...here is my daughter's kindergarten school photo from this year:
i came across many more preschool photos when visiting my mom's house so forgive my indulgence as i throw in a few more memories from those years (kind of cheating or evidence of my lack of organization/planning)...this photo was taken when i was a flower girl in a cousin's wedding. apparently i was being very difficult the day of so someone offered me a very large gumball if i'd cooperate and go down the aisle...i guess i then blew huge gum bubbles the whole way (though i do appear to be concentrating on my flower dropping task in the photo)...
here is the advertisement i mentioned in the last MPT "mommy's pigtails" post
i know this photo of my hands and feet is taking us even pre-preschool, but i included them because i've always had really LONG skinny feet...they've had lots of nicknames over the years and i've been self-conscious of them but finally i've reached a point where that is the size foot a 6 foot tall person should have even if it is hard to find a woman's size 11 shoe in normal styles...
here is another photo of my mom's dad with myself (left) and my sister (right)...
here is one of me, my mom's mom, my mom and my sister...i like the smirk on both of the adults' faces...
and one more of me cuddling up to my mom...i find this photo noteworthy because i became so independent soon after this age...
this was my sister's 3rd birthday (i was 6)...i can see my missing front tooth which was prominent in several other photos from this age...
here i am with my siamese cat "piewackit" my mom got the name from some movie and i have no idea how to spell it...i always thought it was weird...
here are some of our play chairs made into a bed...i believe my grandma made the bed cover...bright green shag carpet...lots of 70's going on here...
my sister and i liked to build and create together in these pre-school years...
here is the swingset in our backyard...me hugging my sister at the top...i believe these were children from the preschool she had in her home...
and here are yet more children from said preschool...i'm the 5th one and my sister is to my left...
here is a jungle gym of sorts in our side yard...
sometimes my sister and i would sleep together...
we also went peach picking as a family once a year and then canned and froze them...
i think i'm only a year or so old in this photo but i included it so you could see our classic orange station wagon...the back window even rolled down and you could ride backwards in the way back...
we also went on an annual quest for wild flowers...here i am with my dad (with his redskins hat) and sister in a field of wild poppies (california's state flower if you didn't know)...
i remember the year before i started school we took a trip to yosemite...once i get the children to sleep i'll include a couple stories from that trip...
and since halloween is almost here i thought i'd include this photo...also stories from trick-or-treating if i have time...
this is a photo of my daughter sea with her special little tiger "goggin"...i noticed in the next photo i was holding a white tiger for a photo, too, though i don't remember playing with it...
my mom really worked with the curling iron and feathering for these shots...also noteworthy are all the missing teeth and permanent top teeth coming in...
this photo of my daughter was taken last month when she lost her first tooth...she had just turned 5 so we both lost teeth early...
i always slept in crazy positions....here are those sponge rollers i was telling you about...
and finally, the end result of said rollers for my curly hair for my first day of 1st grade...

so i have a lot to write about...as if i didn't already have too many photos...but i don't have a very good organization...i mentioned during my preschool years post that i didn't attend kindergarten so this was my first year in school...i honestly don't remember the first day that well but it is because i more or less walked out of my parent's home and never looked back (figuratively and literally)...i embraced independence as i chose for the theme for this year...ready to be on my own...i may have actually been TOO independent at this age which is a theme that will run through later posts...

i attended a 12 year christian private school (all 12 years i might add) and just recently co-chaired the reunion planning committee for our 20 year high school reunion (more on that in later posts)...my teacher was mrs. krominga (no idea how to spell her name...it sounded a little bit like captain kangaroo, a show i liked from about that era...there were about 30 students in my class and there were 2 other first grade classes...the school was about 5 minutes from our home and my dad usually drove us to school. he worked right down the street at the university...this school was very influenced by both the predominant religion of the little community and the medical center/dental school/professional and those ideas will run through later posts as well...for now, my early memories of first grade include LOVING gymnastics (which i was in most of the time i was in school despite my height and awkwardness), being very social/verbal/competitive in school "i know the answer!" sort of obnoxious student...i remember competing with a boy i had a crush on...more on him in my 2nd grade post...

i remember this year as being quite carefree...i enjoyed school, extracurricular activities, friends, my place in the world and embraced my independence...