Memories

 Before I move on to the next house, I just want to say a  a word about memories

Memories are funny things. I love when police shows have the cops  ask someone to identify a picture of someone, and they can recall a random person they briefly saw crossing the street or something.  Our memories aren't like photocopy machines.  Memories are incredibly subjective and degrade over time as well.  Do you think you could recognize the person who took your order at some random restaurant if you were asked?  I didn't think so!

The reason I am qualifying my memories is because mine may be completely different than the rest of my families.  So I am not lying or making things up, my memory may just be different than theirs or yours.

The other reason I want to mention this is because  of how much you can tell about a person from what aspect of the situation we remember most vividly.

I'm not sure when this was or why, ( maybe it was when my brother was born) that  Beth and I were staying with my aunt and uncle in their palatial (to me) sprawling ranch house. It may have actually been palatial because my uncle is a very successful pharmacist.  I have good memories of playing with my cousins, but both my sister and I have a negative memory of my aunt .  She was just a little snooty!  My sister's memory is that she was admiring a glittery crystal chandelier type table lamp and our aunt told her to keep her hands off the lamp, in no uncertain terms.  My memory was that I saw some candy bars in the freezer and I asked if I could have one.  I think she let me have one, but yelled at me that those were there for her kids and not for me.  It was pretty rude of my to ask for something before it was offered, of course, but since I was all of five years old and in unfamiliar territory, she could have been just a tad bit more gentle about it!

I mention this because it tells you something about my sister and my respective focus in life.  She is all about the glitter and I am all about the food!

Now on to more house stories.

At the top of the stairs in the big house, there was a landing big enough to use as a playroom.  Beth and I would make elaborate houses for our Barbie Dolls of which we had many!  I am sorry to say that we ruined some perfectly good vintage Barbies and their clothes!  Hindsight is so painful. We would use all kinds of household items as chairs, closets, cars,  (Hey, this cut glass crystal goblet would be a great toilet!)
  I also had one of those chemistry sets with the chemicals and everything.  I think those chemicals must have been benign because I mixed them with impunity and never blew up the house.  We used the microscope to make slides of things like hair and skin, and boogers. Fun!

At some point, my sister and I acquired a small phonograph and a ton of records.  They were 33s and 78s and were mostly soundtracks of Disney movies and some random kids stories set to opera.  Think of the Three Bears with tunes from Lohengrin!.  My favorite was Sleeping Beauty with music from the Tchaikovsky Ballet (I have since realized that the melodies used in the movie were all the best tunes from the Ballet which is actually not Tchaik's best effort!) We also had Alice in Wonderland (with originalm1955 Mouskateer Darlene Gillespie singing the songs). Beth and I would use the records to stage epic shows for our parents, lip syncing all the songs.  I always thought Beth was being kind by allowing me the leads, but it was really so she could ham it up as everyone else. She could be the White Rabbit, The Queen of Hearts. Tweedle Dee and Dum all at the same time!  It was her tour de force and great prep for a future actor!

I enjoyed performing, also, but I had a dreamy introverted side, too.  There was a balcony beyond the play area, and I would sit out there and watch impossibly slow, lazy bumble bees lumber by.  If I sat still enough, the squirrels would almost come close enough to touch!  I am not sure about the integrity of that balcony, but it was a privacy paradise.

I also liked to pace along the top of the back fence until I was in some pre-hypnogogic state and once spent about two hours doing backdrops on the trampoline to see how long I could go.  I made it to two thousand!  Really!

So now you know a little bit more about my life in the big house at the Children's Home.  Next time, I will move on to Jefferson City.  Promise.