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QaR
July 2009 
What's your most vivid childhood memory?
Posted on Jul 2nd, 2009
by 
mimi
mimi
This is in Response to the Questions and Reflections for June 21, 2009:
SUMMER ---growing up in a tiny perfect little town, not even a town, too small to even be a town. But it had everything a kid like me needed. My sister Helen and I still talk about how lucky we were to have grown up where and when we did. When everything was uncomplicated and just there.
Some things were big and wonderous - like the giant weeds along the railway tracks where we played and took the shortcut to Grandma's house. We'd look on and under the leaves and find snakes, grasshoppers, praying mantis, cacoons, butterflies. We had instant stuff for science projects.
There were wild strawberries to collect, and hickory nut and walnut trees, plum, apple and cherry trees in neighbours' yards, and vegetable gardens where kids could just pick a hot tomato off the vine, or pull up a carrot and rinse it off under the outside tap. We had creeks to explore and knew when the polliwogs arrived, and we watched the red-winged blackbirds building nests in the bullrushes. We hated when the boys would pick the bullrushes and use them as a weapons, almost as bad as the chestnuts on strings they whipped at us.
We could sit in the shade of a huge chestnut tree at Kathleen Tronovsky's house across the street , or climb the walnut tree next door and hide on the lower limb. There were roses in everyone's front yard that climbed sparkling white trellises. People washed their porches and steps with garden hoses and then washed the sidewalk in front of their house.
After the supper dishes were done, kitchen counters cleaned and the floor swept, the mothers would go out for a walk around town and stop and talk to the other ladies doing the same, or talk to people sitting on their front porch. I liked when I got to go with her and we got invited up to sit on the porch. Usually, the ladies would open their front door, go in and bring out a drink and some snacks for visitors. In the evening, we kids could hear the grown ups laughing as they gathered on each others porches and talked till sometimes 10 at night.
I remember the hot hot summers when I was about 5, trying to walk barefoot on the scorching sidewalk, after putting on my stretchy bubbly blue bathing suit and getting to the grassy patch in our tiny back yard. My dad made a sprinkler for the hose out of vinegar bottle cap. He punched some holes in the bottle cap, and attached a wire e to it to stick in the ground. My sister and I would run through the cold water and scream in delight. We'd get sunburned and not complain....
The day would end, and the air was always fresh with the smell of flowers and the sounds of insects singing late into the night -- Moths banged on the windows outside as we fell asleep, the dark green blinds banged softly inside with each soft breeze.
Some things were big and wonderous - like the giant weeds along the railway tracks where we played and took the shortcut to Grandma's house. We'd look on and under the leaves and find snakes, grasshoppers, praying mantis, cacoons, butterflies. We had instant stuff for science projects.
There were wild strawberries to collect, and hickory nut and walnut trees, plum, apple and cherry trees in neighbours' yards, and vegetable gardens where kids could just pick a hot tomato off the vine, or pull up a carrot and rinse it off under the outside tap. We had creeks to explore and knew when the polliwogs arrived, and we watched the red-winged blackbirds building nests in the bullrushes. We hated when the boys would pick the bullrushes and use them as a weapons, almost as bad as the chestnuts on strings they whipped at us.
We could sit in the shade of a huge chestnut tree at Kathleen Tronovsky's house across the street , or climb the walnut tree next door and hide on the lower limb. There were roses in everyone's front yard that climbed sparkling white trellises. People washed their porches and steps with garden hoses and then washed the sidewalk in front of their house.
After the supper dishes were done, kitchen counters cleaned and the floor swept, the mothers would go out for a walk around town and stop and talk to the other ladies doing the same, or talk to people sitting on their front porch. I liked when I got to go with her and we got invited up to sit on the porch. Usually, the ladies would open their front door, go in and bring out a drink and some snacks for visitors. In the evening, we kids could hear the grown ups laughing as they gathered on each others porches and talked till sometimes 10 at night.
I remember the hot hot summers when I was about 5, trying to walk barefoot on the scorching sidewalk, after putting on my stretchy bubbly blue bathing suit and getting to the grassy patch in our tiny back yard. My dad made a sprinkler for the hose out of vinegar bottle cap. He punched some holes in the bottle cap, and attached a wire e to it to stick in the ground. My sister and I would run through the cold water and scream in delight. We'd get sunburned and not complain....
The day would end, and the air was always fresh with the smell of flowers and the sounds of insects singing late into the night -- Moths banged on the windows outside as we fell asleep, the dark green blinds banged softly inside with each soft breeze.
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