What do you remember?

Every now and then I like to get out the old photo albums and just stroll through. I was sitting with Jonathan, my eight year old, the other night looking for photos of my platinum bond hair. Yes, at one point I did indeed have hair. In Southern California it was easy to be blond, and boy was I. The top left is Kindergarten the middle is first grade the top right is second grade followed by third to sixth grade. The family move to Washington State had a dramatic effect on my hair color in fourth grade as it was no longer being bleached out by the California sun. Jonathan is now in second grade and growing out his hair. He looks like a little surfer boy, much like what I looked like around that time. There he is above with a friend he made in Haiti and again below handing out toothbrushes. As we flipped throught the photo album he got a real kick out of seeing what his dad looked like when he was a boy and then seeing Dad's report cards from school.

So on we search as my brain wanders back to those early years...

These are memories of a third grader and they are foggy at best, and yet I can recall summers, there were three in there, of camping and the YMCA sponsored Indian Guides events and Vacation Bible School. The summers were a time of exploration in the vacant lots being prepped for construction. We would dig large holes in the ground and cover them with scraps of plywood and have secret tunnels for entrances. The top of the fort would be covered with dirt and grass for camouflage. I remember stealing these weird oil filled plastic “wands” from a man down the street and taking them into the fort and holding them up to the splinters of light allowed to sneak in for us to see. The glitter and sparkles would slowly flow from one end to the other reflecting light and sending the colors dancing around the fort. I spent many days at the end of Palmbark Street in that vacant lot with my friends. Mom was at home during the day and keenly aware of where we were via the network of neighborhood moms on the lookout, but every now and then we would allude the dragnet and venture out to the uncharted waters of the other side of Palmbark and the world of the bigger kids, it was scary and exciting. Those forays to the “other side” were few and far between and we would always return via the vacant lot to make it look as if that is where we had always been. One hot day a recall sneaking into a friend’s back yard and plummeting down his back hill covered in ice plant. If you have never slid down an ice plant slope you have not lived. Ice Plant is a succulent that is used as a ground cover. It has triangular shaped “fingers” that are filled with slimy goo that has the wonderful ability to aid in sliding. The Tough Skin pants we wore were the perfect outer garment to aid in the sliding. The goo would stick to the pants and form a protective outer shell of lubrication. We would run to the edge of the hill and dive onto the Ice Plant smashing the fingers and releasing the goo. Every dive would result in more goo and longer slides. We didn’t care much about the mess or the destruction we were causing, this was the peak of fun, and well worth the tongue lashing we were going to receive at the end of the day. I can still remember the smell of Ice Plant. Many more memories of Vista, CA swirl through my head. Like the time Frank rode his skateboard into a parked car and broke his collar bone. Mom was not sure what was wrong so she made him raise his arms and pulled his shirt off. As he did his shoulder collapsed in toward his neck as the collar bone overlapped. Or the time I was late coming home from an adventure and missed the family as they left for McDonald’s. I have memories of some kind of summer camp where we made sand candles at a local park and VBS at our church with the courtyard round about. I remember getting in really big trouble for throwing a cactus at a girl I liked. She had barbed thorns in her for a few days and I got a spanking at school and when I got home that day. I remember the small Alligator lizards we would find, Amy, my younger sister, would call them “Screwdrivers” but I can’t remember why. We would hold them by the tail until it fell off. They have the ability to just allow the tail to detach without dying; it is some kind of escape mechanism. I remember the smell of eucalyptus trees, and peeling the bark off Madonna trees. I have many memories of hiking in the Sierra Nevada mountains. Sometimes with all of us and then a couple times with just the kids and Grandpa. I remember stealing my first candy bar from the little store down near the highway. I remember Jamie my first “girlfriend” in third grade; she had really cool blond hair. She was just like Jamie Summers, the bionic woman. I remember moving to Washington and not being able to say goodbye to Jamie, leaving my giant stuffed paper fish hanging from the ceiling in my classroom. I remember the really nice neighboor man who's wife had the coolest cactus garden, he would throw oranges and other fruit he grew in his yard over the fence to us kids. I will never forget the old blue station wagon we had. It had backwards facing rear seats, was really stinky, absolutely huge and never really died it just seemed to vanish one day after we had moved to Washington. There are any other memories of trips, events, smells, sights and sounds rambling around in my mind someday I'll get them all down on paper.

Tony