Post a childhood memory

[FortunaMaximus]

Probably '85, central Ontario, a winter evening, I'm 8. Reminded of it now 'cause we've got the first snow of the year up here.

I was always a precocious kid, ya know. Books and numbers, was never much for toys. Did the usual things, though. biking, jumping off quarry sand dunes, playing hockey and soccer.

Anyway, it's Christmas break, I'm up home for a couple weeks with the family at the house. I miss that house. Hot tub with skylights, on an acre of flatland, a ways down to a forest.

About a foot of snow on the ground, soft thick flakes, decided to go for a walk. Decided I'd just flop on the snow, one eye was somewhat swollen, as I'd taken another puck off it earlier in the holiday break. Pretty standard stuff when you're a Canadian kid, I suppose.

I'd read 2010 the year before, and the Universe exploded for me after reading that. It got a lot bigger and a lot more awesome. Flop back on the snow, start making snow angels and sinking into the snow a bit, if you know that warm feeling you get when your winter clothing meshes with the snow and it actually warms you up...

All those stars, man. Thousands and thousands of them. Uncountable, gorgeous, mesmerizing. Thought about other civilizations out there, and realized if they looked up in their sky, they couldn't help but feel the same awe.

To this day, I have never really made an effort to learn the names of the stars. They, after all, are suns with their own names.

[Tennenbaum]

I just read this thread after a long and kinda crappy day. Man, so many things back then that I remember now. I thought I was so miserable when I was growing up. I see now, that those were some of the best times ever. But maybe they just are so now that I'm older and can see things much differently.

I remember being really little and my grandmother used to watch me. We had 2 sets of furniture in the living room. Our regular couch, a tan recliner and 2 rocking chairs. And the 'company' couch, chair (covered in clear plastic) and table at the other end of the room by the big window.

I used to sit behind the chair w/ a bunch of pots and pans and pretend I was Julia Child. Something about that I just really miss. My Nana rocking in her rocking chair, and me just sitting back there for HOURS.

I did a lot of things by myself when I was little. I've always lived in my own little world.

[katyseagull]

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I used to sit behind the chair w/ a bunch of pots and pans and pretend I was Julia Child. Something about that I just really miss. My Nana rocking in her rocking chair, and me just sitting back there for HOURS.


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This is really cute Tenn. Made me smile. You are great at describing your memories.

I loved your earlier post too. Picturing you on the bike with your sister is so cute. And I almost wrote about how I used to sit in the trees with my sister. Like you, I can't remember what we did up there but it was lots of fun!

All of these posts have been just great [img]/images/graemlins/heart.gif[/img]

Really cheered me up and I enjoyed reading every one of them. Don't you guys think it's cool how each one is so distinctive and yet easy to relate to? Kind of cool to find out what our posters were like when they were kids.

Anyway, keep 'em coming loungers! I hope we get memories from all of you [img]/images/graemlins/smile.gif[/img]

[Stuey]

When I was around 8 I saw this commercial...

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Raisin Bran
"Sturdy Danny McGee was up his fifty-ninth tree, he said 'I work as fast as I can,' when he suddenly saw Two scoops of raisins inapackageof Kellogg's Raisin Bran!" and he comes racing down from the tree while the chorus sings "now here comes Dan..." "Well he rushed to the ground, 'cause ol' Danny had found What's important to a raisin fan, 'cause Kellogg's puts TWO SCOOPS OF RAISINS inapackageof Kellogg's Raisin Bran!"


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It showed a lumberjack, Danny, climbing trees. Well I figured I should try that. I grew up on a small farm so it was easy to find everything I needed. Got some nails a hammer and a old garden hose. Worked pretty good but I did not get very high as I could only go as high as I could put the nails in from the ground.

Well my mom finally saw me and she freaked out. Not sure why though I had a tree-house that was a good 30 feet high and had 4 floors in it. If she only knew how often I almost fell out of that sucker. [img]/images/graemlins/smile.gif[/img]

I also used to ride pigs. Pigs don't like that which is why it is so much fun. You just sit on the fence and when a pig goes by you jump on and try and stay on as long as possible. Problem is you always fall off sooner or later and you can imagine what you land in.

[Exsubmariner]

I grew up on the gulf coast.

There were occasionally hurricanes. I have memories of them. Mainly not the storms themselves, but more about my father. My father worked for a utility company. When storms would come, he would have duty, repairing down power lines and the like.

I remember my house and the feeling of safety that came from living in it. My father found the best built brick house he could buy. He then reinforced it with storm windows. During the storms, I would stand in front of the big sliding glass door and watch the winds tear through my back yard. I would watch the pine trees bend double, and then, when the eye passed, bend double the other way. All my siblings and my mother gathered there in the great room and watched out that reinforced glass door at the mayhem outside and were perfectly safe.

My father was wise enough that even in his absence, his family was looked after. I remember after one storm, the power was out for days. My father once cooked eggs for breakfast in the fireplace. I remember him gingerly reaching his hand wrapped in a towel over the bed of hot coals to flip the eggs in a metal skillet. I was perfectly safe and happy, despite the rest of the world.

I had a neighbor who used to say that there was always a beautiful day after a bad storm. For me, this is still true today.

[Tennenbaum]

Just because I'm remembering:

[pryor15]

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this thread:


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minjack
I need to find a similar picture of Joe Bob Briggs to reflect MY style of movie review [img]/images/graemlins/grin.gif[/img]
/minjack

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isn't it fun?

[Glo]

Okay, a couple from Hawaii.

During the summer months, our parents and their friends would take a bunch of us (about 2 or 3 car loads) and drive around the island (Oahu).

We'd start at around 7 in the morning and headed north and hit Waimea Bay first, surf was flat and no one was there. We jumped in for like an hour then headed off. That's all I remember, it's all fuzzy these days.

Considering I was only 7 or 8 at the time, I don't really remember much, but I always remembered how much I loved going around da island.

Another fav memory of Hawaii is anytime it rained. Up Nanakuli valley there was an area where the water would pool up into a big pond. Right in the middle of the pond was a 15-20 ft high cliff.

One random rainy afternoon my best friend and I went exploring when someone said that there was a bunch of people somewhere near the high school. On the way up we ran into my friend's brother who guided us the rest of the way. When we get there the whole high school including my brother was there. FRIGGIN AWESOME!!!!! I had the best time that day.

I love Hawaii.

[Blarg]

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I grew up on the gulf coast.

There were occasionally hurricanes. I have memories of them. Mainly not the storms themselves, but more about my father. My father worked for a utility company. When storms would come, he would have duty, repairing down power lines and the like.

I remember my house and the feeling of safety that came from living in it. My father found the best built brick house he could buy. He then reinforced it with storm windows. During the storms, I would stand in front of the big sliding glass door and watch the winds tear through my back yard. I would watch the pine trees bend double, and then, when the eye passed, bend double the other way. All my siblings and my mother gathered there in the great room and watched out that reinforced glass door at the mayhem outside and were perfectly safe.

My father was wise enough that even in his absence, his family was looked after. I remember after one storm, the power was out for days. My father once cooked eggs for breakfast in the fireplace. I remember him gingerly reaching his hand wrapped in a towel over the bed of hot coals to flip the eggs in a metal skillet. I was perfectly safe and happy, despite the rest of the world.

I had a neighbor who used to say that there was always a beautiful day after a bad storm. For me, this is still true today.

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Dude, this sparked memories.

I LOVED typhoons in Guam, and really miss them. And Guam was a small, flat little island that typhoons hit HARD, and frequently. Winds of 150 mph, etc. Some of my favorite memories are of sneaking out of the house in a typhoon and running hard into the wind, as hard as I could, and barely moving. Sometimes for every three steps, I'd move one real step worth of space ahead. Sometimes I'd just break even, going nowhere when running full out. Sometimes even lifting a foot for a split second meant I'd actually be running backwards while going forwards. It was weird, eerie, surreal fun. There was always at least some faint lick of terror creeping up around the edge of things to inspire it with some extra special flavor. The wind would hit so hard sometimes that it would stagger me back, and I'd wonder if the very next gust might be the one to pick me up. If it did, where would it carry me? Would it rush up and grab me, fling into the sky, and then fade, leaving me to plummet back to earth? Would it shake me like a dog shakes a rat, or drive me into a wall or a tree, or send me skidding over the asphalt until it peeled me like an orange? Would it pin me down while a mailbox, window shutter, or car made its slow, inevitable tumble through the air, leaving me to consider the inevitability of its arc, to crush or decapitate me? Would I go missing and never be found? Should I really be where I was?

Nature was so alive, God come down to earth, the age of miracles reborn so you could really feel it in your skin. It was spooky and glorious.

Going in wouldn't necessarily make you any safer, but a cinder-block house sure helped. I remember the whole family, and we had a big one, kneeling, lying, and squatting around the toilet bowl, the strongest place in the house, each with a hand on the bowl in case the winds came to claim us. The wind hitting the house like a grenade, the dogs peeing themselves. Dad was strong, Mom was warm and probably stronger than she wanted to be. This was how a family was supposed to die, but would we?

Those might have been the best times in my life.

The next morning, if the worst part of the typhoon had passed, we'd tentatively step outside to see how much of the world was left.

[Runkmud]

When I was five years old, my family moved to a little town called Dallas Georgia, on the outskirts of Marrietta. We, my father, mother, and my brother, 1 year older than me, moved into a two story house that had an expanse of forest behind it.

Soon after we moved in, my brother and I were adopted by a neighborhood dog, owned by no one. She was a german shepard, collie mix. We affectionately named her Snuffy because of her sneezing fits. My father and mother were gone for most of the day and nights due to college and work. We were latch key kids for the most part. Unfortunately my brother started his first year of school and I was left alone.

I know what you're thinking, what kind of parents leave thier 5 year old unattended for most of the day? Well, times were different then, a world full of pedophiles and kidnappers seemed unimaginable. Thankfully, I had Snuffy to protect me.

Now I know all kids tend to idolize thier first pets, but when I say Snuffy was a hero, I mean it. When I would take my coloring books in the middle of the cul-de-sac to color, if she heard a car coming, she would come and gently grab my hand in her mouth and pull me to the side of the road.

Behind our house was miles of forest, beautiful, gorgeous, forest. There was a creek, with a waterfall that was probably four or five feet tall, but in my memory it seemed like ten. There was an old civil war bridge, and we used to find old bullets out there. So my days were spent exploring with Snuffy in the woods. If I ever got lost, Snuffy knew the way home. If I encountered anyone on those old paths, Snuffy barked and snarled if she perceived any threat.

I must have walked miles in those forests with my faithful companion/bodyguard/wetnurse. It now seems a bit odd that some of my best memories were of me alone with my dog, but those were some of the best times of my life.