My First Memories

I was just 2 years and 9 months old when my brother Bill (formally known as William Hale) was born on February 21st, 1940. Go ahead...do the math...I dare you. My first memory is of a woman in a dull bluish green chenille bathrobe oohing and aahing over this little thing in a blanket. I am still not sure if this woman was my mother or my grandmother, but I must have been jealous, because I remember not having nice feelings at that time. I think I probably wanted to ditch that 'thing.'


Oddly enough, my second vivid memory also had to do with that bundle in the blanket...when he reached about 12-14 months of age (I was about 4 by then). We were on a family outing in the desert, and all of a sudden my baby brother decided to walk (well, that is what my memory says). Again, EVERYONE was so excited about the steps this adorable child (and he was) was making, that I was just simply forgotten....no one seemed to care at all. So, being the personality I am, I remember running up a little hill and shouting, "Look at me." Pathetic, isn't it. I laugh now, when I think of it.

My next real memories were at age 5 when I started to attend nursery school. I remember my little friend, Catherine Hogg, who later became on of my best friends in grade school. We enjoyed playing together. I remember a castor bean tree that we were all warned about. (I am surprised they didn't remove it.) They said we would die if we ate any of the beans. I also remember making beads from magazines. We cut long triangular strips out of slick, colored magazines, dipped them in glue, and rolled them over a nail, starting with the wide end first, and let them dry. They were so pretty. We also made teeny tiny furniture for a doll house, much of it from modeling clay. I remember making a fruit bowl with little pieces of fruit...really teeny tiny.

After that year, I began first grade, and my memories from then on are prolific to say the least. You will be amazed, I am sure.