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My Semi-Crazy Life [2]

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[Continued from Part 1]

Our new house was on the corner of an intersection. Not a busy one but it did make Mom want us to play in the back yard more, which was fenced. Or on the carport, which soon became the Daytona 500 in my eyes to me and my younger sister and brother. I'd get on my bigwheel, which by now, i had outgrown a bit, my knees sticking precariously out so as to miss the handle bars. My sister on her tricycle and my brother on his little Incredible Hulk ride-thing. Im not sure what it was. It had 3 wheels and was plastic and green and it rolled and he liked it so it worked. The 3 of us circling and circling till Mom would come out and redflag the race.

This was where i lived for 4th, 5th, and 6th grade, in Dublin Virginia. Becoming good friends with a girl that lived down the street from me. Her name was Heather and she liked to do all the things i liked to do. But her mom didnt let her stay out as long as mine did. So i was often left to my imagination once again to entertain me outside in the vast suburban jungle - well, i say jungle but it was actually just an empty wooded lot near my house but to me it was a jungle!

My mom did not work. She stayed home to raise me and my younger siblings. She cooked and cleaned and canned and laid out in the sun while i went on my little adventures around the neighborhood.

School during this time was interesting. In the 4th grade i had a crush on my teacher and fell in love with science and geology. The girls in my class where giggling about boys but i didnt see the attraction. Boys to me were "buddies". I understood boys better than girls and was more comfortable playing around them. Boys games were more interesting to me because they got to play things like flag-football and kickball and T-ball. Boys liked to rough house as did I. Back in Hurricane my first best friend had been a boy and we had been inseperable. So when the girls in my class started gossiping about kissing and holding hands, i was clueless and had no interest in it.

For some reason, i dont remember much about the 5th grade. This segment of memory has been blanked out for some reason. I do remember we had to move to a different house but in the same town but im not certain of the reason why. Heather disappeared from my life almost as quickly as she came into it.

This house had a fenced in back yard too and one time while running from another kid in the neighborhood - he was chasing me with the garden hose and i didnt want to get squirted - i ran through the open gate but my shorts caught on the gate latch causing me to fall. My right ankle slammed into one of the bolts that held the gate to the rest of the chainlink fence and punctured the front of my ankle. It swelled up the size of a softball or bigger immediately and i was unable to walk on it. It was strange because there wasnt much blood coming from this hole about the size of a quarter on the front of my ankle. But once my mom put some pressure on where it had swollen, blood shot out in a stream and i was taken to the hospital pretty quick. Because it was a hole, there was really no skin to stitch back together and the doctor tried to stitch the hole closed but it had about the same effect as trying to close shoes with the shoe laces. You can only pull those things so tight but theres still a gap there.

My mom was instructed to have me keep the wound as dry and clean as possible. Yeah right. Like that was gonna happen with my outdoor spirit and tomboy nature.

Our family had a trip planned to Clearwater Florida during this time and it was torture to me because i was not allowed to get into the water and swim. But i made the best of it and got me an inner tube and floated around on it with goggles on and a snorkel in my mouth so i could at least float around and look into the water. It was so incredibly clear! We were at some natural spring and it was beautiful. While the other kids played and swam and jumped from the diving board, i floated around on my tube, with my right leg bent so my ankle was up out of the water, imagining i was a bird flying high above the ground. Once in a while i would find a bluegill to follow around. Needless to say, several times i would forget about my ankle and keeping my leg bent and it would end up beside my left leg, trailing the water. I would simply raise the foot again and keep on floating.

Well, the inevitable happened and it got infected and i had to be hospitalized for 5 days. Another adventure for me, for i had never been away from my parents BY MYSELF since birth, so i was all excited about it. My mom and dad were worried i was going to be scared but i had the time of my life. I got to lay around and watch what i wanted on TV. I was given a menu every day and could pretty much order whatever food i wanted on it and the nurses would bring it. The doctor would come in and check my wound and make sure it was healing and not getting anymore infected. Towards the end of the 5 days though, i was about going stir crazy and ready to be getting outside to play again. The wound did eventually heal and i still bare the scar. It sort of resembles a bullet wound.

Im thinking i dont remember much about 5th grade because it was during this school year that we changed houses and i had to change schools in mid-year. I do remember 6th grade, however, but not much of my homebound activities during this time. Its sort of odd the way i remember more of home during 5th grade and more of school during 6th grade.

I began to notice boys in a different light in 6th grade and had my first crush on a boy named Chris. He was blonde and brown eyed and bold in his actions. He liked being the center of attention and seemed to have many friends. He cussed too, which was strange to me. He'd say words like "pussy" and "fuck" and i had no clue what they meant and it made me feel uncomfortable around him so even though he didnt really know i existed, i made sure it stayed that way.

One day, while he was surrounded by some of the other kids, he was talking about some space ship that the United States was building and how once it was in space it would be taking pictures of the earth. He said something about it spying on him while he was trying to "fuck" a girl. Again, not having any clue what he was talking about, i left the small group that had clustered around him and went about my own business. Only years later did i realize that Chris had been right about the "space ship" because the Space Shuttle began to launch its first missions.

While other girls in my class were beginning to blossom and wear (training) bras, i remained slim and straight. Not even a hint of breasts beginning to form. It was very disheartening to me because the girls with the budding boobs were the ones the boys seemed to notice. Somehow, i managed to talk my mom into getting me one of these (training) bras so i could wear it. And she did get me one. And i did wear it. And it was the one and only time during my 6th grade year that i wore it because a girl in the class snapped the back of the bra one day while i was walking past her desk. It made a loud embarrassing pop and i could feel my face turning 8 shades of red as i hurried to my desk among snickers and giggles. I dont think i touched a bra again till i was 15, in 10th grade. I really had no reason to wear one. There was nothing there!

[To Be Continued....]