Some Fill-ins And More Fodder For Thought...

When you become my age, you are not sure what are memories, reminisces, or things that have been told to you so many times that you think that you remember them!!

Case in point, do I have an early memory of my Great Grandfather Kinley teaching me to read in Indiana when I was three (we are rocking in rocking chairs, side by side) and him bringing me sweet potatoes over in his pockets every morning...or is this something that has been retold so many times that I think I remember it.

I know that I remember my folks and I living with my Grandmother (Nonnie) on the fifth floor of the Macy Apartments...which were demolished for the Capitol Approach. I remember a creepy self-service elevator that went down to an even creepier boiler room that my younger sister and I used to explore.

I remember living in the Cedar-Riverside area in Minneapolis and becoming my sister's hero by stepping in when some older kids threatened her with a hatchet...this was either before I started kindergarten at Clay School or that year. I remember the school play for kindergarten that year was Little Black Sambo (I had the lead with cork-blackened face ala Ted Dansen) and I remember the Tigers all yelling "Little Black Sambo, your pants are falling down!" This got the biggest laugh...parents were laughing so hard they had tears running down their faces...an event like that stays in your mind!

I remember a trip to Kentucky that summer and proudly showing my mother a mushroom that I round (never really noticed that it was growing in a horse turd)...I remember starting First Grade in a one-room school house and having vienna sausage sandwiches for lunch...I know that I remember what a huge man my grandfather Harve Strunk was...lifting me onto his shoulders with his only arm, and walking the tobacco fields...I remember how little my grandmother Mary Strunk was (about four feet tall)and her ability to kill chickens for Sunday dinner by wringing their necks...and them running all around the yard headless.

I remember the permanent move back to Saint Paul and starting Ericsson School that same year...and playing soldiers in the dirt with my friend Dave Corbo...but some of the other "memories" I am sure are really part of that "Neverland Fog" that could be re-tellings or imagination or whatever!

I am sure that I will have more to say about this in future postings!