Monday Memory

I remember turning five years old. I remember my birthday party with my family ~ my grandparents coming for dinner ~ the chocolate birthday cake with the five candles that I blew out all by myself! ~ the crown I wore made of blue construction paper ~ blue, because that was my favorite color that year ~ I was so excited to be turning five. 

I was excited to be turning five, because I had been told that when I turned five, I would be able to go to school. 

I was the third of six kids & every day, I watched my older sister & brother get on that yellow school bus in the morning & then get off in the afternoon & I so wanted to ride that bus! We played school all the time. My older sister ~ older than me by four years ~ was always the teacher & I already knew the alphabet & could read a little & I could count to twenty ~ I knew my address & phone number & the phone number of my grandparents ~ both grandparents. I don’t think I was all that smart ~ I just was able to memorize easily. 

My birthday is in May. I thought that I was going to go to school the very next day after my birthday but I was to be disappointed ~ I had to wait until September! I wasn’t happy about this ~ but my life was filled with these kinds of disappointments & would always be. 

The summer seemed to take forever ~ summers were so long when I was a kid. Remember? Remember how summer seemed to be several years long? 

Finally, it was September & I was going to school. I remember what I wore that first day ~ a pink & white sear-sucker striped dress & white ankle socks & red shoes. I have always loved red shoes. 

Like everything else, school would be a disappointment. I wanted to read books & I had to sit with the other kids & learn the alphabet which I already knew. I had to learn how to count, which I already knew how to do. I had to help the kids who couldn’t tie their shoe laces ~ why didn’t they already know how to do that? My mother told me that you couldn’t go to school unless you could tie your own shoes! & these kids couldn’t do it! I thought they were dumb! 

But getting on that bus everyday ~ that was great!