This faded section of the puzzle is bigger then I remember it being…I know Rozatti’s was on one end of Madison Avenue and there was a little grocery store at the other… Annie’s or something like that…
There were trolley tracks by the playground and we would wave every time a trolley went by and train tracks on the way to school… You always crossed the street at the corner and you made sure to look both ways before you did…
Where were we?
Okay, over there… that piece…
That’s about 1955 when mom and dad went to the hospital to get a new baby. They got another baby brother; his name would be Chris.
When they came back from the hospital though, he wasn’t with mom and dad.
We were told he was still too small and I’d have to wait till he grew a little more, but they went back again and this time they brought him home.
Do you see those big pieces right next to that? That’s 1956 and 1957. I started kindergarten and my teacher’s name was Mrs. McKelvy. I know, some of those pieces of the puzzle are kind of worn, but I remember crayons, learning how to print my name, paste, finger paints and nap time… I had a blue mat that mom and dad made for me that I would nap on, also the firehouse I’d walk by every day, to and from school. I wanted to be a fireman when I grew up.
That other piece is first grade at Sacred Heart and Sister Sillean. Grandmom knew Sister Sillean, so I knew I had to behave around her! I had to wear long pants and good shirt and a tie every day! Learning to tie a tie was a lot harder then tying my shoes. The classroom always smelled funny.
When I turned six, my mom decided she was going to give me a surprise birthday party and invite my first grade class. I didn’t know anything about it and after I got cleaned up, after my nap, my mom asked me to go get Grandpop down in the basement.
Down in the basement???
But that’s where the devil lived and it was dark down there!
My mom insisted that I get Grandpop, so I opened the door and switched on the lights and everyone yelled, “Surprise!”
I screamed, I cried and I think I may have wet myself, because as sure as I was clinging to those basement steps, I knew that bad devil just got me!
I don’t remember much about the party, but I do remember about a week later. I and everyone else in the first grade came down with the chicken pox…
So the devil was really there!
That next one is my mom and dad going to the hospital again for another baby.
This time they brought home another baby sister, Marianne. At least now, Dianne would have someone to play dolls with.
Aw, that’s “Lady”! She was our first dog, a black and brown collie with white paws and there’s my first bike, a real bike, with just two wheels! Lady had puppies out in the garage and that was the only time I was allowed in the garage, to see her and her puppies. She was a good dog! She had soft fur, she liked to lick my face and she was real protective of my new baby sister. She would always lie beside the bassinet in the dinning room protecting her.
More faded pieces of the puzzle, but we’re starting to get clear of it.
Matt, Me, Chris & Dianne outside the house in Clifton Heights.
Six years old, summertime and the YMCA!
My first time ever on a big school bus heading to the YMCA pool! The seats were green and the backs were shinny silver with little bumps and they had handles.
All the upper windows were down on the bus, the breeze was warm and felt real neat and we were singing our YMCA song…
Aye, Aye Ky - Ike Us,
Nobody likes us,
We are the kids from Clifton Heights.
Always a wining,
Always a grinning,
Always a feeling fine,
Aye, aye, aye…
I know I had a good time and I remembered scraping my elbow pretty bad on the concrete at the pool. It was bleeding, but it didn’t hurt! [How come?] The grownups cleaned it and put a band-aid on it and told me I was good for not crying.
That piece there is when I had a loose front tooth that seemed to bother my mom, more then it was bothering me. She told me to go see Grandmom in her bedroom. Grandmom was in bed and said let me see, so I opened my mouth and before I knew it, Grandmom grabbed a tissue and had pulled out my loose tooth.
I asked my mom why Grandmom was in bed and mom told me Grandmom wasn’t feeling well that day.
What’s that section of the puzzle there? That’s about 1958.
Our family was complete! Mom, Dad, Matt, Me, Dianne, Christopher, Marianne, Grandmom and Grandpop…
All the real and adopted Aunts and Uncles, the house on Berkley Avenue, the streets and paths I had memorized and knew every short cut on... We may not have fully understood it, but we always felt loved, safe and protected.
Dwight D Eisenhower was the president, that’s what we had learned in school and school had let out for the summer.
We were driving over to New Jersey that next weekend and my life, as I knew it, with all its familiar comforts and surroundings, was about to change.
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