GIRLHOOD GIFTS GALORE

The Richest Little Poor Kid

THEN:

The best gifts cannot be held onto. They slip by like the grains of sand under your toes when the waves rush in over your feet. They are the Great Ones like Love, Time, Thoughtfulness, Forgiveness, Peace, Patience, Tenderness, Understanding, Appreciation. These types of gifts are the truest and most beautiful ones of all.

My greatest gifts as a child are memories of these.

Sometimes, we receive a gift we can hold onto. A book, a toy, a letter. Usually these gifts are kept and cherished best if they represent one of the Great Ones. Someone showed their Love for me. Someone spent Time with me or dedicated their Time to making or finding something for me. Someone envisioned how much I would like this and brought it to me.

I have been blessed to have many tangible gifts as well as millions of intangible ones. For a child that grew up in some pretty significant poverty, I managed a lot of memorable and wonderful gifts, and I cherished them and took pretty good care of them most of the time, because I knew another one would not come along if I lost or destroyed this one.

One of my earliest and most precious gifts was a used doll named "Cuddly". I did not name this doll and I don't know if that's the name she came with or if my cousin Anzie gave it to her.

Anzie was helping make a bed and I held up a doll that was on the floor near the wall.

"What's this dolly's name?" I asked. I was less than three years old, possibly even one year old.

Anzie answered, "Her name is Cuddly."

"I like her."

"You can have her if you want."

I was struck by how simply the doll went from being Anzie's to being mine. I'd never been very interested in dolls before but I loved Anzie dearly and was so impressed with her generosity that I vowed to deserve it. I would take care of Cuddly FOREVER! She became my near constant companion for many years. I cut off almost all her hair (because I thought new born babies were supposed to be bald.) Then her eyelashes went, just because I wanted to see what she would look like without them. I painted her nails and put "permanent makeup" on her (also nail polish.) She's had a hard time, but I still "like her" and my grand daughter has played with her many times.

I had a few other dolls. Drowsy was my second favorite doll. She wore a pink polka dot sleeper and said things like, "Mommy, I'm sleepy," and "I want another drink of water!" She had a very pouty voice for that last phrase. Daddy and Momma bought her for me. She was brand new, and  I did not get many new dolls. I loved the polka dots, and her whiny little voice, and her sleepy little eyes. She was tucked under one arm and Cuddly under the other, for many of my youngest years. I did not often play with them the way other little girls did. I was more into riding horses and climbing trees, but they went where I went, and woe unto anyone that held them by their foot or tossed them around carelessly. I was furious if they were, in my young eyes, "mistreated". I once got excited and ran inside when it started storming, only to realize that Cuddly was still out there in the rain. My mother would not allow me to go back out to get her.  I looked out the window and cried until the rain stopped. When I brought her in, she was soaked through and her cloth body had absorbed a lot of water. I was petrified as I watched mom take her apart, make a new body for her, and put her back together again. Sometimes, my mom amazed me breathless!

I still have "Ella", a rubber elephant toy that I've had since I was, my mother says, about six months old. Ella too is in sad shape, but I love every inch of her. She has a big grin and she wears a backpack that I always imagined was full of the best books.

I was given a tricycle when I was about two and I logged many hours on that toy. My dad rode it under the table and bumped his head trying to show me how to ride it. My parents tell me they were amazed at how quickly I took to it and whizzed all over the house endangering every knee cap and shin in the house. My older cousin Becky was given a trike at about the same time, but she did not take to hers as well as I did to mine. I can remember running laps around her as we rode around the pot bellied stove. I could hear the family remarking that I was younger and smaller, but faster and fearless. Becky soon tired of her contraption and went back to her dolls, but my dolls had to sit and politely watch while worked on being a speed demon.

When I was six my favorite toys were plastic farm and zoo animals. By that age, I also had a Mother Goose doll that said nursery rhymes when you pulled her string. She was well loved, and so was my Barbie doll complete with extra clothing and shoes. I also had a View Master Viewer and several coloring books and some crayons. I was getting toy rich! My favorite pastime, though, was playing with the plastic animals. I would pull the narrow drawers out of my mother's sewing machine and place them on their sides. If they had anything in them, I would empty the contents into a certain spot and tell myself that I would fill the drawer back up later. (Likely my mother filled the drawer back up, but it was always my intent to do so.) Those drawers would then become barns and homes for my animals and I spend hours acting out dramas in which the zoo would lose a monkey and all the animals would go in search of him or the cow would fall in a ditch and have to rescued by the elephants and the bison. Drowsy, and Cuddly, Mother Goose, and Barbie just watched me play. They were the audience for these stories.

My parents bought me a plush monkey. He was brand new and wore vivid colors. I adored that monkey. I did not have him long, however, because my little niece, Tanya, cried for him as she and her mother (my sister, Lila) left one day and Mom and Lila talked me into "loaning" the monkey to Tanya. I never got it back and it was years before I let any of them forget it. Since I'm writing about it today, I'm thinking maybe I never did. But the only thing I have left of that awesome gift is the memory, the story. So, I will not lose that as well. I will be true to the memory of the awesome monkey.

At about that same age (six or seven) I was given a Big Wheel. I'd outgrown my tricycle and this was my parents answer to that problem. The Big Wheel was low to the ground and maneuvered better than the tricycle ever had. This was amazingly fun! I was soon spinning down the dirt drive way and throwing dust and gravel all over the place.

When I was eight and we moved to a more remote area, the roads were not even the slightly-flattened graveled driveway type and the Big Wheel became a lot less practical. There was only a few flat patches that would allow me to ride it. Most of the time it stuck in dips or the wheels would spin as I peddled my frustrated little heart out.

My dad saw that I needed a new diversion. He climbed so high in a tree that my mother had to shout out her dire warnings about falling to his death. He strung chains in a sturdy limb high in that tree and removed any other branches that were in the way. Soon I had a swing that was very much like a low trapeze. In the middle, my feet could touch the ground. On both ends of it's swoop it was high off the ground.  At it's highest point I could jump onto the hood of the old International Truck that stood nearby. My dad had given me for the truck for a playhouse. If the truck had been moved a little, I could have jumped off my swing and onto the top of the cab. That's how high the swing went. The truck and the swing became my two best toys. I was into Sci Fi and usually pretended that truck was a spaceship. I would go rescue Tom Swift from eminent peril. (Sandi had only read dozens of Tom Swift books to me.) Or I would "land" in that truck/spaceship and discover some strange planet with odd animals and danger around every corner. Only my "spaceship" was safe! I can remember reading in the old truck on rainy days. Once my sister, Lila, gave me a book of cowboy ghost stories and I read them in that truck with the rain hitting the cab in lonely, metallic plunks. Now and then I would look at the house and wonder if I should make a run for it, since the book was making me a bit jittery, and I was longing for the familiar sounds of my home, and maybe a mustard sandwich or a biscuit with mayonaise. But the rain was cold and constant and deterred me. Eventually I fell asleep tucked up into an old blanket that I kept in the truck. I must not have been too scared or too hungry after all.

One day I came home from school and my mom and dad surprised me with my very own am/fm radio! I had been playing mom's radio and her records for myself since I was five or six, but this one was portable! I could put batteries in it, or stretch out a long extension cord for it, and listen to music while I played in my truck or while I swang and sang on my trapeze-like swing. There is nothing like music to help you remember there is no need to feel lonely.

Mother saved up S & H Green Stamps and usually she bought household items, pots and pans, dishes, towels, small appliances, etc. with them. One day though, she told me, "You can have my Green Stamps. What do you want to get with them?" I always flipped through the S & H catalog, using it as a "wish book", so I knew just what I wanted. I excitedly went straight to the page in the magazine that had dolls and pointed out "Jody, an old fashioned girl". Jody was a cowgirl doll with hair down to her boots. When she arrived, I went to my mother and asked if there was a way to keep her long hair from frizzing up and being destroyed the way a Barbie doll's hair usually was. Momma braided Jody's hair and told me to keep it that way and it would stay pretty. Jody was a great toy and I had fun with her for many years.

My mother found Raggedy Ann and Andy sheets for my bed. I'm not sure if they came from a yard sale, the S & H green stamps catalog, or a bag full of hand me downs. I am sure that my neice Tanya, my cousin Ramona, my sister Sandi, and I all spent many happy hours snuggled on and under them, enjoying the pretty sheets and the warm electric blanket that kept us toasty in the winter. I remember looking in pure wonderment at the doll's magical faces and being delighted with those sheets. Tanya wound up with the originals, or at least with a pillowcase from the originals. I have a pillowcase from an identical set that I still sleep on from time to time.

Another day, Pop said, "You have a present at the house." He told me this when he and my mother picked me up at the bus stop which was miles away from home. I asked now and then on the way home what the present was, but Daddy kept saying, "You have to find it when we get home."

When we got home, I ran through the house (my parent's gifts were always awesome and I was very excited.) I began looking under things and tearing around rather wildly. Momma said, "Don't make a mess! It's not under anything. It's out in plain view."

Daddy said, "Don't give it away!"

"Well, she was getting ready to tear the house down!" Both of them laughed.

Eventually, Daddy had to point it out. They had hung my present on the wall, high over my short little head, and it was a brand new B.B. gun! The fun I had with that! I had never had a B.B. gun but was soon shooting clothes pins, and bulls eyes on cardboard, and pine cones, and walnuts. No one had to warn me not to shoot living creatures with it. I would have cried my eyes out if I'd accidentally hurt a beetle, let alone one of my dear chicken friends!

I had two teddy bears that were precious to me. One of them was Professor Bhaer. My daddy bought The Professor because I had wanted him very much and had not asked for him, thinking he was much too expensive. I was more than aware that money was tight in our home. My sister Sandi, had been reading Little Women to me, so the bear was quickly christened "Professor Bhaer." It made perfect sense to both of us and the Professor is still among my most prized possessions.

My other cherished teddy was given to me for Christmas when I was about 13. He was a fat, fluffy, golden fellow that I named Ted. E. Bear after the little bear voiced by Tom Smothers in the animated Christmas show, "The Bear Who Slept Through Christmas." I lost Ted. E. Bear in one of my many moves and of all the toys I used to have and have no more, I'd like him back best of all, even more so than the awesome monkey or my sweet Jody!

When I had my tenth birthday my cousin Teresa Kay Kinder made a very big deal out of it, "Double digits!" she told me excitedly. She spent a lot of time and energy decorating, inviting people, and planning games. It rained and no one showed up except family, but we still had the best time! Theresa gave me a Quiz Whiz that I had hours and hours of fun with. My sister, Lila gave me a pair of skates. This opened up a whole new world of fun for me and eventually led to my going skating every Saturday that I could manage to come up with the money. Skating became one of my favorite pastimes.

Four dresses were given to me and became listed as favorite childhood gifts. The first was a big flowing blue dress that was much too big for me. I think Lila gave me that dress. I called it my "Princess dress" and I wanted to wear it all the time. Every day after school, I shook off the stress of teachers and rules and slipped into the peace of my Princess Dress. It played a pivotal part in surviving a teacher that hated me for no known reason. It made me feel safe and important.

One dress was brown and black and looked just a little like Jody's cowgirl dress. I believe Momma picked it out for me at a yard sale when I was about twelve years old. I wore it over and over, often with cowboy boots. One day I was wearing it and feeling just a bit pretty when a dear friend, Shane Hensley walked by with another boy that I did not know. Shane said, "Hi!" He smiled happily and asked if I was doing okay in the new school. "I love it! You?" He and I had both been at LFE before. He said he loved CES too, then as he was walking away, he spoke quietly to the other boy, "Do you know her? That's one of the prettiest and nicest girls in the whole world!" You don't feel pretty or noticed much when you are twelve, but that quiet compliment, that I wasn't even supposed to hear, stood out in my mind, encouraging me for the rest of my life.

Eventually, my Aunt Nancy suggested it was the cowgirl dress that might be the cause of many unexplainable sounds and sights my mother and I had been experiencing in our new home and not long after that the dress went amiss. I don't know if my mother gave it away or if my Auntie took it with her, at mom's suggestion, but I missed it greatly and the unexplainable sounds and sights never stopped. Strange things happened in that house even when I was an adult living there with my own sons and my first husband.

One dress was a sundress my Pop picked out for me that Mother thought I would not like. The dress itself was a white sundress with pink and red birds all over it, parrots I believe. It had elastic all around the bosom and two wide, sturdy straps that kept it from falling off when I ran or played. I was twelve years old and it was the perfect dress for a young lady that was one part princess and one part adventurer.

The last dress was bought for my seventh grade graduation. It was purple and cut very prettily. It made me feel sort of pretty and very grown up. I wore it for many years, even after I was married, but eventually it ripped. I missed it everafter.

I had always tried to hog the cameras in the family, either behind or in front of them. I was fascinated with the process of taking and then seeing a photo. I was beguiled by the art of it. I was destined to become an avid photographer. When I was about thirteen, Mom and Dad gave me a 110 camera and I officially became the family photographer. Somehow my parents found the money to help me get film developed rather regularly. What a gift that was!

For my birthday when I turned thirteen, Lila gave me a record player and two 45 records, Bob Seger and the Silver Bullet Band and Dr. Hook. I still had and  adored my radio, but now I could play what I wanted to hear exactly when I wanted to hear it, as long as I could come up with records. I asked her, "How am I supposed to get any more records?" I did not get an allowance, and had no way of making money that I knew of, so this was a fair enough question.

"You have birthdays, and Christmases, and Just becauses." She smiled at me. This cheered me some. Lila would bring me more records!

"And you can check records out at the library too." Sandi added. That cheered me a lot!

"Oh! That's right! I can!" Now I was intensely excited and my sisters laughed at my joy.

True to her word, Lila bought me records for birthdays, Christmases, and 'just becauses'. She handed me The Eagles, John Lennon, Jim Croce, Linda Ronstadt and so much more that I soon had a stack of 45s that kept falling over.

Sandi and I shared a room and there was only one inside door in our whole shotgun house anyway, and that was for the bathroom. So, for her part, Sandi helped me keep the records I checked out of the library from being overdue, and she listened to me play those and my own records over and over as much as she could possibly tolerate before begging me to, "Switch out the record and play something else, anything else, or turn on the radio for a bit, or silence! Silence is good! What's wrong with a little silence?" She gifted me Patience and Understanding, and then life gave me MTV!

I knew growing up that I was the richest little poor kid in the world!