March 20, 2016- My Brother’s Memories

When we were watching a commercial for a violent video game, Mike mentioned how the ones that we played as kids were never this way. He told me that Cindy and Jessica had given him a game called Gopher. I hadn’t even remembered that it even existed.

   He has been strolling down memory lane lately. He hadn’t really been doing so that much before this. Of course, he seems to bring up the bad ones more than the good, like incidents in which his classmates picked on him. I knew about some of them but not others.

   He said that he was punched on the shoulder once. Another time, kids dared him to beat up another classmate but he didn’t do so. He told me about additional incidents that I can’t really recall right now. It is terrible that kids can be so cruel to one another.

   Mike was also a member of the CYO (Catholic Youth Organization) in grade school. I hadn’t remembered this until he recently mentioned that they went to a Yankees vs. Red Sox game and also a NJ Nets one.

   He said that we celebrated New Year’s Eve at the Bailey’s (our family friends) house in the 1970s. He mentioned that we popped balloons then. This definitely is not in my memory bank. I wish that I had more such happy times in there. The unpleasant things seem more abundant and vivid, unfortunately.

   One of these that he reminded of me was a 4^th of July incident. We were at our friend’s house for the traditional celebration when Mom’s migraine headache was so bad that Dad had to take her to the ER. After they returned, Mom had to take a nap. She was so out of it from the shot that they gave her. This was very upsetting.

     When I tell him about some of my childhood memories, he says that he can’t remember those. I guess that even though we shared experiences, there will be some that we can’t recall or we will recollect different aspects about them.

   Maybe in the afterlife, our spirits will be able to revisit our past and witness these moments. That is just a part of my somewhat crazy afterlife fantasy. I don’t talk to my brother about such things because he might think that this is foolish. I share them with Sharon who always says that she likes them and hopes that they will be a reality then.

March 13, 2016- Additional Childhood Memories- Part 2

Later

Mike was doing more of his jealousy routine- Cindy this time. But then we were reminiscing about our friendship with her and Jessica for a couple of minutes. We feel bad that we never went to Jessica’s high school graduation party. I had forgotten that we had even been invited to it until I found a thank you card from her in my memento tote a couple of years ago. We had sent her a card with money in it.

   That was in 1990, so at the time I am almost certain that I was living with my Aunt Ann. Things between Mom and Dad weren’t good as they were going through the divorce. This must have been part of the reason why we didn’t attend her party.

   He was doing impressions of Cindy and Jessica’s grandparents a couple of times today. One was Mr. K saying “How about those Yankees?” He also reminded me of the time that Mrs. K was trying to teach me how to sweep the sidewalk properly and efficiently. Even after that I still wasn’t able to do that good of a job; it’s like my brain can’t learn even simple stuff sometimes. I’m sure that Amy would say something like “Don’t put yourself down”.

   Mike has been doing many of impersonations today. It’s better than hearing him complain, that’s for sure. He did an Uncle Joe one earlier then we talked a little about him. We were trying to remember what year that he built that big addition onto their ranch style home- 1986 or 1987?  It’s hard to believe that it’s been 23 years since he died from cancer.

   Of course, he was then also expressing his jealousies about our Cousin Donna and her husband.   Donna has her doctorate (library science) now. I haven’t seen her since Uncle Joe’s funeral. Mom and Mike last saw her at Missy’s wedding which I didn’t go to in 1999.

   Afterwards, he moved onto some about Rob, who is actually our second cousin (Missy’s son) but Aunt Ann adopted him. He’s a welder and does some farming as well. He plays the guitar too. I haven’t seen him in about 11 years.

   Mike is talking a lot but I’m not that bothered by it today because I’m doing so too- not nearly as much as he is though. He’s like Grandma Next-Door’s one motor mouth friend Gladys. I still remember being upset one Sunday night because she was interrupting my enjoyment of “The Wonderful World of Disney” when I was a little girl.

   He mentioned “The Honeymooners”. I can’t believe that I forgot that this is also one of Dad’s favorite shows. He thought that he was the “King of the Castle” just like Ralph Kramden did. I’m pretty sure that this is one that character’s lines. We would watch it with him sometimes, Mike more so than me.

The Honeymooners

Note- both photos are from the internet.

 

Happy Birthday, Mark

My brother's 41st birthday is today. I didn't buy him a card though but did give him a gift of the photos of his favourite tennis players Sania Mirza and Vania King that I took when we were at the US Open last year. Although he does complain often and teases and puts me down alot, when he isn't being Mr Critical and the Angry Middle-Aged Man we do have fun times together and I would consider him one of my friends. I have good memories of us when we were kids such as playing with stuffed animals and his Matchbox cars, watching our favourited tv shows and movies together and enjoying either listening to the Yankees games on the radio or watching them on tv, despite him constantly teasing me about Don Mattingly.

The photos, from top to bottom are from 1985, 1983, 1982, 1975 and 1973. I love the tiger sweater that my aunt made my cousin Ellen. 2 of the shots in that group are non-bday ones of us just having fun playing in the snow and building a snowman. Yikes, you can see that I was wearing legwarmers in the 1983 one - that's one fashion trend that I hope never makes a comeback. We had some good cakes at these parties, I even made a few of them in the 80's. Sometimes we'd get Carvel ice cream ones. Yummy, now I'm having a craving for this which is odd because I'm a candy lover not a cake one now.

My 80's crush

My brother used to tease me alot about my crush on Don Mattingly. I enjoyed watching the Yankees games with him in the 80's. That crush ended in the early 90's but my brother still teases me about him. My dad got me the 1984 Topp's baseball card but it was stolen from me by a boyfriend 12 years later and I'm still mad about this. I got another one but it's slightly flawed. I should've been more careful when buying it at the flea market. Sometimes I wonder why I even thought that he was cute. I guess my tastes have changed - not really into guys with facial hair that much anymore.