February 21, 2017- More Childhood Memories- Part 2

Braces and Dad’s Train Set

Mike was talking about some childhood memories that I had remembered incorrectly. I had thought that Mom paid for our braces but he said that she told him that this expense was covered under Dad’s GM dental plan. Another one was about Dad’s train set- it didn’t have the steam coming out of the locomotive. Dad’s friend Junior had that kind and he was jealous of him because of this. It did make the train noises though.

Braces- 1980

1969

 

           

 Fireworks

I asked Mike the name of the fireworks mail order catalog that he got in the mid-80s. He said that it was Blue Angel. I thought so but I just wanted to know for sure. Mike got in trouble for having fireworks. One of our neighbors- it might’ve been Mrs. K- called the cops when he was setting them off. He bought these during our trip to Virginia in 1986 either in that state or Maryland. 

    

   Fireworks- even the sparklers- scare me. We had little tanks a couple of times. I remember Grandma Next-Door being frightened when one of those got close to her.

Internet photos

    

                        

 Long Walks

In the mid-1980s, Mom and I dropped our 1984 Buick Century off at the Westfield dealership/service center for repairs or an oil change. We walked all the way home, which had to have been about 5 miles. We stopped at Sal’s Deli for soda during this long trek. Sal used to work at the Butcher Block. I was surprised that he actually remembered me as one of its customers.

  

   I remember another long walk that I took around the same time period. My brother and I had missed the bus home from our high school in Scotch Plains. I guess that our parents weren’t home or we just decided to not even bother calling them. That was about a 5 mile journey as well.

November 22, 2015

Bullies/Mean Kids

I was sitting at our picnic table with a couple of neighborhood girls when suddenly one of them threw her gum into my hair and was laughing.  Mom tried using peanut butter to get it out. I don’t remember if this worked or not. Maybe she had to cut it out.

  My kindergarten classmate, Michelle F, wouldn’t let me play with any of the dolls one day. I was very upset about this.

   A boy almost threw my Beary Bear down the sewer drain. Well, he was really Mike’s stuffed animal but I considered him partly mine too. I was feeling scared and nearly cried. I also wished that I hadn’t even taken Beary along on that bike ride with me.

   Some of my grade school classmates and Girl Scout troop members used to pick on me, calling me names like “Brace Face” and “Four eyes “ These girls have shown up in my dreams but they often were nice to me.

   Mike got picked on even worse than me. “Mike disease” and they’d also use his middle name of Francis, saying that it was a girlie one.

   It was terrible that his gym teacher and some of his classmates made fun of him for the way that he was doing his jumping jacks. That teacher got in trouble for this. Both of us hated that class; we were always the last or next to last to be picked for teams.

   There were a couple of other things that he might have gotten teased about. He had speech problems when he was a little kid and had to go to therapy. L was one of the letters that he had trouble saying. He also couldn’t really tie his shoes up until about early 2^nd grade. Sometimes, our friend Kelly had to help him do so.

   A couple of his classmates threw eggs at our house once and it wasn’t even Mischief Night (October 30). I think that their Dads made them apologize. Mike told me that the one boy had punched him in the arm and called him names too

    I defended him against a neighborhood bully when he was about 9 years old. We were in the field across from our house. I grabbed the boy’s arm and said “Leave my brother alone!”

   Unfortunately, I was stupid and agreed to a rematch against the jerk. His 2 friends were there. Kelly and Mike came with me. He hit me in the face and I ran. I always wished that I had said “So you think you are so tough beating up on a girl” or something like that.

   A boy was walking behind me in the hallway of our high school. I heard him saying “Evil eye” a couple of times. I turned around and saw that it was one of Mike’s classmates who had picked on him in grade school. Was he implying that I was an ugly witch or something like that?

 

Beary Bear

 

 

 

                                                                           

June 13, 2015- Mom-Part 2

Some of her Bradlees salary helped to pay for most of our Catholic school tuition. She probably talked Dad into getting us braces. I doubt that he wanted to spend his money on that. He had no problem giving it to his family though.

   In the fall she would rake the leaves into low piles to make a house for us – these would divide the rooms of it.

   She always made sure that she got us nice presents for Christmas and birthdays. There was a board game under the tree nearly every year. We still have some of these, including Hangman, Battleship and Connect Four.

   We’ve had good times at flea markets and Chinese Auctions (which are now called tricky trays or gift auctions to be politically correct, I suppose). Some of both types of these events were at Roselle Catholic.

   Kathy and her mom Helen came with us most of the time. I got my Fred frog stuffed animal in a grab bag at a Chinese Auction in Mother Seton high school. Mike said that our grade school had one but I hadn’t remembered this until he mentioned it. 

   Some of the outdoor flea markets that we liked going to were Columbus (near Aunt Ann’s house), Englishtown, Westfield, and Woodbridge. I think that we went to Collingswood a couple of times too. US 1 Indoor Flea Market was our family’s favorite.

   Mom and I used to enjoy watching classic films together. Our favorites include Gaslight, Rebecca, Rear Window, The Uninvited, Arsenic and Old Lace, The Great Escape, The Adventures of Robin Hood, and To Kill a Mockingbird.  Sometimes Mike would watch them with us.

1979

 

 

Brace Face

I'm suprised that I actually smiled for my class photos when I had my braces. I had them for nearly 3 years and they were taken off during the summer before I started high school in 1983. I can't believe that I actually kept these reminders of my brace face days - the case for my headgear, a totebag, my super smile certificate and the pin - smiling faces wear braces. I vividly remember the pain of having them but in the end it was all worth it. I had to wear a night retainer for some time too - maybe a year. My brother had braces also but he had a regular retainer afterwards.