cut that little child, inside of me and such a part of you...
It started with the Thirty-three video (Smashing Pumpkins) and has gotten stronger with my life getting more complicated and with these beautiful clear days we've been having.
I really want to be a kid again.
When i was little, my worries came down to if my mom would give me a couple of bucks for soda and a candy bar, and if she would let me hang out with my friends on the block. Thats when it was our block. We were the kids there, we all would play in the street, doing little parades and saying hell and damn because we thought it was just soooo bad of us. I became friends with Michael because he lived behind me. In Chowchilla, almost all of the blocks are even blocks with alleys right down the middle. Michael and i would climb on our fences and talk to each other, eventually being able to play together. He always came to my house cos i had this playhouse (huuuge) that my stepdad, chuck, built for me and my brother, and michael's parents scared me. Eventually Drue became friends with his younger brother cody.
Then there were the people down the block. I think the boy's name was jonathan, i can't remember his sister's name. She was older than me, but we were pretty much best friends for awhile. Strange girl she was..
Remember the song the night the lights went out in georgia,that reba remade? I got in a fight with one of my friends (can't even remember her name or what she looked like) over that song. I hated it cos there was a guy named andy in it, and my name was shortened to Andi then. Andi Kissell... Anyway, i had taken my radio over to her house and we put it in her garage... when that song came on, i went to change it, and she got mad. She said it was her house, so she could listen to what she wanted. I said okay, took my radio, and left.. heh heh
While we were living there on Alameda, a mexican family moved in across the street. I think they were the only ones on 'our block' i can't remember their names, but there was a boy a year or two older than me, a boy drue's age, and a girl way younger than us... she rarely came over. Michael and the oldest boy hated each other, and cody and the younger boy hated eachother... They were awesome tho... hehe they taught my brother how to say cuss words in spanish tsk tsk.
Down the street the other way (from jonathan and his sister) was jamie and her family. They actually lived on the corner, with their house facing the other street. None of this mattered, cos by then Michael and i did all of our moving by the alley. anyway, they were pretty much white trash, and mom didn't like me hanging out with them although we weren't much better. Once jamie or one of her siblings was having a birthday party and i snuck over there. I was such a rebel *LOL* they had a piñata and we were supposed to line up from youngest to oldest to hit it... i didn't want a blindfold on so i didn't hit it...
there were 2 girls, twins that lived between me and... urgh was christina the name of jonathan's sister??? i think so... anyway, they lived almost right in the middle of our houses. Christina and I were walking to her house once when they informed us that one of the members of NKOTB had like set a hotel room on fire... we were like nuh-uh! But then we were all depressed... gawd we were obsessed too... i always liked joey and... umm.. well the one that everyone liked. I liked really pretty guys then.
In third grade i liked a guy named matthew stockwell... he was such a little prick... Kristen wilson also liked him. She was the snottiest preppiest person in our school. She was always talking about her horses and what it was like to be a real cowgirl. *LOL* well, he ended up 'going out with' a girl in Kristen's group.
In the second half of 5th grade we moved to oklahoma. Then i found the wonder of... damn was his name kendrick?? well, something bates... he looked just like matthew, except he had a cowboy hat, accent, and he was so very sweet. Stigler middle school horrified me cos they gave spankings. I asked my mom why noone went to jail for it. We got spankings alright, but NOT from our school. It seemed so uncivilized to me. We got back to california around the time of the madera county fair in chowchilla (there was one in chowchilla and one in madera) i saw all of these girls that never talked to me before, like jennifer... i always had a crush on her... but yeah, she was like oh you're back and acting all excited. thats when i stopped liking her *LOL*
they were moving the sixth graders either to fairmead from wilson middle school or vice versa. fairmead was a little community out in the country that had the 4th and 5th grade school. So, if your parents pushed you could choose which one you went to. in sixth grade i went to wilson middle. Thats when Katy and i became really good friends. Her i and michelle were like ALWAYS together. We all went to katy's house after school... well, sometimes michelle wasn't allowed, but my grandma always let me. Then in 7th grade all of my class was back together again... which meant that tara and kasey and that whole group was back... tara was a 'tough girl' very amusing considering she was about the size of andrea, but shorter. I was a part of their group off and on in 5th grade... and maybe 4th... but yeah tara all yells at me to come over to her... so i was like alright... and she's all talking to me but katy and michelle were walking away so i was like bye yo... except i didn't say yo then...
thats the first time i ever gave up a friend on purpose i think.
in.. umm... second grade i think... i had a friend named alexis... she was a pretty blonde thing with glasses, and having glasses that weren't just for reading (if they were for reading it was cool) she got made fun of. I was pretty much her only friend (that happens with me a lot). So one day, these kids are making fun of her and she takes off running and goes to cry under the monkey bars. Suddenly all these people are around her asking if she was alright and some of the kids that were making fun of her were saying sorry. This is when i learned where making a scene can get you. I've still never tried it... don't think i would.. anyway, she moved away.
in seventh grade i had to start actual PE... before we had just done it with our class, and never really did anything. I hated it til i met Saul Jimenez (however that's spelled). Gawd, i was in absolute awe of him. He was cute and sweet and sooo funny. He wasn't like anyone i'd ever met in my short life... but, alas, after my first half of 7th grade we moved to the other side of highway 152, so i was in the dairyland school district.
I think that's what i like in guys. Not being like anyone else... as i think i mentioned yesterday, i have this weird obsession with relating people to other people. Matthew isn't like anyone else i know. Not in looks, personality or attitude... rarely he'll faintly remind me of dustin (reader). Rarely. For that matter, i don't know anyone else like andrea either. Phoebe has hair like my friend joy, but other than that they are both very much individuals... I love it!!! wooo..
anyway, at dairyland there was this guy named Chad Wood... he was in eighth grade... EVERYONE liked him... girls in chowchilla knew who he was. He could've been an abercrombie model when he bulked up... i never had a crush on him, and because of that we became friends. That happened to me a lot... in 4th or 5th grade i became good friends with david fuentes... and for that many girls hated me...
i'm like OKAY, we're FRIENDS... ugh
it was about a week before school was out that my grandpa died... may 30th... the EXACT same day that sharon's grandpa died.... i couldn't cry... i don't know if i was in shock or if my life was just shitty enough that i didn't notice much else. i missed the second to the last day of school for his funeral... even tho our teachers said that it wouldn't matter if we missed the whole last week joe made us go... i think he was glad that grandpa was dead... grandpa always saw him for what he really was and hated him... joe of course didn't go to the funeral, my whole family would've freaked out... i just sat there bent over with my face in my hands the whole time... i didn't know what to do at a funeral, and the pastor was a fucking COCK... he was my great-grandma's pastor at that holy-roller church... he kept saying that he had always tried to get my grandpa to accept jesus but he always said not yet not yet... and that on his deathbed he still refused...
which is bs cos my grandpa had a stroke... he didn't even recognize my mom in that last week or two... and if someone was bugging him like that there is a good chance he'd tell them to bugger off... grandpa didn't put up with shit... and when you're 6'2, buff, and with a bit of chub to make you look buffer... who will argue...
so yeah, that summer was interesting... i went to stay with my grandma off and on, and then i went to stay a week cos i wanted to watch the xgames and we didn't have cable... my brother and sister insisted on coming... the problem was that joe would beat the shit out of them usually, so although my brother managed to be good, my sister was a little hellion so grandma couldn't handle her... she most definitely wouldn't beat her... grandpa could've handled her... not with beatings but with sheer aura... but yeah he of course wasn't there
then me and grandma were sitting around watching tv one day (drue was with a friend) when we got a call saying that alexis was missing... so we're thinking she's just out playing, pappy (our landlord.. gawd i loved him) had tons of land and we were always running over it... and she could've fell down or something... so, yeah we went out to look.. eventually grandma went back into town to get drue, and aunt pauline (grandpa's siter) and her grandson willie came from madera to help... we figured if she was hiding cos she was afraid of getting a spanking that she would come to willie no matter what... of course she didn't... they found out that michael brodeur... a man who had just moved in not to long ago on the property had past mental problems and had been acting funny... and had been gone all day...
they found him at an AA meeting... when they got him out and talked to him apparently all he would say is "i left her in the shade" over and over... they got him to take them there... and, yeah...
gawd she was beautiful... 6 years old and although she had her tantrums, she really had a heart of gold... that was the biggest thing that had ever happened in our community... the others being when we had 3 funnel clouds pass overhead... 2 of which touched down... and (before i was born i think) when a dairyland bus was busnapped with everyone inside and the whole group was put in a buried trailer for ransom... they all got out, and there was a movie about it.
anyway, pappy was in his 60s or 70s and was just an amazing person. He loved us sooo much, he was like a second grandfather... alexis's death crushed him just as much as the rest of us... well, except maybe mom and chuck, as they were her parents... and then joe got this idea that pappy was somehow responsible... i was like fuck that... and i didn't really care what anyone else thought cos me and my brother were living with my grandma full time then and she knew it was bs... during one of the hearings for the michael guy i walked out cos my cousin jennifer or someone wanted to smoke so i was going with... pappy was just sitting on the bench outside, totally deflated... that was the first time i'd ever hugged him... i wish i could see him... but for all i know he could have died by now... i hope not tho... he really was a strong man... very very healthy... but that was a blow to him
he had a few cats, all half wild, but he would feed them and admire them... one of them, one that HATED kids... got hit with something one day so her neck was sliced open... she was pappy's favourite... he would sit with her for awhile, then leave for awhile... i don't think he wanted us kids to see him cry... we kept the flies away while he was gone and let her know she wasn't alone... finally pappy sent us home... i still wonder if he managed to get the strength to put her down...
it really was a beautiful home... just it was right by the highway... because of the fences you had to go all the way down the driveway to get to the highway (the road at the end of the driveway led right to it)... thats where everyone else lived... in trailers in the middle of the drive, making it a curved drive...
it still all seems so surreal... my whole life... i feel like i was built at the age of 15 or 16, and someone took this memory of an andi kissell and stuck it in my head...
I really want to be a kid again.
When i was little, my worries came down to if my mom would give me a couple of bucks for soda and a candy bar, and if she would let me hang out with my friends on the block. Thats when it was our block. We were the kids there, we all would play in the street, doing little parades and saying hell and damn because we thought it was just soooo bad of us. I became friends with Michael because he lived behind me. In Chowchilla, almost all of the blocks are even blocks with alleys right down the middle. Michael and i would climb on our fences and talk to each other, eventually being able to play together. He always came to my house cos i had this playhouse (huuuge) that my stepdad, chuck, built for me and my brother, and michael's parents scared me. Eventually Drue became friends with his younger brother cody.
Then there were the people down the block. I think the boy's name was jonathan, i can't remember his sister's name. She was older than me, but we were pretty much best friends for awhile. Strange girl she was..
Remember the song the night the lights went out in georgia,that reba remade? I got in a fight with one of my friends (can't even remember her name or what she looked like) over that song. I hated it cos there was a guy named andy in it, and my name was shortened to Andi then. Andi Kissell... Anyway, i had taken my radio over to her house and we put it in her garage... when that song came on, i went to change it, and she got mad. She said it was her house, so she could listen to what she wanted. I said okay, took my radio, and left.. heh heh
While we were living there on Alameda, a mexican family moved in across the street. I think they were the only ones on 'our block' i can't remember their names, but there was a boy a year or two older than me, a boy drue's age, and a girl way younger than us... she rarely came over. Michael and the oldest boy hated each other, and cody and the younger boy hated eachother... They were awesome tho... hehe they taught my brother how to say cuss words in spanish tsk tsk.
Down the street the other way (from jonathan and his sister) was jamie and her family. They actually lived on the corner, with their house facing the other street. None of this mattered, cos by then Michael and i did all of our moving by the alley. anyway, they were pretty much white trash, and mom didn't like me hanging out with them although we weren't much better. Once jamie or one of her siblings was having a birthday party and i snuck over there. I was such a rebel *LOL* they had a piñata and we were supposed to line up from youngest to oldest to hit it... i didn't want a blindfold on so i didn't hit it...
there were 2 girls, twins that lived between me and... urgh was christina the name of jonathan's sister??? i think so... anyway, they lived almost right in the middle of our houses. Christina and I were walking to her house once when they informed us that one of the members of NKOTB had like set a hotel room on fire... we were like nuh-uh! But then we were all depressed... gawd we were obsessed too... i always liked joey and... umm.. well the one that everyone liked. I liked really pretty guys then.
In third grade i liked a guy named matthew stockwell... he was such a little prick... Kristen wilson also liked him. She was the snottiest preppiest person in our school. She was always talking about her horses and what it was like to be a real cowgirl. *LOL* well, he ended up 'going out with' a girl in Kristen's group.
In the second half of 5th grade we moved to oklahoma. Then i found the wonder of... damn was his name kendrick?? well, something bates... he looked just like matthew, except he had a cowboy hat, accent, and he was so very sweet. Stigler middle school horrified me cos they gave spankings. I asked my mom why noone went to jail for it. We got spankings alright, but NOT from our school. It seemed so uncivilized to me. We got back to california around the time of the madera county fair in chowchilla (there was one in chowchilla and one in madera) i saw all of these girls that never talked to me before, like jennifer... i always had a crush on her... but yeah, she was like oh you're back and acting all excited. thats when i stopped liking her *LOL*
they were moving the sixth graders either to fairmead from wilson middle school or vice versa. fairmead was a little community out in the country that had the 4th and 5th grade school. So, if your parents pushed you could choose which one you went to. in sixth grade i went to wilson middle. Thats when Katy and i became really good friends. Her i and michelle were like ALWAYS together. We all went to katy's house after school... well, sometimes michelle wasn't allowed, but my grandma always let me. Then in 7th grade all of my class was back together again... which meant that tara and kasey and that whole group was back... tara was a 'tough girl' very amusing considering she was about the size of andrea, but shorter. I was a part of their group off and on in 5th grade... and maybe 4th... but yeah tara all yells at me to come over to her... so i was like alright... and she's all talking to me but katy and michelle were walking away so i was like bye yo... except i didn't say yo then...
thats the first time i ever gave up a friend on purpose i think.
in.. umm... second grade i think... i had a friend named alexis... she was a pretty blonde thing with glasses, and having glasses that weren't just for reading (if they were for reading it was cool) she got made fun of. I was pretty much her only friend (that happens with me a lot). So one day, these kids are making fun of her and she takes off running and goes to cry under the monkey bars. Suddenly all these people are around her asking if she was alright and some of the kids that were making fun of her were saying sorry. This is when i learned where making a scene can get you. I've still never tried it... don't think i would.. anyway, she moved away.
in seventh grade i had to start actual PE... before we had just done it with our class, and never really did anything. I hated it til i met Saul Jimenez (however that's spelled). Gawd, i was in absolute awe of him. He was cute and sweet and sooo funny. He wasn't like anyone i'd ever met in my short life... but, alas, after my first half of 7th grade we moved to the other side of highway 152, so i was in the dairyland school district.
I think that's what i like in guys. Not being like anyone else... as i think i mentioned yesterday, i have this weird obsession with relating people to other people. Matthew isn't like anyone else i know. Not in looks, personality or attitude... rarely he'll faintly remind me of dustin (reader). Rarely. For that matter, i don't know anyone else like andrea either. Phoebe has hair like my friend joy, but other than that they are both very much individuals... I love it!!! wooo..
anyway, at dairyland there was this guy named Chad Wood... he was in eighth grade... EVERYONE liked him... girls in chowchilla knew who he was. He could've been an abercrombie model when he bulked up... i never had a crush on him, and because of that we became friends. That happened to me a lot... in 4th or 5th grade i became good friends with david fuentes... and for that many girls hated me...
i'm like OKAY, we're FRIENDS... ugh
it was about a week before school was out that my grandpa died... may 30th... the EXACT same day that sharon's grandpa died.... i couldn't cry... i don't know if i was in shock or if my life was just shitty enough that i didn't notice much else. i missed the second to the last day of school for his funeral... even tho our teachers said that it wouldn't matter if we missed the whole last week joe made us go... i think he was glad that grandpa was dead... grandpa always saw him for what he really was and hated him... joe of course didn't go to the funeral, my whole family would've freaked out... i just sat there bent over with my face in my hands the whole time... i didn't know what to do at a funeral, and the pastor was a fucking COCK... he was my great-grandma's pastor at that holy-roller church... he kept saying that he had always tried to get my grandpa to accept jesus but he always said not yet not yet... and that on his deathbed he still refused...
which is bs cos my grandpa had a stroke... he didn't even recognize my mom in that last week or two... and if someone was bugging him like that there is a good chance he'd tell them to bugger off... grandpa didn't put up with shit... and when you're 6'2, buff, and with a bit of chub to make you look buffer... who will argue...
so yeah, that summer was interesting... i went to stay with my grandma off and on, and then i went to stay a week cos i wanted to watch the xgames and we didn't have cable... my brother and sister insisted on coming... the problem was that joe would beat the shit out of them usually, so although my brother managed to be good, my sister was a little hellion so grandma couldn't handle her... she most definitely wouldn't beat her... grandpa could've handled her... not with beatings but with sheer aura... but yeah he of course wasn't there
then me and grandma were sitting around watching tv one day (drue was with a friend) when we got a call saying that alexis was missing... so we're thinking she's just out playing, pappy (our landlord.. gawd i loved him) had tons of land and we were always running over it... and she could've fell down or something... so, yeah we went out to look.. eventually grandma went back into town to get drue, and aunt pauline (grandpa's siter) and her grandson willie came from madera to help... we figured if she was hiding cos she was afraid of getting a spanking that she would come to willie no matter what... of course she didn't... they found out that michael brodeur... a man who had just moved in not to long ago on the property had past mental problems and had been acting funny... and had been gone all day...
they found him at an AA meeting... when they got him out and talked to him apparently all he would say is "i left her in the shade" over and over... they got him to take them there... and, yeah...
gawd she was beautiful... 6 years old and although she had her tantrums, she really had a heart of gold... that was the biggest thing that had ever happened in our community... the others being when we had 3 funnel clouds pass overhead... 2 of which touched down... and (before i was born i think) when a dairyland bus was busnapped with everyone inside and the whole group was put in a buried trailer for ransom... they all got out, and there was a movie about it.
anyway, pappy was in his 60s or 70s and was just an amazing person. He loved us sooo much, he was like a second grandfather... alexis's death crushed him just as much as the rest of us... well, except maybe mom and chuck, as they were her parents... and then joe got this idea that pappy was somehow responsible... i was like fuck that... and i didn't really care what anyone else thought cos me and my brother were living with my grandma full time then and she knew it was bs... during one of the hearings for the michael guy i walked out cos my cousin jennifer or someone wanted to smoke so i was going with... pappy was just sitting on the bench outside, totally deflated... that was the first time i'd ever hugged him... i wish i could see him... but for all i know he could have died by now... i hope not tho... he really was a strong man... very very healthy... but that was a blow to him
he had a few cats, all half wild, but he would feed them and admire them... one of them, one that HATED kids... got hit with something one day so her neck was sliced open... she was pappy's favourite... he would sit with her for awhile, then leave for awhile... i don't think he wanted us kids to see him cry... we kept the flies away while he was gone and let her know she wasn't alone... finally pappy sent us home... i still wonder if he managed to get the strength to put her down...
it really was a beautiful home... just it was right by the highway... because of the fences you had to go all the way down the driveway to get to the highway (the road at the end of the driveway led right to it)... thats where everyone else lived... in trailers in the middle of the drive, making it a curved drive...
it still all seems so surreal... my whole life... i feel like i was built at the age of 15 or 16, and someone took this memory of an andi kissell and stuck it in my head...