Part three.
This is how I've become who I am today. Currently it's my life from my birth to sometime around 3rd grade. The actual update is lower with the stars around it *** so scroll down to that if you remember what I wrote before.
Part 1: Born-Kindergarten.
This is (with out a doubt) the fuzziest time of my life. I don't remember nearly anything. I remember once I woke up, crying and being so happy that I was alive. It felt like I was born that day, but I was clearly 4+ years old. That's my oldest memory. I now have some crazy theories as to what happened. One is that I had a ghost someone enter my body, but only gain very minor control. Another is that A ghost took my body over and took over most the control. The reason I think that is I have a little voice in my head (maybe it's me?) that tells me the answers to things. But... it can't read. That's why I have to read everything out loud-in my head, as well as the reason I'm bad at spelling(because it can't tell me how to spell). And the third, and most likely answer is that I just had a bad dream, and I want to feel special so I make up stuff that seems semi-plauseable to be such.
Anyways, as I said I only have a few little memories. One involves me going up to my cusins house up in Northern Washington (I lived in Salem at the time) with their Grandparents. It was a very long and boring drive, and it involved getting stuck/lost in a forest. I don't remember getting there or even leaving, I just remember that bit.
Another memory was when I was very little, my father (kyle) did a side-job and got me a puppy. He was a Chinese pug, and we named him Brownie. He quickly became my best friend. At that time in my life I had very few friends, none in fact. All I had were the adults that put up with me.
I also remember a fire. We were living at my grandparents, and I was playing the NES at the time. I think I was playing the turtles(Teenage mutant turtles) video game. There was a fire in the chimney and they had to call the fire department. I was so worried that my precious little game system would be burnt. I was very into games at the time, mostly because you didn't have to have friends to enjoy games. So I could have fun by myself. It was also something I was quite good at, so I took pride in it.
I believe that's all there is to know about me before I was in some sort of schoolings. The other knowledge of me at this age is all second hand from my mother. Like when I threw sand at a little kids eyes because he was near me, or the fact that I won games off our neighbors by beating them at games (when I was less than 4). There's a few more second hand memories too, like the wolf who someone owned that hated everyone but it's owner and me, or that I once ate an entire dish of cat food. I suppose it's for the best that I don't remember though, I think we moved a lot and there were a lot of fights between my mother and Kyle. And they didn't end here, nor did they end anytime soon. But I'll leave that for another day.
Part 2: Kindergarten to sometime in 2nd grade.
This is another little chapter of my life. Yet again my memories are few and far between, but I can piece a few together. For kindergarten I went to a little school about a mile away from my house. (grandmas house with me, my mom, kyle. Uncle john his two kids and his wife in it. 9 people in a 3 bedroom house.) There wasn't a whole lot for me to remember. I know I loved the train tracks that you could build together and make things out of. I also remember the goopy stuff they let us play with sometimes. It was in a giant bucket and we got to pour it down little tubes and funnels and it made stuff move. I liked it. Another vague memory was that we had to make a little 'trap' to catch the gingerbread cookie man. My idea was little pieces of stuff with glue on them. I was a dumb child. :(
We were in Salem at this time. I think we moved to an apartment between kindergarten and 1st grade, but I think we got evicted and sent back to my grandma's house. I'm pretty sure what happened, cause I remember a kid named Luigi from some apartments. We kinda played together sometimes. But he broke my toy gun, my favorite one. It was a little machine gun that made ratttatatatata noises when you pulled the trigger. I didn't like him after that. And a few weeks after that I think is when we moved back in with my grandparents.
I also remember how unfair my grandma and aunt were to me when it came time for punishments. My cousin (Stephany) pinched me so I pushed her down. We both got in trouble, and she was told to sit in the living room (with the TV on) and I was sent into a corner of the hallway. This wasn't the first time that happened either, and I can't clearly remember any other instances of this but I know they did happen.
After... some amount of time, I started going to the bigger elementary school. I was too close for the bus to pick me up, so I rode my bike. There were these two neighbor girls who always tried to get a ride from me on the back bolts of my bike. I tried to be fair about it and switch off on who got rides, but I did favor one over the other. (She was nicer) They fought about it sometimes, I felt bad about that.
On one day when I was riding to school, it was very windy and there was some water floating around, so it was hard to look forward when I was petling.... and I hit a parked car. Yep, parked. But it was a huge truck, and my wheel got stuck on/under the bumper. This was a major problem for me, because I was already frustrated and half crying, and now my bike was stuck. After about 10 min of kicking it, it finally came free. But my day didn't get any better. When I was about 5 min ride from the school, I turned and slid when I was going through a really dirty mud puddle and just finished my ride to school like that. They made me call my mom and get my grandma to bring some clothes in for me to change into. That was a very bad day.
This is also about the time I started using computers. My grandpa gave me the password to get into his computer and let me play the demo's of games he had. He had all the really old duke nuke'em games, and the old Doom 3d game and the wolfenstiegne 3d game. I was quite happy. He also had jazz jackrabbit and a few other games I forgot the name of. This along with the Nintendo took up most of my free time.
I believe it was about half way through 1st grade that we moved up to Tigard from Salem. Tigard is about an hours drive north of Salem. Up there we got a rental house over on Fanno Creak. Odd, I know. That place will later have been one of the better times of my childhood, but that time did not last long. And right now, it was just a time of more life.
When I moved in, I again had no friends and not a lot to do other than play video games. So I did that a lot in my free time. I never really made friends in school, and the one friend I did make moved away to Utah a few weeks after we became friends. I went to phill luise elementary school, and I had the same teacher for 1st and 2nd grade. I hated her so much. She was the first person in my life I thought about calling a bitch.
And, surprise, I was a stupid kid. I had to be in the special reading classes because I couldn't read very well. Ironically I can now read better than most people and yet... my spelling never caught up with me. Odd, that is. You'd think someone who reads as much as I do would pick something up about spelling. But nope, never did.
Anyways, back to how things were. I remember I played soccer a lot on recess. I enjoyed soccer a lot, even though I sucked at it and was always last picked anyways. A kid named JD was basically my idol at this time. He was good at Soccer and as far as I remember, fairly popular and likable. I wanted to be just like him. But I wasn't.
Then, came the day I was hoeing for a long time. I got to switch schools. I'm not exactly sure why it happened, but they tore down my old school and sent me to Durham Elementary. Life was basically the same here, but the teacher wasn't a bitch. She was nice, I don't remember much else about her though. I do remember they'd let me spend some of my recesses inside playing the Brazilian trail game. (think Oregon trail, but in Brazil!)
I also remember the RETARDED way they did spelling tests. Basically it was set up like this. You paired up people and gave them each a different spelling list based off of how good they are at spelling. Then you had them read it to each other and you take the test like that. BUT, the person who was my partner was also bad at spelling, and unlike me, bad at reading. So he'd give me the wrong words. And I tried to tell the teacher this, because I was spelling words (that didn't make a bit of sense for how they were said) and she didn't believe me. That's when I first started to doubt the school systems.
I also remember my first crush. I have no idea what this girls name is or was, and I'm not sure why I liked her. All I really remember is that she was pale, and wore a black and white polka-dot skirt. I think she may have had freckles too. She could be the reason why I like pale girls as well as freckles on girls. But I'm not sure.
My parents still fight now, but I don't think any of the major ones I remember happened till after I got into the 3rd grade. So I'll save those stories for another time. Now it's time for a tale of crushed dreams. There was a kid down the street from me that I met. I forgot his name, but he was 2-3 years older than me. I thought we were becoming friends, but it was more like I was the point-and-laugh at kid. He'd try to get me to do stupid things, or just make me get hurt or something. At the time I didn't notice, cause I was just happy to have a friend for once. The day I finally saw him for who he was is when he asked to barrow a football, and I let him, and then he wouldn't let me play with him. After that I got the football back and I didn't really speak with him much. I was kinda depressed and angry for the next few weeks, but I just kept on playing games and my worries went away.
***New entry***
Part 3, The cousins.
So here we are, a bit farther in time. It took me a few years to get here. There was something I'd forgotten until this point in my life, due to it's random nature. Occasionally my family (myself, Mom, and Kyle) would head up to the north end of Washington to visit my cousins Jay and Chris. (well, my parents would talk to Uncle dale and Aunt Mary, but who cares about them?)
The trips up there were utter torture. Long roads, with parents who smoke and no air conditioning in a black van. Horrible. At one point, just out of shear boredom and restlessness I convinced myself that I was going to spontaneously combust, and I made a deal with the godly body (I call him god, but I've never thought of him in the sense that a Christian or whatever would. Just a governing body for random chance, I guess.) that if I could just hear 'the record man' I'd be happy before I died. I really liked that song.
Anyways. I never exploded randomly, to my satisfaction. And here were some of the highlights of my trip - They had a full sized trampoline. And if you have or know any creative kids, you know just how bad of an idea that is. They also had bikes and enough space to do whatever you felt like on them. Plenty of roads no one used, plenty of speed bumps and little curbs that went up to do jumps off of. Even a small ramp made from a couple 2x4's and a piece of plywood. And to top it all off, they had Sega Channel. A little thing that used cable (like for a TV) to let you link up and play around 100 different titles on the Sega Genesis. I thought this was the greatest idea, ever, in the invention of anything. So whenever it was too hot, or we got bored of being outside, or we were afraid of getting in too much trouble with the trampoline, we'd head inside and play that. Many hours of fun.
Something I never really thought about is the parents there, they never really seemed to do anything the entire time we were there. I know they were there, and I know they were at least passively watching us, but they weren't really... paying attention. That could be why we were able to have so much fun, is because they were distracting each other so much.
And that's the short history on my cousins. And the reason that's important is because right around this time, in 3rd grade, they moved from northern Washington down to Oregon, in fact about half a mile away from me. And on a bike, with the joyful youth flowing through your veins, half a mile is nothing more than anticipation of the fun to be had.
So almost every day after school, and over the summer, I'd spend with those two. Generally at different times. Chris was fun because he was a dare devil, doing things that would make parents scream and get the respect of children everywhere. He was the boy who took two home made ramps and jumped them. Not just a few feet though, but about a few yards. (This was from the point of view of a 10 year old, so forgive me if I'm way off. As best as I can remember though, it was more of a distance than a 6 foot man to me was tall) He was amazing like that, people liked him and he loved to be outside.
Jay on the other hand was very different. Although the older of the brothers, he was the more easily angered but oddly more mature. He was a thinker, and enjoyed the outdoors at times but preferred to play his clarinet or games to going outside. A bit on the heavier side, but nothing like what America is used to now-a-days. I generally played video games with him, and after much pleading and begging of my parents, we too were proud owners of the Sega Channel. This was a good time to be alive.
No, my parents didn't stop arguing, and no, Kyle didn't stop drinking. But with my cousins here, we had plenty of time away from that with each other that it didn't feel like it mattered as much. One of our favorite activities that all three of us enjoyed (to our parents disdain) was Beaver Damming.
The idea was simple, there was a small creak, about a foot across, that was sitting in very soft, sand-ish mud that lead to a waterfall which was about 3 feet tall. And by using only the things we found around there (sticks, leaves, mud) we were to form a dam and let the little creak fill up till it was massively overfull, and then all three kick down the dam and watch it BURST down the tiny cliff and splash the ground below. Some of the good fun in that was lost when we had to get sprayed down by the icy cold hose after we got home before they even let us inside, and even then we had to change in the garage and then take a shower.
Another memory I was always quite fond of, was the lazy days we spent under the bridge. There was another small river by their house, and on the days when it was unbearably hot we'd just get our bikes and park under the thick concrete bridge and look at the water. Because we were in the shade, under the bridge, and by water, it was generally very cool down there. Our parents warned us every time they heard about it, because they knew gangs frequented that spot. We only saw a few people down there besides us, and we generally shared or left when they arrived. It wasn't a problem. I don't remember what we did under that bridge, I don't think we talked much. Just being around each other in the cool area was enough I guess.
Another thing we all three liked to do was just exploring around (where we shouldn't have been). We'd walk around in the forests between the houses, peeking around and finding more trails and hidden ways to get around. We also found an old bridge from long ago, which all it was is two massive pieces of metal with LARGE planks across it. At the time, it was missing 2-3 of the planks (each was about half a foot tall and over a foot long) so we'd have to jump with the river below us. And down that trail was thing of children legends: it lead to a path with an old sign attached to a broken fence that simple stated “DO NOT ENTER”.
And of course, after many days of looking at that sign, we went beyond. Although it was a bright, sunny day, the forest played with shadows and sounds. Everything seemed to be sneaking up on us and the bugs were thicker than ever. We never got very far, then we saw someone start to rustle around ahead of us. We all tensed up and ran away as fast as we could, for fear of our lives and getting caught. We never went back down that trail.
We'd also adventure around the new construction areas. Walking around in half built houses and walking up stairs that don't have the center bits put in. That was always very interesting to us. Warnings all around from the parents, but who expects them to watch us all the time? We're kids, we can live through anything. Either way though, one thing that I felt very bad about, I was playing around one of the new homes and I saw some mud. I didn't think it was that bad so I stepped in it to keep walking on, and I found my shoe stuck. So I stepped with my other shoe to pull myself out. But I stepped in the mud. In no time at all I was up to mud with both knees with my cousin laughing his butt off on the sidewalk. I eventually got him to try and help me get out, and squirmed out of it, missing my shoe. So I walked home, shame faced and muddy, and explained what happened, and that I needed some new shoes. After I told the whole story, my mom thought it was funny so it helped, but I still felt bad.
On some days, we would do a game we made up. I had many Matchbox cars, and I also had a metal barn. So we'd take all of them, dump them in the metal barn, then dump the barn on the floor, and then after the barn was set down, we'd go on a mad grab to get all the cars we could. Rules were you could only take one car per hand. Then, we'd line our cars up in front of us, and trade. We'd trade cars for hours to each other. Trading two for one, one for three. Making deals to trade in circles so that we each got what we wanted. Arguing over which car was better than the last. I was always partial to the car with the back end trunk that opened up backwards. It was blue and had yellow Triangles on it. Reminded me of Rocko from Rocko's modern life.
Also with those cars, and many yellow plastic tracks, we build a course that started at the top of my top bunk and went all the way down to the center landing on the flight of stairs. With one jump and two loops, it was the most impressive thing we'd ever done. We let it stay there for a few days. It was the crowning gem of our race track building skills. After a few days we got bored with it.
I also recall a time when we'd take the ceiling fan in my room (which wasn't more than a foot from my top bunk) and put things on top of each blade to see who could stay on the longest when we turned it back on. Stuffed animals normally didn't last two long, but the double-sock was the champ at it. We almost got it to high once before the double-sock fell off and hit the wall.
We also had a bunny for a little bit at this time. Kyle caught it in the park not too far away from our house and brought it home. He didn't have a name, but after a few days in the house we found one very easily. All the wires on ground level in the house became parts of wires with in hours, due to Jaws the bunny. He was a good bunny, left poop droppings everywhere and eating every wire in sight, but he was a good bunny. Then we got tired of it and put him in the back yard. Then we remembered that bunnies can dig, and we never saw him again. We didn't mind much, he was tough, he could live on his own.
Around this time we started getting in infestation of Raccoons. I didn't even know what it was at first, I thought it was a weird looking cat walking towards the back door one night. I showed my mom and she started half freaking out that there were raccoons coming to the door. At first there was one, he found the dog food outside and started eating it. With in a week it had risen to 2-3 per night. And after a month it was around 4 a night. After a while though, it turned into 4 and two babies. They were cute and fun to watch. They're pretty smart creatures, and have good use of their 'hands'. I'm sure they'd make a great pet if they ever reached the domestication level of dogs.
And at the time, these were the best times of my life. I'd never been happier and I'd never known as many joys as my cousins brought me. But like everything good in life, it had to come to an end. Dale and Mary (their parents) got a divorce and they were sent up to Washington with Dale and Mary moved back down to Salem to be near her mother and father. I don't remember it effecting me too badly at the time, but I know over the course of the few weeks and months that passed afterworlds my view on life quickly dropped into something less than optimistic. This may have been about the time when I started to think that anything I get that I enjoy will be taken from me at one point or another. Which still, to this day, is one of my fears, and one of my realities.
Till next time. In the next edition, expect a move to Redland (the country area around Oregon City) as well as the meeting of Erik and Kevin, my two friends growing up.