My Journey Through Childhood

The Early Days

To understand where I am and where I might be going in my life, you must

first understand where I came from. From my earliest memory, I have been

on the move. I have always been running, jumping, hopping, talking and

moving. My summer days were never spent in the house because if I ever

said I was bored my mom would have put me to work.

I felt like I lived in the middle of nowhere. We had no neighbor kids to play

with, no local park, community swimming pool or game room. Instead, we

had 6 siblings, my grandparent’s ranch, the now vacant old golf course with

hundreds of wooded acres, the creek to swim in and our game room was

nature’s gigantic offering of trees, deep grass and old animal trails that were

certainly once used by Indians, pilgrims, cowboys and old mountain men.

We would go fishing at least once a week. Our walk took us down Soldier

Creek. We climbed over rocks, swung on grapevines, hunted for gold and

fought many battles against great warriors. An old stick made a great gun,

sword and walking cane. In late summer we ate blackberries along the creek

banks and there were ALWAYS cherry tomatoes, peas, radishes, corn  and so much more hiding in grandpa’s garden.

As summer rolled into fall, there were berry picking trips for canning day,

woodcutting at the ranch with the Jardines, cows to milk, eggs to collect and

animals to butcher for the freezer. Grandpa saw to it we had lamb, beef and

homemade butter while mom and dad saw to the eggs, rabbit meat, pork

and whatever animal was hunted for that year,

Winters were spent listening to mom read late at night by the fire. We

traveled across the country with Pa and Ma Ingalls; we were educated by

Little Tree, lived on islands in the mountains and under the sea. All this just in the stories mom read to us those long cold nights. At night we listened to the mountain lions and coyotes outside our door and knew we were safe as Dad was always close by.

When the rain stopped and spring came, life started again with baby lambs,

calves and pony rides. The best games were the ones we made up all by our

little ol’ selves. I remember one day we were playing cowboy and my lasso was an old yellow rope and my wild mustang was the family pony. I remember the first time I finally roped that thing around the neck. He was on a full run and just as I yelled “I got one,” the rope hit the end and off I sailed in the air. I can still see the look on my brother George’s face. It was a look of “why did the idiot not let go?” I realized my error and finally let go only after being drug through the whole yard and half way through my grandparent’s field.

When the blue birds stopped flying in my noggin, I could hear George saying

“Why didn’t you let go?” To which I replied “I did! Just not as soon as I should

have.” I think I was 10 years old and may be that was my first concussion

but I will never know because we then had to catch the pony to remove the

lasso.

There were movie nights at the Up Town Theater in downtown Sonora. We

got our burgers at the Jimtown Frosty and Fosters Freeze. I remember getting pizza at the Pick and then Jan Darone would enter my life and pizza was at Mountain Steamer Pizza which was also the place of my first job.

My parents enrolled us in 4-H in 1974 and today, some 42 years later, I am

still enrolled. I raised pigs with people like the Wittmans, Kirkwoods and

Moyles. The best times were at the Mother Lode Fair showing our rabbits,

pigs and an occasional lamb. I never won many awards but we had so much

fun. I still remember the year we hauled the pigs to the fair in the back of a

station wagon. Yup, that is a story for a different Blog.

I still remember the year the rodeo came to the fair. I was having a giggling

contest with Mary Macon (Lopez) late one night and we saw a gigantic bull

running through the barns. There were cowboys chasing it, trying to rope it

and I thought heck I have done that before. That is when I realized the bull

had a lasso around its neck. I walked over and picked up the lasso this time I

was smart enough to NOT hold onto the rope. I handed it to one of the

cowboys that was chasing the bull and I said “Good Luck! If he runs let go.”

Looking back I must say it was peaches. I had the best of everything. Life

was great. I also realize we had it hard but who didn’t? It was the 1970’s in

Tuolumne County and unemployment was high and the world was an

interesting place. But I have a secret. God had blessed me with the best life

EVER! I was being raised in what I would later realize was the best

community in the world, I was going to school with people that would

become my lifelong friends. Friends that  continue to love and support me as I travel on "My Journey".