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BLOG SQUADRON #4: My Room, Age 8
Dec. 8th, 2005 12:20 pmthis week's entry topic: write in as much detail as you can about your room when you were 8. memories from year 7 or 9 are acceptable as well.
this is a tough one. the fact is that i don't remember that much about the period of my life prior to year 10, especially physical environment specifics. i think there are many reasons for this, the most likely being that my brain choses to forget this stuff in order to make room for new events.
i tend never to dwell on the past. i try not to hold grudges from it either, i feel like if i'm going to forget i might as well forgive because sooner or later i'll not remember the grudge either. for instance, a certain friend of mine from high school: the early years is now my friend, and i couldn't remember that apparently i'd been really angry at her when i was 14. must not have been that important hunh? since all i can seem to remember post-9 is the traumas, the agonies, the depressive episode, the religious zeal, the loss of zeal, singing, and only certain etched days from high school.
that was a long back story for this.
here's what i remember: we shared the room off the kitchen end of the hallway, right by the backdoor to the house (which was usually the only one we used). we didn't get our own until my 10th birthday. two twin beds, pushed together to save space in the smallish duplex. i believe mine was the one closest to the wall- i used to be a wall sleeper. know what i mean? yeah. the alarm clock played old radio dramas at night sometimes, sometimes music, sometimes nothing. i remember liking to hear the radio programs best. i remember trying to fall asleep, and my sister (older, smarter, bigger and with the better hair) would try to piss me off when i was right on the edge of it. "hey, whatcha doin'?" "going to sleep." "where's sleep?" "in my head." "how can it be in your head if you're going to it?" *snicker from her bed* and etc. until i got exasperated enough to yell for mom or leave the bed to get her.
now i'm remembering a little bit more. maybe i got the bed by the wall because i use to always fall out of bed when i was younger. was that period over by then? i can't remember. i had a penchant for laying with half my body hanging off the side, would wake up with mom putting me back into it.
back to the room. did we have the TV by then? i remember the sweet green tv we got for our room, so me and my sister could watch our own TV programs. (i really don't like old "Star Trek" and "Hogan's Heroes" episodes.) laughing as we watched the Tracy Ulman Show, the start of the Simpsons then the Simpsons first season, then In Living Color.
it was very messy most of the time. we were whirlwind kids with way more on our minds (saving each other from monsters, making up new dirt recipes, riding bikes) to bother with cleaning. when enforced, i remember listening to the radio, hearing my favorite songs, usually a Tears for Fears, Michael Jackson, or "Back to Life". getting hit for not cleaning, once, maybe it was more than once? i don't know why, but i seem to recall being the kid that got hit the most. we all have our own selective memories.
i don't remember ever spending a lot of time in there, unless i was punished (like the time i accidentally broke the Pyrex dish with drawn butter in it and dad screamed bloody murder and sent me to bed without my share of the crab) or doing homework (with the TV on most of the night, i couldn't concentrate out in the dining room). this was after my imaginary friend Pinkie, whose friend Bluey would show up sometimes.
Peanuts characters sheets? my stuffed dog, a pound puppy, the big ones? it was a gift for my 5th birthday because i was a big girl and gave up my bottle of ice water. i think by the time i was 8 i was biting my fingernails.
i remember coveting my sister's leotard (she got to go to tumbling at the park, but not me) with the orange sun on a red background. there's a picture somewhere around someone's house (probably grandma's) of me in that leotard with roller skates on. yes, i was roller skating around on the hard wood floors.
hard wood. no more 5:30 wake up calls- i was old enough to walk to school with my sister, wait for her after school on patrol duty, or visiting her in her class. her teacher would be my teacher, and i don't even know how that happened, but it was brilliant. except for every so often being called her name.
my dolls slept with me, Carrie and Karen. Karen was new. I didn't like her as much as Carrie, because Carrie was made by hand from scratch- not a pattern like Karen with prepainted face- and my mom had painted a beautiful face with blue eyes.
remember those sweaters she made us? you got the unicorn, i got a dragon. handpainted with love. (i never had popularity, but mom put a lot of work and love in those garments.)
back to the room... that's all i really remember. besides waking up and seeing the herd of cockroaches roaming across the ceiling like buffalo. *shudder* maybe that was the year i had my only brown and white dream- it was a horror dream of giant cockroaches taking over the world.
i can't remember the physical objects. but i remember that no matter how much my sister bothered me sometimes when i was trying to go to sleep, or how much we fought over other things, she was my best friend, and i think the only person in my life i really respected. it sucked because she could really push my buttons, and i could not retaliate verbally (not smart enough yet), so i would kick/punch her or just scream. we could be pretty rotten to each other. but, still, the love was there. if ever one of our friends on the block talked about her, i stood up for her. she did the same for me. sometimes, that's all we could do- stand together. i disliked the way she treated me, but i really wanted to be her. i can't hate her because she is everything i want to be.
p.s. the saddest sound in the world, truly, to me, is the sound of my sister crying. i just felt so... helpless all the time. i didn't know what to do to make her feel better, and later on she stopped confiding in me. that hurt a bit. i am way over it now. i've forgotten most everything we used to fight about, isn't that weird? instead i focus on the her i know now, how much fun we have together, and how i can let her know how much she's a great inspiration in my life, as well as how i love her a lot.
this is a tough one. the fact is that i don't remember that much about the period of my life prior to year 10, especially physical environment specifics. i think there are many reasons for this, the most likely being that my brain choses to forget this stuff in order to make room for new events.
i tend never to dwell on the past. i try not to hold grudges from it either, i feel like if i'm going to forget i might as well forgive because sooner or later i'll not remember the grudge either. for instance, a certain friend of mine from high school: the early years is now my friend, and i couldn't remember that apparently i'd been really angry at her when i was 14. must not have been that important hunh? since all i can seem to remember post-9 is the traumas, the agonies, the depressive episode, the religious zeal, the loss of zeal, singing, and only certain etched days from high school.
that was a long back story for this.
here's what i remember: we shared the room off the kitchen end of the hallway, right by the backdoor to the house (which was usually the only one we used). we didn't get our own until my 10th birthday. two twin beds, pushed together to save space in the smallish duplex. i believe mine was the one closest to the wall- i used to be a wall sleeper. know what i mean? yeah. the alarm clock played old radio dramas at night sometimes, sometimes music, sometimes nothing. i remember liking to hear the radio programs best. i remember trying to fall asleep, and my sister (older, smarter, bigger and with the better hair) would try to piss me off when i was right on the edge of it. "hey, whatcha doin'?" "going to sleep." "where's sleep?" "in my head." "how can it be in your head if you're going to it?" *snicker from her bed* and etc. until i got exasperated enough to yell for mom or leave the bed to get her.
now i'm remembering a little bit more. maybe i got the bed by the wall because i use to always fall out of bed when i was younger. was that period over by then? i can't remember. i had a penchant for laying with half my body hanging off the side, would wake up with mom putting me back into it.
back to the room. did we have the TV by then? i remember the sweet green tv we got for our room, so me and my sister could watch our own TV programs. (i really don't like old "Star Trek" and "Hogan's Heroes" episodes.) laughing as we watched the Tracy Ulman Show, the start of the Simpsons then the Simpsons first season, then In Living Color.
it was very messy most of the time. we were whirlwind kids with way more on our minds (saving each other from monsters, making up new dirt recipes, riding bikes) to bother with cleaning. when enforced, i remember listening to the radio, hearing my favorite songs, usually a Tears for Fears, Michael Jackson, or "Back to Life". getting hit for not cleaning, once, maybe it was more than once? i don't know why, but i seem to recall being the kid that got hit the most. we all have our own selective memories.
i don't remember ever spending a lot of time in there, unless i was punished (like the time i accidentally broke the Pyrex dish with drawn butter in it and dad screamed bloody murder and sent me to bed without my share of the crab) or doing homework (with the TV on most of the night, i couldn't concentrate out in the dining room). this was after my imaginary friend Pinkie, whose friend Bluey would show up sometimes.
Peanuts characters sheets? my stuffed dog, a pound puppy, the big ones? it was a gift for my 5th birthday because i was a big girl and gave up my bottle of ice water. i think by the time i was 8 i was biting my fingernails.
i remember coveting my sister's leotard (she got to go to tumbling at the park, but not me) with the orange sun on a red background. there's a picture somewhere around someone's house (probably grandma's) of me in that leotard with roller skates on. yes, i was roller skating around on the hard wood floors.
hard wood. no more 5:30 wake up calls- i was old enough to walk to school with my sister, wait for her after school on patrol duty, or visiting her in her class. her teacher would be my teacher, and i don't even know how that happened, but it was brilliant. except for every so often being called her name.
my dolls slept with me, Carrie and Karen. Karen was new. I didn't like her as much as Carrie, because Carrie was made by hand from scratch- not a pattern like Karen with prepainted face- and my mom had painted a beautiful face with blue eyes.
remember those sweaters she made us? you got the unicorn, i got a dragon. handpainted with love. (i never had popularity, but mom put a lot of work and love in those garments.)
back to the room... that's all i really remember. besides waking up and seeing the herd of cockroaches roaming across the ceiling like buffalo. *shudder* maybe that was the year i had my only brown and white dream- it was a horror dream of giant cockroaches taking over the world.
i can't remember the physical objects. but i remember that no matter how much my sister bothered me sometimes when i was trying to go to sleep, or how much we fought over other things, she was my best friend, and i think the only person in my life i really respected. it sucked because she could really push my buttons, and i could not retaliate verbally (not smart enough yet), so i would kick/punch her or just scream. we could be pretty rotten to each other. but, still, the love was there. if ever one of our friends on the block talked about her, i stood up for her. she did the same for me. sometimes, that's all we could do- stand together. i disliked the way she treated me, but i really wanted to be her. i can't hate her because she is everything i want to be.
p.s. the saddest sound in the world, truly, to me, is the sound of my sister crying. i just felt so... helpless all the time. i didn't know what to do to make her feel better, and later on she stopped confiding in me. that hurt a bit. i am way over it now. i've forgotten most everything we used to fight about, isn't that weird? instead i focus on the her i know now, how much fun we have together, and how i can let her know how much she's a great inspiration in my life, as well as how i love her a lot.
