I’m a native born New Hampshire citizen. I am one of five children, but I am also a twin and third in birth order. I went to school in the same public school (they were called consolidated back then) for 11 years until we became a regional school district for my final year in 1971. The town I was born in was rural with cultural aspirations. I knew pretty nearly all the kids in my class. In fact, many of them were like siblings because I had known them for so long. The kids in my neighborhood played ball in the field behind my house. On warm summer nights we’d catch fireflies in an old peanut butter jar. On July 4th we taped sparklers to our bike spokes and rode around after dark. Halloween was a time to dress up outrageously in our own handmade costumes. I especially liked going to the neighbors’ houses to sample their cookies, candied apples and cider. I remember one fun haunted house we went to where we were blindfolded and led through a “gruesome” dungeon where we had to step barefoot through “brains” (cooked spaghetti), “cobwebs” (hanging threads) and “eyeballs” (grapes).
My life growing up was very hands-on. If I could use my hands to examine it, or my eyes to look at it or tangibly interact with it, I did very well with it. My handwriting has never been very good and I find it difficult to express myself in print. So I’m happy to be able to use a word processor but I’ll still have to work on the self-expression thing.
This blog thing is not very hands-on for me. It requires so much more cognitive processing that doesn’t rely on kinesthetic memory. This is one thing that intimidates me but I know there’s a way to get over it. Wish me luck.
