30 Day Blog Challenge — Day Four

Childhood Stories

This is a difficult prompt. I have few memories of my childhood, mostly just bits and pieces of things, especially before age 10. I remember playing with my Barbie outside at this one house where we lived in Covington VA. I left her outside in the rain and her hair got caked with mud so I cut it all off. I think it was around that time too when my sister made me eat mud pies by convincing me that they were actually chocolate pies.

I mostly remember my grandmothers.

My maternal grandmother was always giving me things: decorative Avon perfume bottles, pictures and eventually, a rocking chair. I remember her dogs always ate boiled chicken bits from her hands. And I would sit in that rocking chair in her bedroom listening to the police scanner my grandfather kept on all the time. I also remember that she watched a lot of preachers on the television. Billy Graham was her favorite. And Grandma made the best spaghetti with mushrooms and Texas Pete.

My paternal grandmother loved gardening. I cannot remember a time when she wasn’t working her garden and she would let me pull weeds and bring up pots of beans to snap on the back porch. She was also the most generous woman I’ve ever known. You could come to her house any time of the day and there would be food to eat. She fed anyone who showed up. And she made sure that there was always homemade chunky applesauce and pistachio pudding for me.

I do remember spending weekends at Craig’s Creek with my dad’s kin. His family owned a house there and all of us would gather there, especially on my paternal grandma’s birthday, which just happened to be July 4th. Mama always made grandma a snowball cake and there would be barbequing and fishing down at the creek. I learned to love reading and listening to Neil Diamond from my Aunts Jo and Betty.

I didn’t have the happiest of childhoods, but the few memories I have of good times, I cherish them.