Tag: my childhood

Raftin’ Down the River (‘Memory Lane’ Contest, Day 14)

Posted By: leeduigon(patty)Posted On:

Huckleberry Finn's Raft | Symbolism & Analysis | Study.com

This is it, folks–the last day of our Memory Lane Contest. If you’ve got a memory you’d like to share, post it here.

When I read Huckleberry Finn , ages and ages ago, I, too, wanted to travel down the river on a raft. And as luck would have it, all the materials were ready to hand: an informal dump site, discarded wooden pallets, old tires–and a stream.

On a blisteringly hot summer day, my friends and I assembled a raft, complete with an old tire at each corner to help float it. Hard work in all that heat! Took us almost all day. But we kept at it till we had a raft. And then we launched it.

Straight to the bottom. No waiting, glub-glub-glub–adios, raft. The old tires most emphatically did NOT float, they might as well have been four cinderblocks… *Sigh*  Live and learn…

And now it’s time for your memories, folks. The winner gets a prize–although the memories themselves are a kind of prize, aren’t they?

Tommy’s Pond (‘Memory Lane’ Contest, Day 11)

Posted By: leeduigon(patty)Posted On:

Tommy's Pond #2, Metuchen, New Jersey - Nature photography - Quora

Patty and I went out to sit by Tommy’s Pond this morning. Memories galore! All four seasons’ worth. Here we skated, sledded, fished, and tried to catch frogs. It was a big part of my childhood. I caught a newt here once–wow! I can’t decide which season was my favorite, at Tommy’s Pond. Just watching the little pumpkinseed sunfish guarding their nests was a treat.

Post your memories here for our Memory Lane Contest–only three more days to go, and then we’ll have the winner. All viewers, even first-timers, are welcome: enter as often as you like. You could sin a book or a T-shirt.

‘You Are My Sunshine’ (Memory Lane Contest, Day 9)

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I think this may well be my earliest memory: my father rocking me in his arms at night because I couldn’t sleep, and singing this to me: You Are My Sunshine. I can’t have been more than two years old. Oh, Daddy!

Meanwhile, this is where you post your memories in our First Annual Memory Lane Contest. Anyone can play, and you can enter as often as you please.

We’ll even take more Gene Autry memories.

‘Memory Lane’ Contest, Day 3

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In a bid to keep sanity, we bring you Day 3 of our Memory Lane Contest. Post your memories here. Two weeks later, someone wins a prize. It could be you!

Meanwhile, here’s this…

WATER-POWERED AQUAZONE ROCKETS

These water-powered rockets were big, big, big! on TV when I was a boy. Oh, how I wanted one! As you can see, they’re still around. I finally got one when I was in my forties… and it didn’t work! Grrr! Didn’t even sort of work. It just went “Pssht!” and fell off the launcher. Every time.

And now for some of your memories!

‘Memory Lane’ Contest, Day 2

Posted By: leeduigon(patty)Posted On:

Okay! We’re off to a good start.

Each day, I’ll post a place for you to post your entries. That way they’ll all be in the same place.

Do You Remember? - Milk vending machine spotted in London ...

Let me get us started today–with milk machines. Remember them? The ones in our town had wooden platforms which sometimes fell to pieces. Golden opportunity! If you dug into the dirt where the platform used to be, you could find fabulous numbers of quarters that people dropped and that fell through the cracks in the platform. What a bonanza!

But that’s enough from me. Any readers’ memories today? Here’s the place to share them.

‘One Wide River to Cross’

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Is this a hymn–or just a folk song about Noah and the Ark?

It’s both, wouldn’t you say? I loved it as a little boy, and I love it now.

Sung here by Chuck Szabo.

Memory Lane: ‘That Happy Feeling’

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Ach! I’m tired, I’m stiff and sore all over, it’s raining again (!), and this computer is giving me fits, it doesn’t want to work today.

So what am I doing, posting a tune called That Happy Feeling?

Well, it’s a happy memory, then. Band leader Bert Kaempfert had a lot of hits when I was in my early teens, back in the early 1960s, before our culture imploded. I don’t think music sounds like this anymore.

If you’re young, here’s a little bit of what you missed. I wish I could have missed rap music.

Peeper Season

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Calling Spring Peepers - Pseudacris crucifer

“Betcha can’t eat just one”?

When spring rolls around–and our spring, here in New Jersey, has been very cold and wet so far–my editor, Susan, calls me up to let me listen to the chorus of spring peepers who come out of hibernation and sing in her back yard. These are charming little frogs who whoop it up for a week or two and then disappear. Mating season, I guess.

When I was a boy, my friend Ellen–showing off!–accidentally swallowed a spring peeper. Right on my back porch: my mother would’ve been appalled, had she seen that. I’m afraid I laughed. “What’s the matter–got a frog in your throat?”

Well, I’ve heard the peepers on my phone. I wish they’d show up here, but somehow they don’t. Maybe they don’t know Ellen moved away a long time ago.

Sanity Break: ‘You Are My Sunshine’

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I just can’t do any more nooze today.

This song–You Are My Sunshine, sung by Gene Autry–is one of my earliest memories. My daddy used to sing it to me when I was a toddler and had a nightmare. He’d pick me up and rock me in his arms until I was calm enough to go back to sleep. Sometimes he’d sing Sweet Violets, but I’m already close to tears and prefer not to go any closer.

Some of those nights, he’d have to get what sleep he could because his shift at the Ford Motor plant began at 6 a.m. But that didn’t stop him from comforting his children when we needed it.

Memory Lane: Popular Prices

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My Sports Obsession II | Baseball card packs, Baseball ...

Here are some of the prices I grew up with. Kind of hard to believe, isn’t it?

Pack of baseball cards, with gum: 5 cents  ($5.00 now–and no gum)

Comic book: 10 cents.  Special issue, 25 cents

Box of Good & Plenty candy: 5 cents

Bag of Licorice All-Sorts: 29 cents ($5.00 now)

Movie ticket: 25 cents (Don’t ask!)

Gallon of gasoline: 25 cents

And so on… An allowance of 50 cents would get a 10-year-old kid through the week.