Sally Gerard

I promised some of my student memoirs. Here are some bits and pieces:

Playing Tag in the Dark:

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We were shrieking and chuckling which caused my mom to come yell at us for being too loud. We told my mom, “We’ll be quiet.” We just told her what she wanted to hear so we could continue the game. After a while, she wanted us to settle down before we went to bed. We decided to play Monopoly, but it was on the top shelf so we got out a footstool to grab it. We were in haste to play, so we left the footstool out. 

Words:

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Now that my great-grandma has passed, I feel ashamed I didn’t spend more time with her than I did. I chose not to spend much time with her after this incident. I no longer had the respect that I had before for her. Also, I was afraid she would say something else to hurt me and my aunt wouldn’t be there to protect me. I, still to this day, wish my great-grandma had never said this to me because it truly turned every connection we ever had. 

Microsoft Word:

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I craved the process of writing, the heavy scent of coffee in the air and the multitude of notebooks scattered around, pens and papers beside the clutter with an open laptop in front of tired, but determined eyes. 

Just this scene to write before the inspiration’s gone and then I’ll go to sleep. 

My mother was intrigued, asking questions and encouraging. She complimented my writing and was happy I was doing it for myself. My father didn’t even try to feign interest and that’s perhaps part of what hurt most from his lack of interest. 

So when lunch was over, I deleted the document and went into my room. 

A Wee lad:

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When I was a Wee Lad and really trying hard to look back at positives, I can’t recall much at all. 

I slowly and carefully took apart the box to begin the building of this new train set. This HO scale train is what I really looked forward to going home and being my own little adventures: where cars were stuck on the track ultimately ending in a rather  tragic demise, or customizing the train to haul my hot wheels to different races and events competing in challenges against better or lessor opponents. Often times I thought of laying miniature railroad track across America and me shrinking down to operate the engine. The track would just appear and people would be baffled by the sight of a little train running down the road out of nowhere. 

Tractor Drive:

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My eyes filtered out all the non-John Deeres. There were a couple of As, a couple of 730s-propane too!, and 80 and an R. I heard the powerful sound of two cylinders popping. I liked hearing the pops of the Deeres dominate all others except that high RPM noisy Z! 

At lunch, people sat in groups that fit them. They were all very nice people. Some got up to talk to us and they were very polite. The sun put a glow over the prairie, a site I’m familiar with, but this time it was different, almost like it was more golden. 

Four Wheel Fishing:

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The first part of the ride is almost disappointingly easy and I easily navigate my four-wheeler over the trail. Rocks are few and mostly do not require climbing over with the four-wheeler. My favorite is riding through the shallow streams across the trail. The water is so very clear and perfect and I can see all the little rocks in the bottom until one of us plows through, stirring up the calm. The trees around us are green, full and thick. 

My dad and I love to fish together. The Louis Lake trip if usually our special fishing trip and we do lots of fly fishing up here.