memory lane is a very long street.....here is the first block

i have a pretty good memory. well, compared to my family and friends, i have a REALLY good memory. i have a really vivid memory. when you recollect events are they so real in your mind that you can sometimes evoke the smells and sounds and sights just like you were watching a movie in your head? i can see so many things in my minds eye......

on this last trip i had a really nice time wandering some of the haunts of my elementary thru high school years. i grew up in davis, which is right next to sacramento. it was great fun to drive around the neighborhood and recall so many friends homes and the times we shared there.....recalling who lived where.....seeing the sidewalks i spent so many hours roller skating on--

1710 palm place....when we lived there it was sage green. i kinda like it with the lilac trim! we had the coolest tunnel upstairs that went between our room and our 3 brothers. living on a cul-de-sac as great. there were tons of kids-well, there were 6 kids in my family alone! we played outside til all hours of the dark it seemed playing hide and go seek and baseball and mashy-mashy (a person was it, they were on a bike and their objective was to run over the other players feet, hence the name mashy mashy!) we would sit on the corner and watch for the sugar beet trucks to drive by and hope that they would lose one out of the truck and we would eat it.....

2521 bates drive--my home away from home--ANY chance i got i was off like a shot to christi's house! we had so much fun there....playing made up games of eat around the house, disneyland in the garage, being private investigators, playing restaurant and making menus and cooking junk to eat....and as we got older singing songs around the house and laying on the roof slathered in baby oil for maximum tanning....and playing poker with the next door neighbor bobby kemp in his camper while we smoked cherry cigars......her parents gave us waaaaay tooo much freedom, but they sure did give us everything we needed to flesh out our schemes and imaginations to our hearts desires.....i loved being at her house!

birch lane school......one time christi and i went on an adventure. we really had great imaginations and we pretended we were out camping. we went to the school, built a little campfire and roasted hotdogs....i loved that school!

when i was in 4th grade my sister joan was doing a science experiment in her class that involved germinating seeds with a light.....unfortunately the school caught fire and burned down the whole wing. she was sooooo concerned that our parents would have to pay for it LOL we used to be crossing guards and got to go to the circus as a reward--we also used to to pick up the windfall of walnuts from all of the walnut trees that were in front of the school--lots of memories gathering them in the very cold wind. bringing home sack after sack of them. husking them if they needed it, and then all of the cracking....sooooo much work, but so worth it when my mom would use them in baking. which she did EVERY SINGLE DAY...cookies every day---2 in your lunch and 2 for snack after school! my mom was the BEST cook ever. she planned what she was gonna make for dinner by what she was making for dessert. we had dessert every day too. and dinner was always at 5.

off to oliver wendall holmes jr. high for 7th, 8th, and 9th grades.....fun to see where we used to go out to smoke, out front--where we caught a field on fire once, good thing the neighbor was there with a hose and got it put out easily--out back, and also by the track.....we smoked in the bathrooms too. yeah, we started smoking when we were in 5th grade....what were we thinking???

now really....do you even see a spot that would be a good place for kids to smoke in the middle of that track? me either....but there was a little burm that you could lay down and smoke behind....how dumb we were....we never got caught though. i am sure that they knew we were out there doing it, but the early 70's were alot different i guess....we could come and go alot easier than they can now.

i still know all the words for most of the songs for the play the wizard of oz that we did when i was in 7th grade. i was a munchkin--i was only 74 lbs in the 7th grade. danelle myers was dorothy. we did NOT like danelle, or her sisters lavonne and cheryl. they went to our church and were our ages. we did NOT like them, nor did they like us, but our parents were friends so we had to spend alot of time together....we all worked in the snack bar too and got to earn $$.....they made the best milkshakes ever. i was thrilled when i found that wendy's must use the same base and method for their frostys! they are amazing when frozen. i love to go to wendy's :o)

one of the places we spent ALOT of time at was the cemetary. we either walked or rode bikes all over town, but we used to walk to one store in particular, buy candy and then, on the way home we would go thru the cemetary and sit on the markers and eat candy, smoke, and talk and laugh. we loved it there.....

i didn't take many pictures of downtown area but it ws fun to drive around to where we walked and relive so many time in my minds eye. one of the memories that was fun was remembering when we walked about 5 miles to the voyager inn. we walked thru the fields and it was wet and cold and pheasants kept flying out of the tall grasses. of course my mom had no idea that i was doing that....why we did it is beyond me, but the freedom that we had to go playing and exploring to our hearts content is just amazing to me. there was such safety and an innocence that i am sad that my kids don't get to experience.....what a fun trip down memory lane.....it was a real blessing growing up there. i have so many wonderful memories......