What are your parents’ memories of you – before you can remember?
It was warmer than usual that year, the Christmas of 1958 in Burbank, California, as the minty-pine smell of eucalyptus trees filled the ‘valley’ air. Indeed, the Santa Ana winds labored longer than normal, like my mother. Born three weeks late on December 16, the fifth child, I weighed eleven pounds, eight ounces. I shared the title of ‘new arrival’ with a big AmanaTM upright freezer which was standing by the Christmas tree when Mom and I came home from the hospital. My poetic mother later characterized my contribution to, and character within, the family.
In December, a brand-new appearance,
To help even up the girls and the boys.
Power packed and energy plus, a son,
Kenneth Richard was the best Christmas toy.
Throughout my first year, my mother still seemed pleased with her fifth contribution to the ‘baby boomer’ generation. She wrote, “Our second son, Kenny was a good baby, and at five weeks, he slept through the night. At three months he would laugh out loud at the kids and would scold his sister Debbie when she would scare him.”
And at the start of the 60’s, I hadn’t yet worn-out my welcome; but kept my parents on guard as I engaged with my surroundings; demonstrating interest in how things work. Mom wrote, “We have to watch him constantly… He takes things apart and puts them back together, turns knobs and pushes buttons, and mimics the other kids… Debbie gets on her trike, and Kenny climbs on the back, and around the house they go…Kenny was such a busy little guy, turning things on and off, like the water taps. He would move anything that could move.”
My first memories are of the stairway leading up to the bedrooms, slumber parties with cousins, and the cinder-block wall creating our backyard boundaries; however, the memory of me once getting myself into wet cement, according to family members, is less ‘concrete.’
What are your parents’ memories of you – before you can remember?
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