Random childhood memories

Chapter 1 of “The Cool Jacket Journals” published this fall by Knopf.

I am what I am

[quote]He was desperate and he just wanted my coat.

That's only after he looked at your ugly sneakers.

Was it a Members Only jacket?

That’s what desperate men do when they see angora.

I was expecting a sex/rape story …

I am 71 years old and when I had just turned 3 my bother and sister had taught me how to swim, without telling my mother. Our next door neighbors had a big in ground pool and I remember the day my siblings and I were visiting my 3 year old self was standing on the diving board preparing to sail off into the deep end. Just as I ran down the diving board my mother walked through the gate to tell us to come home and she saw me on the board. She screamed bloody murder as I flew off the board into the water and swam to the side of the pool and grabbed onto the side as my sister pulled me out of the water. The life left my mother's body that day for a few moments. But my siblings finally told her they had taught me how to swim so I wouldn't ever drown if I fell in a pool when no one was around.

To summarize, he said, "Show me that pecker" and a friendship was forged?

I learned how to kick when I was 8 yrs old. I mean KICK!

Was it lynx, OP?

Stroller length ?

Shitting in the cafeteria?

That's a random memory, OP?

Ann Miller posting at R9

OP I take it you did not go to a parochial School.

I remember the fire alarm in Catholic School being a steady buzzing alarm. We had 5 minutes to exit the building. The nuns were screaming " remember the Lost souls in Chicago" referring to the Lady of Angels fire that happened at least 10 years ago from then. Our school was modern built on an open concept with external hallways, multiple exits and single level nothing like the fire trap the Lady of Angels School was. One of the many inconsistencies I noted starting at age 7 attending Catholic School.

Ann miller is r12

I walked in on my uncle doing the conga dressed up like Kay Thompson. Pretty ugly dress.

Good for you OP!

You held your power and spoke your truth. But next time, there's a better hill to almost die on - just and over your pink Disney Princess jacket with the rhinestones around the collar. You could've bought another one at WalMart.

R7. Why was your mother trespassing on your neighbor's property.

When I was in the first grade, one day one of the school's secretaries came to the class and asked to speak to the teacher outside. When she returned, her face was ashen and she was clearly upset. She told the class to line up and we were going to the multi-purpose room IMMEDIATELY and scared the hell out of all of us. I was second or third in our two-line procession down the hall, and for some reason I said "It's a bomb!" because there had been bomb threats to other schools — it was on the news — and the teacher just screeched to a halt, turned around and leaned over into my face screaming "Where did you hear that? Who told you?" and I said I made it up. She turned around and hurriedly lead the class toward the room, but as soon as we arrived and seated, she grabbed me by my shirt and said we're going to see the principal.

It didn't turn out well. There had been a bomb threat to the school, and they thought I knew who it was because a 6 year old wasn't capable of putting two and two together, apparently. I kept telling them I saw the stories on the news and thought this was the same thing. They didn't believe me, of course. Parents were called, father had a shit fit, and I learned to keep my mouth shut.

[quote] Why was your mother trespassing on your neighbor's property.

Trespassing? Have you never had neighbors who were close personal friends? In 1956 people didn't even lock their doors when they went away overnight.

R22. No. I was born in mid 1980s. Don't even know my neighbors names.

Fingering myself under the table

A trash bully chick had it in for me in the 5th grade. She had a bleached perm at that age poor thing, and wore flat hard soled pumps. She chased me around the playground and I just knew she was going to slide and fall in those things and I would be afraid to laugh. It happened. Later she tried to get me to walk up the school stairs in front of her. “I won’t do anything” she said. I’d had it. I turned and walked right into the principals office and told on her. My teacher said “Joyce won’t be bothering you any more.” Of course I’ve never met anyone nice with the name Joyce.

I was called to stand up in class for some reason and I happened to have a hardon at the time.

Something about a bowl of pineapple and a mother whose youth and beauty flashed before her eyes. Also, something about stealing her man and me being a pint-sized prostitute??????

I was jail bait

As a toddler at the beach being overwhelmed by a wave as my parents held onto each hand. I remember them laughing at me drowning!

Did he make you perform a degrading dance, or display your puny cocklet?

My cousin was very hot. He was 2 yrs older than me. Once we were working in my uncle's shed and using rubber cement. He said "Haha, this looks like jizz." I was 15 and did not know what jizz was, so I asked. He laughed and said he'd show me, so he jerked one out while I watched. It was so hot.

In 6th grade I accidentally opened a neighbor's quail cage and all the quail flew away.

I drew circles all over my grandmother's bras when I was about 4.

[Quote] He got up, called me a fucking bitch

Well, to be fair, you are a fucking bitch

We were standing in line for ice cream at the St. Louis zoo. My grandma stepped on a stray ketchup packet which squirted all over some queen's white shorts. He screeched "I'll never wait in line for ice cream again!."

After Christmas vacation my 2nd grade teacher asked everyone in class to tell what they did for the holidays. I lied and said I went to (far off) Pennsylvania, mainly because I thought it was a beautiful name and, therefore, probably a beautiful place to visit. A couple weeks later my mom told me, "Mrs. Lane asked me if I enjoyed our trip to Pennsylvania." I was really pissed off that they had somehow figured out that I had lied, but I didn't really take the "no one likes a fibber" lesson to heart. Years later, when I saw "Ordinary People," I felt that my fantasy of a folksy Pennsylvania Christmas was at least the equal of Beth's dream of a Dickensian Christmas in London.

I remember mamma

Was it a rescue jacket?

A couple weeks later my mom told me, "Mrs. Lane asked me if I enjoyed our trip to Pennsylvania."

Is there no schoolroom confidentiality?

When we went barefoot at school and someone said of my feet - It's the missing link!

I have a lot of class. Always have. Even as a tot I was well aware of what constitutes good taste. Gifted. That’s what I call it.

Walter, the boy across the street, would take me behind the garage. He taught me a game where we'd take our dicks out and rub them together while chanting, "Wieners necking! Weiners necking!"

New Jersey in the mid-60s was strange.

Walter is a creepy name

I was a good Catholic boy with a prized mini statue of Mary that was phosphorescent. I swapped it for a look at my neighbors penis. I think he got the better deal.

Two children in my neighborhood got run over by a street cleaner. I don't know why they didn't just move out of the way.

The popcorn man lied

OP, did he make you perform humiliating songs and degrading dances? Did he sneer at your puny cocklet?

R47 = R30

We had an earthquake in the early hours of the morning and I thought it was my older brother moving my bed back and forward.

R43, you think his name is what’s creepy in that story?

Mini Bazooka Joe comic inside individually wrapped pieces of Bazooka bubble gum.

Going to a public pool during summer, being in a men's locker room for the first time. It was crowded with lots of naked men. I saw the penis of an adult man that grossed me out. I thought it was deformed!

I later learned it wasn't deformed, just uncircumcised.

I was an altar boy and got to serve at a funeral where I turned my red mini-cape around to show the black underside.

During the Sylmar quake I yelled out for my brother, decades later I still called out for him if awakened in the middle of the night by a quake...my husband finds it amusing, I'm not even close to my brother.

r54 were you ever bed partners?

My grandmother walking very carefully with one hand on the railing and one on my seven year old shoulder for fear of slipping and falling on the blindingly slick polished floors of the Venezuelan Army’s HQ outside Caracas circa 1959. Not wearing heels, I didn’t understand the danger.

r55, bunk beds, I was around 9, brother 12.

I had a friend over and we hid in a dark cupboard together. I reached over and felt he had brought some marbles for us to play with then realized I was cupping his balls.

r58, How old were you? 15 or 16?

[quote] I thought it was deformed!

R52 I had a similar experience, but I thought the tip had collapsed into the penis!

These days, I think WE’RE considered to be the deformed ones!

I helped my father get water samples from nearby creeks. I don't know why he wanted them.

The nuns had an afternoon tea for pupils and we had to bring cake. I brought my favorites but wouldn't give them up.

I don't think they make them anymore, but in the 1960s children could buy little assorted Valentines Day cards that sort of punched out of bigger sheets so you'd have enough to give all your classmates. I begged my mom to buy me some, and I laboriously filled them out with the names of all my classmates. On Valentine's Day things must have gotten hectic around my house in the morning, and I forgot my cards. When the time came to exchange cards and i realized that I had forgotten them, i just sobbed inconsolably. I'm not sure, but I think the teacher might have even had the principal call my mom. I was probably in 3rd grade.

I was minding my business, playing with my Smurf figurines when this big monstrous retarded neighbor came towards me on his bike saying he was going to eat me and my Smurfs. Heart pounding I went shrieking down the street.

Not childhood memories more early teen memories but I hung out with a bunch of "Cheap awful girls" The one I always called the Queen Bee her mother would invite her girlfriends and me to decorate Christmas cookies, Puppy Chow, etc, Listen to Christmas music, the apt was old right out of 1940. It was nice and cozy. Being a bunch of giggly cunts one of them took a pic of me holding her New kids on the block Danny Doll. A few years later they teamed up against me and took the pic and put red around my lips and gave me blue eyeshadow, wrote Transvestite all over it and put it in an envelope and dropped it off in my mailbox. I was terrified! Terrified that's how my mom and Alzheimers riddled grandmother would find out I was gay.

r63 you poor thing. I can just imagine being a child and having that happen to me.

I used to hide under the house with my dog.

My bedroom had a skylight rather than a normal window. When I left it open spiders crawled in.

R67 Lucky you.

Swinging on a tree vine in the forest behind my childhood home like a young, gay Tarzan. My Purple Rain soundtrack cassette blaring loudly from my Panasonic boombox. My friends yelling at me to hurry up so they could have their turn to swing on the vine. As I recall, all of this happened during this time of year exactly 40 years ago.

[Quote]playing with my Smurf figurines when this big monstrous retarded neighbor came towards me on his bike saying he was going to eat me and my Smurfs

r64 perhaps he was role playing Gargamel?

Your brother was a real tough one, OP.

Didn't your mom hear all this from the kitchen?

playing in a muddied storm drain in my new white shorts. My mother was horrified.

r1 How lucky you were to have such caring siblings. Your poor mother lost 1/4 of her life that day.

My fat aunt farting.

The time I set my hair with my mother's curlers.

My parents were divorced before my first birthday. My dad worked at many different faraway job sites but my Mom made sure I visited him when I could. Those handoffs would grow increasingly tense throughout my childhood so that when I was about 7 or 8, they would send me between the two of them on my own so they would have NO interaction (think, a kid being sent out a restaurant to the waiting parent's car).

When I was 9 my mom took me to the airport to put me on a plane to visit my Dad. I had flown solo many times before, but this trip was going to be the longest, farthest away and for the greatest length of time. After I checked in and checked my bags, my Mom went to the payphone with a purseful of quarters to make the long-distance call to update my Dad on the flight info and ETA. Sometime during that call he said something stupid, my Mom reacted stupidly and he hung up on her.

"You wait here! I have to go get some more quarters!" my Mom told me. She came back, fed the payphone, my Dad picked up the phone and she hung up on him.

insisting on only using Farah Fawcett Shampoo by Faberge when I was six years old. My mom ordered it for me by the case.

We had a turtle who scraped its shell repeatedly trying to get under a wooden gate that was too low for him.

Jumping off the roof of the house for fun and not breaking my back or legs.

The one time I went to overnight camp in the summer, it was a bible camp and the staff were friendly enough but the campers were largely inner city youth. A couple of them bullied me and one day an ass whooping was about to take place and I ran myself out that situation.

R80. Overnight Bible camp? Did you see many campers "risen" in the morning?

Going to a public pool during summer... I saw the penis of an adult man

R52 i had the same experience in the change room. But I saw two men talking in the showers.

[quote]But I saw two men talking in the showers.

No doubt talking about that creepy kid hanging out in the locker room staring at everyone

Sitting on one of my grandmothers window seats on a sunny day in winter.

In the early to mid 70s there was a lot of suburban construction going on in Orlando Florida. My friends and I would often ride our bikes and go into the houses and I loved doing that! This was not the vandalize it was just to hang out. There was an actual model home that was fully finished and furnished. I must have spent like five hours in there pretending it was my house ,all the electric was on and I played with all the appliances etc it was fun. These were instead of the art 1970s houses with intercom systems Central vacuums all that craziness.

On the first day of a new school I was asked by the teacher to tale a message somewhere. When I got back the class had been replaced by another. I didn't know where my class was so I went home. I find out the next day I missed French class.

That's some tale.

Getting together with my friends in the neighborhood when one of us got a new board game. I loved Clue and Mille Bornes.

Our house was haunted. We four kids had our rooms on the third floor, and we could hear something coming up the steps. Tromp, tromp, tromp, slowly. And every time it would hit the one creek step after the last turn, which it would take very slowly. And then it would stop. This happened all the time. We could never catch it because if we came running out it would stop. Eventually it started taking residence in my room and would scare cousins who spent the night by breathing on their necks and faces with hissing breaths.

We all would see, separately, tiny people running around like they were doing chores or working. All four of us saw them, individually, and it was in two particular rooms for all of us.

I hadn't thought about these things for years.

I asked my dad if I could get a pair of Jordash Jeans and some makeup. I was about 13. He said; Who do you think I am J.D Rockefeller!? I said ; I don't know! Whose that? He laughed and he took me to get them on his motorcycle. He took me to McDonald's, too.

I don’t think OP’s memory us actually random.

At school my male best friend and I thought it would be a lark to sign up for the netball team when students had to choose a sport. I signed up but my friend suddenly disappeared and I was stuck on the otherwise all-girl netball team all year.

[quote] I asked my dad if I could get a pair of Jordash Jeans and some makeup. I was about 13. He said; Who do you think I am J.D Rockefeller!? I said ; I don't know! Whose that? He laughed and he took me to get them on his motorcycle. He took me to McDonald's, too.

But he skipped the spelling and grammar tutor.

R90 are you or were you make?

When I was 7 years old I told my friends we were gonna play Charlie’s Angels and I was going to be Tiffany because she has class. I told the ugly girl in the group she was Sabrina.

Male r90

My maternal grandmother was babysitting me at her apartment when I was about 5 years old. I was alone in the living room when I decided to put some of her eyedrops (which were for glaucoma and were sitting on a lamp table) in my eyes. They burned like hell, and my grandmother heard me yelping and rushed me to the bathroom where she flushed my eyes repeatedly with water.

Another time, we had just moved to a new house (which means I was also 5 at the time), and I was with my grandmother in the living room. For some reason, the wall plate for the light switches was missing. I went to turn on another light, my finger slipped between the switches, and I got a pretty nasty electrical shock. My grandmother rushed over and told me to go pee (an old wives’ tale, I’m sure).

In retrospect, I’m surprised my mother and maternal aunt survived childhood!

Fingering myself at speeds that made me feel like I was drunk

I was in art class and a much older Italian student that had already graduated came in to visit teachers. We chatted and he offered me a ride home after school. He was in enrolled in theater college in San Diego to become an actor.

The next day we drove into the city with a friend of his, I was in the back seat and he reached back and held my hand and I suddenly realized he was gay.

We went back to his house and fooled around, He had the biggest cock I’ve ever had to this day, about 13 inches and a head the size of a lemon!

I planned a trip to visit him on a school break, and he had forgotten to mention he had a boyfriend living with him in the dorm. We tried a threesome but he had bad breath and sharp teeth. I was also a bit heartbroken and inexperienced at the time, “a whore with a heart of gold”…

He was in a play at the time so we’d go to every rehearsal because of the time difference I kept falling asleep during the play, I wound up sleeping with plenty of his friends in retaliation.

Lastly, he is still good looking and has been in several blockbusters years ago, and is more behind the scenes now.

^ Antonio Sabato Jr.

R99. Oh Teafake...you again?

Your hometown proud? You’re from Peoria, IL!!

When I learned my father was secretly smoking.

OP is Tucker Carlson, pretendding again.

When my older brother told me there was no Santa Claus. I raced back to tell my parents.

When we were taken to see Oliver! on a school day.

My dad sat down at the kitchen table, drunk as a skunk, to tell me there was no Santa Claus when I was 7 years old. I was in the middle of going through the Sears Wish Book, making my list to send to Santa.

Thanks, Dad.

Circa 1976...at 13 I remember being fascinated by my parochial school gym teacher's grey sweat pants. They clung to his butt and bunched at his crotch. I zeroed in on his crotch for some reason when he taught us squat thrusts and on his butt the he turned around.

When I was 5 yrs old my mom, my friend and I stood in a long line that reached around the block to see the movie Grease during the summer of 1978. It ignited my lifelong obsession with Olivia Newton-John.

We had an English school teacher who wore pastels and was an obvious queen.

The names have been changed to protect the innocent & the guilty.

When I was young around 5th grade-ish, my two oldest siblings & I got to take a cousin (on my mom's side of the family) over to our paternal grandma house where we all gathered on her huge front porch. My two older siblings got the porch swing & my male cousin & I sat on the wide porch railings & we were bored out of our minds. My male cousin "Bryan" who was several years younger than us (& lived across the street from her) was spoiled by our grandma with bikes, candy, etc. & stuff & when we didn't get any over the years from her she said since we didn't live close to her (we're about about 4 hrs. away) it was basically our fault (not hers).

So my bored self wanted to have some fun with little spoiled fatty 1st grader "Bryan" & I kept telling him his name was "Lacey" not Bryan. I kept it up for a really long time & my relatives on the porch told me to stop but I kept going for something to pass the time & not thinking much of it. He kept saying his real name of course. But little spoiled fatty wanted something to fill his tummy so his then 40ish blonde knockout mom comes out from nowhere (storming out of the screen door) & said "Have any of you seen Lacey? She left this popsicle on the table & its melting.

"Bryan" perked up & said "My name is Lacey. Give it to ME!" She looked at him funny for a second & then proceeded to look around both sides of the house for her while still staying on the big porch. He kept grabbing for the popsicle all the while saying "GIVE IT TO ME! MY NAME IS LACEY! IT'S MINE!". She looked confused & said "WHAT'S GOTTEN INTO YOU? WHY ARE YOU ACTING THIS WAY? KNOCK IT OFF!". She threw her hands up in frustration all the while holding onto the popsicle before going back into the house to look for her with "Bryan" running right behind saying "I'm Lacey! I'm Lacey. My name is Lacey. Give it to me . I want it." My siblings, male cousin & I spent the rest of the time on the front porch cracking up over having lots of fun at "the perfect family living across the street from grandma". When we told our parent what went down on the way back to drop off my male cousin they were mad at me & we never took my male cousin back down to see the other side of the family again.

Of course we all had to go down countless more times to see what our precious spoiled cousins got from "generous" grandma who died in her early 90s. She left nothing to my dad in her will so the kids across the street ended up with more than her own son ever did. Both sides of my family are dumb hillbillies & "Bryan" became a preacher & "Lacey" got knocked up early in life. Don't know much about their kids or spouses. I don't recall ever seeing either of them after that when we went down to visit "generous grandma".

^ "Lacey" was "Bryan's" older sister by a couple years (If that wasn't clear in the above note).

My parents were active in city politics. They helped organize a parade through the business center of our town. Their handsome charismatic candidate won. He became a legendary leader. My mother weep for days when he was assasinated. I was only 8yo but all these years later I can still hear them cheering "Hail Caesar! "

R113. What position did the handsome leader win? Why did the parade take place?

My aunt lived in a beach town and I remember they had the best dairy items for sale at the shops. Flavored milk and yoghurts that I have never had as good since.

When I was 6yo I fell down the steps. My yoghurt for weeks.

Groan.

In grade 4, you didn't get homework on your birthday. I told the lay teacher it was my birthday, and she told the class, "It's Steven's birthday, but he isn't excused from homework. He didn't bring any treats in for you."

I felt embarrassed and ashamed. We were really lacking cash for something like this because my father was on strike. It was so rough I remember mashed potato sandwiches for lunch. I'm in my 60s and can still feel the shame.

Was it stale bread also?

R118. Are you Irish?

I want to eat a choux pastry ring off his dick. Is that so wrong??

My mother knitting winter sweaters for the kids.

Making woollen balls wrapping thread over a piece of carboard.

The Bad Seed

R124. You are the sweetest poster, the most lovely poster. What would you do if I gave you a basket of kisses?

When I used to share a room with my older brother and progressively worked on a hole in the wall to make it worse.

Climbing a ladder and then being too scared to get down. My father saw me and walked away disgusted.

Who worked on whose hole, r126?

An aunt who kept plastic on her sitting furniture.

My dad placing the record player speakers opposite each other, and putting on the Emperor concerto while we both lay on the ground between the speakers. There was a little green pilot light on the record player.

Wanting to say up past my bedtime to watch The Carol Burnett Show on TV.

My Kindergarten teacher was a total bitch. One time, I was called to the office and given a post-it note that said "Get a haircut." (This was a very strict Catholic school.) So I walk back into class and she sees me holding the note and suddenly demands that I read it aloud to the class. I can still see the sadistic grin on her face as she demanded I "tell everyone what it says." I did, and the whole class laughed at me. I don't remember a lot from my childhood but that moment is as clear to me as the day it happened.

Stories like that makes my blood boil

Having three meat pies for school lunch.

Holding a toy microphone and lip syncing to Sheena Easton - Strut in my backyard to my friends.

My brother's first trip on a train and pronouncing aisle as ay-zel.

For world culture day in 4th grade, I gave the speech about Africa—wearing a dashiki.

My clear captions phone reads “Eat shit, drink piss motherfucker”.

When I was five, my dad had a coffee shop on Fire Island and I went out there with him one time. While I was waiting for him to open the door, I turned and saw this man who looked like Mr. Clean leaning up against a railing ten feet away. He was bald and all in white and he was staring at (cruising) my father. I said "Dad look, it's Mr. Clean!" He turned around and said, "Don't look at him!" and hurried me into the shop.

the day my paper dolls flew over the neighbors fence in a gush of wind.

Sone kids at my fancy high school tried to kill ne-more than once. My parents took me to the police. The chief of detectives, who later became the chief of piolice pulled out a psyc evaluation of the girl, yea a girl who was the ring leader. He said she was diagnosed as a sociopath and is looking for someone to kill for gun, sbd I was probably it. He hauled her in, showed her a bag of heroin and said if anything happens to me, said helium will be planted on her snd she Would end up in jail for 30 years. She was old enough to be tried as an adult. Ive g hi afbher travhed for over half a. Century. Im not totally out of danger abd of course the police chief is long since deceased and. any help me. I have to take care of myself abd there are things I have to do to keep a low profile. It was ok for a long time when she moved accross country, but she came back a few years ago. I couldnt go to my high school reunion, not safe.. I wish I knew how to hire a hit man and get away with it, which I never would. But I would pay to have her taken out,

Gun=fun. She wanted to kill ke for fun. My parents were traumatized for the rest of their lives.

My mother knew I was gay at a young age and sent me to a shrink who told her to send me to summer camp. So, at camp when I was about 11 or 12, a cute counselor was talking to a bunch of us. He was sitting down and wearing gym shorts and a tank top. I asked him what his last name was and he said "Horn." I thought for a second and said, a little too loud, "Can I blow your horn?" He said sure and opened his legs a little wider. I had no shame. I was a child predator in reverse. But he didn't let me.

The adolescent neighbor-family friend-roustabout and blond cute guy was showing something to the girls in the bushes-I was 7 or 8 and rushed over to see a very impressive blond haired dick-I was hooked…

The first time I baked cookies. It was a disaster. My family still teases me that even the dog wouldn't eat them.

My grandmother had a porch with screens and windows along with a couch where I would sleep in the summer listening to my transistor radio.

Losing my cherry

R146 wins best post-sweet…

At three, the beauty of lilies of the valley and the smell of petunias.

Mom dropped me and my 4 older siblings off at the theater-I was 7-It was 1965 and the movie was of course “”The Sound of Music”. The singing was wonderful BUT Herr Zeller was so scary along with the scenes of the family hiding in the cemetery-yike!

R10 Or Blacklgama

R147 wins the best response

R147. Did you ever find it? Where did you lose it?

In 6th grade, the way we found out who had made the honor roll was to see our names engraved on gold plaques above each homeroom door. A true gilded honor roll. When I saw my name up there, I was so excited as I had never made the honor roll before. I went home. Told my parents. Called my grandmother. My family was proud and made a big deal for me. Next morning, when I walked into class, my homeroom teacher asked me to step out in the hall with her. I did and she pointed up to the bare spot where the plaque had been. She said, "I am sorry to tell you this, but you didn't actually make the honor roll. I rechecked my math and you were just a couple points shy so we are redoing the plaque without your name. Sorry about that but you'll get it next time". I didn't.

I was in a riptide and it was really pulling me out but there were still people. I was real young. As I went past this guy, I said "Help." He looked down at me and said "What?"

I was cast as The Frankenstein Monster when our school did a performance of The Monster Mash.

Summer vacation from school when my friends and I would ride our bikes for miles. On rainy days we'd play board games. Freedom with no worries.

[quote] She chased me around the playground and I just knew she was going to slide and fall in those things and I would be afraid to laugh. It happened. Later she tried to get me to walk up the school stairs in front of her. “I won’t do anything” she said. I’d had it. I turned and walked right into the principals office and told on her. My teacher said “Joyce won’t be bothering you any more.”

What did you tell on her for? Chasing your around the playground?

I was always stuck with the shoe as the token in Monopoly.

When our cat could not walk straight I knew it was not long for this world.

The day of my baby sister's christening there was a thunderstorm.

I remember walking home from a half-day at school in first grade. It was a blustery nippy day and I had that excited feeling in my stomach that comes from joy. We were leaving for Thanksgiving with my grandparents when I got home.

She was terrorizing me dumbshit R158.

And today Joyce is known as Faye Dunaway.

OK, I’ll bite.

When I was a kid, I was 100% a Tom-boy in a dress. One of my favorite things was climbing trees.

My grandma lived in a place that had this marvelous Oak tree right in front, and after school, I climbed it daily.

One day, I was getting pretty high up there, and then I slipped and fell. I fell straight upon my back, and I will never forget the thud sound made by my body hitting the grass, or how I had lost my breath, or the pain that I felt within a few seconds from my little throbbing skull.

It was bad.

I couldn’t move, breathe, or even cry out in pain, so I just laid there perfectly still, staring at the blue sky above me through the tree branches. I was all alone, and there wasn’t anyone around to help me.

I remained motionless, and it was the first, yet not the last time I said the following words to myself: No one is here. No one saw you fall, and no one knows that you need help. You MUST get up, and you MUST do it right NOW!

And that’s exactly what I did. I got up, and the next day, I climbed that tree again. I never once slipped and fell after that incident, but I knew that if I did, I’d get the fuck up.

When I was about 7, I was in the car with my dad heading home. On the corner of one intersection stood a gorgeous, half-naked man with a bodybuilder's body. A big, flashing grin in place, he posed and flexed his muscles at the passing cars. That apparently was his only reason for being there -- to show off his gym gains to traffic. And it wasn't like it was the corner of Hollywood and Vine; it was sleepy suburbia. Busier intersections could be found just about a half-mile away. My dad was pissssssed and muttered that people should be using their brains instead of their bodies.

I was in the car with my sister and we had stopped at a light. Suddenly this woman was pounding on my sister's window which caused my sister to scream in horror. Turns out I had forgotten to put the cap back on the petrol tank when I was filling up and this good lady Samaritan had the cap to give back to us.

R163 I somehow think you deserved to be terrorized.

When I was in kindergarten, I went to a school that was in walking distance to my house. But usually, my mom (housewife) would pick me up from school (in a car).

One day, I waited and waited and my mom didn't come. Finally, I walked home by myself, even crossing a highway by myself.

I got home and my mom and little sister were watching Hollywood Squares, eating Fritos. My mom had forgotten to pick me up.

Any time I would remind my mom about that, she'd say: "I FORGOT!" -- à la "It TWIRLED up!"

We had a car crash one year coming back from the Royal Easter Show. I remember how the kids in the other car were envious that we had so many show bags in the back seat.

My mom forgot to pick me up from kindergarten and I fell apart. Sobbing, a strange middle-aged woman took me in her car to look for her and there mom was with my baby brother. Was life really so safe back then? Or did we just not know about bad stuff and it wasn’t displayed ba+k then?

I stubbed my toe and it would not stop bleeding so my father had to take me to the emergency room where they stopped it with fire. I remember my father carrying me into the hospital - makes sense as I could not walk.

R165 great how the mind can rescue you at moments of peril.

R157 sounds like Stand By Me

A roadside free fucks stand

I was in the high school production of HMS Pinafore as a sailor. I always stood in the wings to listen to Josephine sing "The hours creep on apace". It was my favorite song in the score but alas not sung by sailors.

I was a kid (early teens) when I got stoned on pot for the first time. My stepmom was starring in a local theater production of "The Pirates of Penzance" and, being stoned, I laughed when she appeared on her way out the door in full costume and makeup. My father freaked: "You're STONED! You're not coming to the show tonight." Flash Forward one year and they're divorced and stepmom is now living in southern England. I go to see her, she gets me stoned on some primo hash, and we take a ride through the actual town of Penzance. Full Circle.

R176. You stayed close with your stepmom after the divorce? Was it TV and Broadway comedianne Kaye Ballard?

I did R177. She wishes she did POP with Papp. LOL

This kid who sat behind me in 2nd grade used to taunt me every day. He'd say loud enough for only me to hear, "After school. I'm gonna get you after school." We were seven. One day I guess I had enough. Even though I was a shy, withdrawn kid, I turned around and said "OK, after school." He looked a little surprised but he met me outside. I pinned him on the ground in no time. I thought I should punch him in the face but I couldn't do it. He never bothered me after that and I learned that bullies do not like to be called out.

My dad sold candy and soda out of a truck at a local drag strip. After the races were over, he would put me on his lap, roll the seat up, and let me mash the gas pedal to the floor. It was thrilling. On the way home, I noticed people walking in lines through fields and when we got to our street there were police cars and fire trucks parked in front of our house. Turns out the babysitter didn't hear me tell her I was going to the track and they called the cops thinking I had fallen into a hole somewhere, which had actually happened to some poor kid a few weeks before. They put my picture in the paper with an article. Even at six I looked gay.