Mom on the Zipline

Ellen at the end of the Zipline

Happy Valley Park

Jump Rope Rhyme Stories...Happy Valley Park

My mother told me
If I were goodie
That she would buy me
A rubber dolly.....

     My mom was the "Queen of Parties".    She seemed to come up with a party at the drop of a hat.    Growing up she planned out birthday theme parties for my brother and I.  A Cowboy theme with baled hay for decorations , Pin the Tail on the Donkey, with all of us looking like little buckaroos.   Dress-up parties where my girlfriends and I looked like miniature little ladies.   A few times I had Christmas parties where she would have a mini dinner party for my friends and myself.   This would include appetizers as well as her decorating the dining table in some way.   On my 10th birthday she said we would have it at   the Happy Valley Park which was just outside of Salinas on Highway 68 that goes to Monterey.   A venue party place that was designed just for kids.   I think all the girls from my class and other classes were invited.   My mom seemed to be preoccupied with my group of friends and concerned that I didn't have enough or that they be the right kinds of  friends.   Which was a challenge since I was a shy girl when it came to school and church but I was quite content with the friends I did have.   Needless to say it was going to be a big party with her planning it.

    Unlike today where there are places like "Pump It Up", "Rocktopia", or even the bowling alley (where my mother told me I was not allowed to go!), there was Happy Valley Park.   It had an indoor Party Room that they would set up for however many would be coming, but it was the outdoors that made this a kids heaven.    Circuitous of the property behind the main building was an oval dirt track where there were multiple bikes of all kinds you could climb aboard and go round and round, racing each other or just riding with the wind blowing in your face, laughing in pure delight.   It wasn't a flat track as it had slight  rises, gentle drops as well as turns .    In the center of the large bike track were swings, playground type equipment, a cargo type climbing rung area, teeter-totters and just about anything to keep a child happy and not wanting to leave.   After you played for an ample amount of time, you went inside the main building into one of the party rooms and had your birthday cake and drinks. After that you would be led outside to go through the Goldmine.    You would wait in line  patiently as they explained the rules of the Goldmine area and then you would  go down a narrow dirt path into a large underground room.   Just like what one imagine a goldmine might be like.   Inside there  were rough wood walls with bare lights up near the edge of the ceiling heights, spaced far apart to give light but not enough to see to well.   It smelled damp and musty inside and once inside  the floor became a fine gravel that crunched under your feet as you walked on it.   This was your time to hunt for gold in the gravel under your feet.   Everyone would find some, of course.   You were given a small little cloth bag to put your gold into and that was your token party favor.  Somehow it sounds so silly compared to parties of today where you feel you need to provide so much to your guests before they leave.  Once done with the Goldmine the best was saved for last. On the far side of the property that you could see when you were riding around the track was what I would call their version of a zipline.    Set up on one side was a platform that stood about 12 to 14 feet off the ground.    There was a cable that spanned a long distance to the end point and attached to the cable was a a swing seat with another long cable hanging down from it that dangled to the side.   One at a time we would climb up on the platform to await our turn on the ride.   An instant smile would come across your face when you were released from the platform to zip to the opposite end which felt like a great distance to me as a child.  Towards the end you would glide to a stop where you would jump off into the sand.   Ride over.   You would grab the cable that was dangling and run back to the platform with the swing seat and hand it off for the next person to ride on, run to the end of the line and wait for your next turn.   Sadly to say Happy Valley Park closed up in the early 70's and now is a gardening nursery center.  I use to wish that I could go there whenever I wanted instead of having to wait for a friend who might have a party there.  I think I remember riding my bike out to it with some friends once after it had closed and looked in the windows to see what we could see inside.  It was too dark inside so we couldn't see anything.   Outside in the back it was a ghost town playground.  The bikes were gone and all was shut up tight.   Some places in childhood can not be visited again and Happy Valley was just one of many.

My brother told her
I kissed a soldier
Now she won't buy me
A rubber dolly.....

Homes and Schools

                          

     When  I look at all the places I have lived I feel like a gypsy.  We never seemed to let the grass grow under our feet!  I never had a favorite home or a special attachment to a home.  I am certain that until we moved to Alameda my family never owned any of those homes but rented them as it seemed we lived in some for almost exactly a year and then moved.

     I did have some memories from each though.  Some good and some not so good.  Our first home in Salinas we lived on a court.  In the garage the owner of the home had a huge train track set up with buildings, trees, overpasses, tunnels and houses.  My brother was fortunate to be allowed to play with it. It's only too bad that we could not take it with us when we moved as he must have been unhappy having to leave it behind.  I wasn't allowed to play with the train set but could watch.  My brother and I shared a room and it was decorated more for a boy.  We had a trundle bunk bed with a slightly western theme to it.  I didn't really mind as I was more a tomboy at that time.  I was already into horses and made sure to watch any cowboy movie or show that was on TV.  My brother Gene was a good sport with having to share a room with a sister five years younger than he.

     Next door to me was a girl my age.  Denise had a playhouse in her side yard which had a little kitchen set up and the house had dutch doors to it.   What really caught my eye though was her Surrey.  It was yellow and had a striped red top with fringe on it.  The Surrey had a bench seat in the middle for two with a set of peddles, then there was a bench seat up in front for two.  The steering wheel was on the left side of the Surrey just like a car.  We had so much fun peddling on the sidewalk of our court.  I didn't know what envy was at that age but that was when I first really wanted what someone else had.  I have only been on one other Surrey that reminded me of Denise's and that was at a cherished home my parents rented in Carmel when our own children were young.  It wasn't in the same condition either as the fringe top was not on it and it was rickety as well.  Still it brought back those fond times I remembered.  I only wish we could have brought it home and fixed it up so our girls could play with it at home.

     Behind the homes on the court was what we called the gully.  My brother was allowed to play in the gully with the other boys but I was not.  I was too young.  The boys would ride their bikes up and down the sides of the gully as it had high sides on either bank and then a flat area at the bottom.  It was a bit like an empty canal area but made of dirt only.  I am not sure what it was used for as I never saw it with water in it.

     I can't believe that I use to walk home from my school Lincoln Elementary as a first grader.  It was  quite a walk and I think it was just a couple of us kids at the time doing this.  The best part was at one point we walked through Maple Park.   I called it the sunken park as you walked down into the park from a path which at the time seemed more deep than it really is.  The park looks different now with the new play equipment.  Still I have a sweet little memory of kissing a boy in that park who walked home with us sometimes. My first kiss to a boy!   One of those quick little pecks on the cheek.
  Lincoln Elementary was also where I had my favorite teacher Mrs. Shifley.  She came to my birthday party, at my request, and gave me the book "A Fly Went By" which I read to my children.  Written inside by her was best wishes for my birthday.

Jump Rope Rhyme Stories...The Galaxie

Bluebells, cockle shells,

Eevie, ivy, over....

When you are little your life is directed constantly. You don't get to make too many choices in your everyday life. Your woken from bed, fed breakfast, clothes put on and so the day goes on. At the end of the day it is all in reverse. You don't have a clue of what your parents are up to and really don't seem to care either. Just so long that it is a happy place you can feel joyful in your little universe.

I lived in the small town of Atwater, California when I was 2 to 6 years of age. It was a town occupied by a lot of Military families who were stationed at Castle Air Force Base. We lived there for that reason as my father was in the Air Force though I have no memory of my father during that time. We lived in a typical neighborhood rather than base housing, where our elementary school, Elmer Wood, was just down the street from our house on Linden Street. One door down from our house was E. L Walters Park where I got my first bee sting. It was a happy time from my memory though at that age it is hard to remember much. At home lived my brother, my mom and myself with my Nan coming over often as well. My Nan worked as a nurse at a hospital nearby. My mom was a stay at home mom and did various social events that Military moms seem to do. Teas, bridge clubs and such.

The part of what you don't know about your parents is what is really going on though. They see to it that your world seems just like all the other friends families you know. Yet military families are not like other families. We move around a lot, and often the dads are not around at all. That was our case.

Our next door neighbor was quite nice to us. I don't remember much about him at that age except for the day he got the Ford Galaxie. I was about 5 years old and the year would have been 1963. It was a warm summer evening and my mom told us we were going for a ride in our neighbor "Bill's" new car. My eyes saw this white convertible with the top down in his driveway. Wow! I am sure that was the first time I had ever noticed a car other than our own. We climbed into the backseat my brother and I with my mom and Bill sitting up front and off we went.

We drove onto a country road with no stop signs and just flew. The warm air blowing in my face, whipping my hair back. The whoosh of warm air bringing tears to my eyes as I tried to sit up higher to look out all around me. I wanted to sit up on top of the back seat and feel that push of invisible warmth. The car was wide and long with blue vinyl interior. The convertible top was hidden under a blue matching cover as though there was no top at all. Silver chrome trim sleeked horizontally down the body of the car. It was a thrill!

My other memory of the Galaxie was sitting in the car with several of my neighbor friends in Bill's driveway. Our mothers were inside the house while we waited for them. We were going somewhere. We were waiting in the backseat when one of them thought to get in the front seat and pretend to drive the car. That little smarty pants pulled the gearstick on the steering wheel while he was trying to turn the steering wheel round and round. That put the car in reverse! Thankfully we were not on a steep incline. We just rolled back out of the driveway, across the street where we stopped when we hit the curb. The car had been parked at the edge of the end of the driveway to begin with. Of course we all knew we were going to be in big trouble. I am pretty sure we didn't go anywhere as had been the plan.

My mom eventually married Bill and we moved to Salinas, California just before I started 1st grade. I didn't see my dad again till many years later. The Galaxie was sold at some point as well and our family bought a Ford Station Wagon with fake wood paneling. Not quite as exciting as the Galaxie.

I like coffee,

I like tea,

I like ____to jump in with me!

Jump Rope Rhyme Stories...Go-Go Boots

Not last night but the night before.

Twenty-four robbers came knocking at my door,

They called me out for the world to see,

And this is what they said to me....

Spanish dancer turn around,

Spanish dancer touch the ground,

Spanish dancer do high kicks,

Spanish dancer do the splits!

It wasn't until I entered fifth grade that I thought much about clothes. Before that I would wear anything that was in my drawers or closet. Yet that year I noticed what girls were wearing in my teen magazines. I saw what the teen girls who went to our church wore. I saw what was on TV. What I really wanted that year was Go-Go Boots.

My family often watched "Laugh-In" when it was on TV and seeing Goldie Hawn and Judy Carne dancing in their Go-Go Boots made me wish I had a pair. At that tender age I also thought if I wore them I would have a skinny body, cute legs and dance as great as they did. I also thought I would have their giddy happy-go-lucky laughter as well.

I saw girls at school that had Go-Go Boots like a girl in my grade named Jesse. It seemed like all of the boots I saw were white which was the color I wanted. Shiny white with small heels, and they zipped up on the inside of the calf. They looked so cool with mini skirts or dresses. I still had plain boring Oxfords, Penny Loafers (with a penny in the little slot in the leather) or Keds tennis shoes. I felt so out of style though I didn't really understand what "style" meant.

I asked my mom if I could have Go-Go Boots but never really got an answer. The more I saw them the more I wanted them. In grade school the girls didn't wear true mini-skirts like the high school girls or on TV. Ours looked more like the knee length skirts that the girls at the Catholic High school wore which was behind our school. What you think and what you see tend to blur together in a young girls mind. Girls our age did not wear the short skirts.

It was at this same age that I was allowed to wear panty hose which had just come out in the stores. My mom allowed me to wear them only to church though I seem to manage to get runs in them every time I wore them so they were a one time wear. I wanted to wear them to look like the older girls, but they were itchy and tended to slowly fall down my hips with the crotch getting lower to my dress or skirt length. Before this girls and women had to wear hose with garter belts which I thought were out of date with the times. I bet they stayed up though! My other choice was to wear ankle socks or knee socks which I thought were quite childish.

With great surprise on Christmas morning I opened a box that had a pair of Go-Go Boots in it! I was thrilled but they were not white. They were black. I tried really hard to be happy about this but this was not what the girl Jesse wore or Goldie Hawn or Judy Carne. I tried them on and they were very tight around my calves. I had to imagine my legs squeezing in them like a tight skirt and then pull the zipper up over my calf with a quick zip to the top. Not as comfortable as I had hoped. The girls I saw with boots seem to slip over their calves with room around the whole leg. Mine were in a state of bunching after you wore them which made them look a bit wrinkled near the ankle. No extra room to spare.

The first day back to school after our Christmas break I picked out my outfit carefully. I had a red and black large check culotte dress which I wore with a white cotton shirt and a red scarf around my neck. I thought it looked cute till I got to school. The Go-Go Boots were uncomfortable. The tightness wasn't easy to move in for jump rope or hopscotch let alone four square. I didn't look skinny and my legs looked bigger in them. I certainly didn't feel so happy. I noticed a lot of white boots but there were some black ones as well.

I know I wore the boots many times but like so much with styles and tastes I did get over the disappointment of the Go-Go Boots. I moved onto wanting the Surfer tee shirt with the bright colors and stripes. Hip hugger pants and jeans which I wanting to have too. The Go-Go Boots faded to the back of my closet.

Spanish dancer do the splits.

Spanish dancer give high kicks.

Spanish dancer turn around.

Spanish dancer get out of town!