To be determined (#5)

Hello readerS how’s it going? Have you all been keeping to the adventurous side of life or sticking to the route most do…? Believe me I will be the last to judge but my advice is that you count on the day you’re in to be the only day there is and then if you make it to the next (day) hopefully you’ll not find yourself looking back with regret.

My dad got a position with the city (Queens) as a landscape architect for the parks department when I was in my fourth year of growth which entailed moving his family from the quaintness of the island to the cramped and ramped up lifestyle of what seemed like a metropolis to a kid like me…I supposed it was and still is, after all.

I had a few years still before entering a proper school and daycare wasn’t an option back in those days…it was of the era when “children were still seen and rarely heard”. I took this saying to a different level because I was possibly only heard running out our seven story apartment building’s door and then for the most part never seen.

We lived on the sixth floor in apartment 6D which was all the information I would ever need to ensure my (at some point) return. Yes, 4 plus years old is a bit young to be out in the city scampering around free but my parents thought they more or less knew of my whereabouts and they were probably relieved to be free of me for a good portion of the day. I’d return around lunchtime to collect my tuna sandwich and tomato soup and then off again would be me. Kidnapping wasn’t a problem back then and if I was ever kidnapped the “Ransom Of Red Chief” would have nothing on a rambunctious child like me.

There was an all year round indoor Olympic size pool in our “luxury” apartment building because we were “ballers” ya know. I remember swimming around like a fish and I remember the pool maintenance man, Joe, who was also the lifeguard, watching me endlessly. He hadn’t any family of his own that I knew of and I think he may have also been a retired marine because he always wore a sailor cap and a white tee. It wasn’t a strange pedophilia thing with Joe, to be clear. He really took me under his wing and gave me tons of pointers on the best ways to swim. Coming from the island and having a natural love of the sea may have endeared me to Joe or perhaps he to me. I was jumping into the deep end of the pool with my snorkel and fins almost everyday for a few years until one day Joe was no longer there…no one tells a little kid what happens to people especially once they’re gone but the pool lost most of its magic for me after that…I still do love to swim and find myself thinking back sometimes on Joe.

Lots of kids lived in my apartment building and my new best friend was Glen (sorry Jimmy). Glen and his sister Wendy lived on a lower floor. If I can remember correctly, they lived on the fourth floor and they had an even bigger apartment than me! They had three bedrooms and all their furniture was covered in plastic which made absolutely no sense to me. Their livingroom was huge and with chandeliers and all that jazz. Their mom, Sharon, never allowed us in there…the whole room made no frigging sense to me; “what the hell did all that plastic mean”.

Glen and I would be sequestered to his bedroom where we would play the Osmond Brothers and The Jackson Five all day long and some of my best dance moves were developed then. Wendy, Glen’s younger sister, was hardly ever allowed to join in. Besides, Glen and I were always hiding under his bed comforter kissing, anyway. Not only did I learn to dance with Glen I also learned to play the kissing game. Yup, for five I was well on my way…to somewhere…?

I remember my mom and Sharon wondering what we got up to blasting the music and bopping our teeny tiny asses away but we were just five years of age so they never really worried or cared as long as we stayed out of that damn plastic encased livingroom.

I determined very early on that the opposite sex was extremely pleasing to me and though I was (and still am) a devout tomboy I surely love to put on a pretty party dress and dance dance dance the day and night away. I danced so much as a kid I’d spin around sometimes and slip and fall. I cracked my head open a few times on the coffee table and a door frame or two…but I’d get right back up and dance again for sure! Stitches lead to scars and scars are souvenirs one keeps for life; perhaps one day I’ll show you.

(stayed tuned because my school years are coming and I assure you school never hindered the adventurous side of me.)