One person or action in your childhood that has a positive memory.

[Treacle]

Some of us had a pretty bad childhood but I always find something positive whether a person or action. So my English grandfather, who raised me and my siblings with my grandmother , is the person who was always kind, gentle, sensitive and extremely hard working. He was up at 6 am and back from work at 6 pm and then would do some painting in our bedrooms or some carpentry or whatever needed to be done. He also worked a job on Saturday mornings. We were 4 very young babies/children. One of memories was sitting on his lap and him rubbing his unshaven face gently against my face and making me laugh. (Don't know why, it just did) ☺

 

[Aunt Marg]

Gosh, I have so many...

I was still peddling around on a tricycle when we moved to a new area of town, and next door to us was a neighbour that tinkered. He built this, he built that, he fixed this, and he fixed that, and little did I know at the time, the good neighbour would become the bike mechanic for all of us neighbourhood kids. We'd often show up at his shop like a biker-gang rolling into town looking for a cold brew, with one kid needing air, another needing something tightened, and someone else who's brakes were failing. In we'd go with frowns and sometimes tears, and out we'd emerge with smiles from ear-to-ear.

A flat tire, a chain that fell off, a broken frame, he was always there for us. From spring until early fall, the door of his workshop/garage was open, and there he'd be, smoking his pipe (gosh how I love the smell of pipe tobacco), and messing around in his shop, and everyone, no matter who you were, were always welcome to drop-in for some good conversation and a cup of coffee prepared on his wood stove, and for chairs, there was an array of cut logs to sit down on, but most of all, and I mention this, because I spotted your stereo on the shelf, our neighbour always had his radio playing.

I still remember the day when the noise of him tinkering and messing around fell silent. I cried so hard. All of us kids cried, as did neighbours from all around. Our neighbourhood was never the same. His workshop was like a book, with a little bit of everything inside, something for everybody.

Over 45 years has come and gone by since his passing, but I have never forgotten his kindness and dedication towards accepting everyone for who they were, and offering his help to anyone needing it. They just don't make 'em like that anymore.

 

[Gary O']

I penned this a few years ago;


Grampa



He was a quiet man.
Work was his vocation and recreation.
I spent a lot of time at their place in my early years, his latter years.
Seems Grampa always had chores that filled his waking hours.
I was his shadow.
He wore coveralls most days, and always sported an old grey fedora.
His high cut oxfords made a shuffling sound as he walked. Parkinson’s was having it’s way with his system.
We’d dine on a bowl of hominy together in the country kitchen.
As the midday sun danced on the table through the window from between the limbs of the giant firs, I’d watch his massive hand struggle to keep his corn on the shaking spoon.

In between chores, and my naps, he’d sit in the old padded rocker and thumb through a photo album while I stood at his side.
‘The dapple was Molly and the grey was Dixie’, pointing to the work horse team he knew so well.

Seemed Grampa had a couple soft balls tucked in his upper shirt sleeves. He was a compact man at five nine, but stout, bull neck, thick arms.

I knew him in his lesser years, keeping his meaning to life by doing small jobs.
Things like sharpening the hoes with rasps, feeding the chickens, gathering eggs, or lubing the tractor.
He cut down a hoe to my size, and all three of us hoed acres of strawberries.

I saw him laugh once.

He was a proud man, brought down and humbled by an untreatable disease, but keeping his misery within.
Dad says he was hard boiled in his younger years, and short on patience. Proud.
I knew him as a much different man.

One time I peered through a cracked door to his study. He was on his hands and knees, talking to his Lord, no longer able to just kneel.
His bible was quite worn.
Dad gave to it me a few years ago.
I leant it back to him at Christmas.
I’ll get it back pretty soon.
I think of times then and times now.
What a difference in pace, in conviction, in the shear enjoyment of endurance in simple living.
I see my grandkids give me an occasional glance of admiration, but nothing like the revered awe I had of him.

He died when I was ten.

I can still hear the shuffle of his feet, but it’s mine that echo his stride now.

 

[win231]

I liked my grandfather much more than my parents. He was much nicer than they were. I was 15 when he died. At his funeral, I was thinking, "Life sure ain't fair. I'd much rather attend my mother's funeral than his."

 

[Wren]

Mine was Auntie Hilda, she divorced her husband (a scandal in those days) after he had an affair making another woman pregnant, and raised her only child alone, she had to work full time so he was a ‘latch key kid’ and a total credit to her.

In my childhood, Auntie was like a second mother to me, we kept in touch but were oceans apart by the time she became ill, I sent her a huge bouquet and was told her face lit up when it arrived so, at least she knew I had not forgotten her before she passed away

 

[Treacle]

I penned this a few years ago;


Grampa

View attachment 110287

He was a quiet man.
Work was his vocation and recreation.
I spent a lot of time at their place in my early years, his latter years.
Seems Grampa always had chores that filled his waking hours.
I was his shadow.
He wore coveralls most days, and always sported an old grey fedora.
His high cut oxfords made a shuffling sound as he walked. Parkinson’s was having it’s way with his system.
We’d dine on a bowl of hominy together in the country kitchen.
As the midday sun danced on the table through the window from between the limbs of the giant firs, I’d watch his massive hand struggle to keep his corn on the shaking spoon.

In between chores, and my naps, he’d sit in the old padded rocker and thumb through a photo album while I stood at his side.
‘The dapple was Molly and the grey was Dixie’, pointing to the work horse team he knew so well.

Seemed Grampa had a couple soft balls tucked in his upper shirt sleeves. He was a compact man at five nine, but stout, bull neck, thick arms.

I knew him in his lesser years, keeping his meaning to life by doing small jobs.
Things like sharpening the hoes with rasps, feeding the chickens, gathering eggs, or lubing the tractor.
He cut down a hoe to my size, and all three of us hoed acres of strawberries.

I saw him laugh once.

He was a proud man, brought down and humbled by an untreatable disease, but keeping his misery within.
Dad says he was hard boiled in his younger years, and short on patience. Proud.
I knew him as a much different man.

One time I peered through a cracked door to his study. He was on his hands and knees, talking to his Lord, no longer able to just kneel.
His bible was quite worn.
Dad gave to it me a few years ago.
I leant it back to him at Christmas.
I’ll get it back pretty soon.
I think of times then and times now.
What a difference in pace, in conviction, in the shear enjoyment of endurance in simple living.
I see my grandkids give me an occasional glance of admiration, but nothing like the revered awe I had of him.

He died when I was ten.

I can still hear the shuffle of his feet, but it’s mine that echo his stride now.

Beautiful picture , beautiful words. ☺

 

[JustBonee]

I could never forget Justine. She was one of my aunt's best friends .. a woman who became a Nun in her twenties. ... as a small child she left me awestruck, with her beauty and intelligence. I couldn't believe she was real ...
And I only saw her a few times ever, but she was so nice, and interested in talking to me.

 

[asp3]

I feel very fortunate to have very many positives in my childhood. The one that came to mind first after reading the topic title was attending a children's theater production with a parent (I'm pretty sure it was my father) and hearing the piece of metal they shook to produce the sound of thunder. I have no idea what the play was or what it was about, but I remember that and being amazed that people could make sounds like that.

The second one that came to mind was going to the science museum with my parents.

 

[chic]

Grandma. Both of them, but most especially my maternal grandmother.

 

[treeguy64]

Too many positives to begin listing. I had a happy, fulfilling childhood.

 

[Repondering]

Mrs. Bland, our primary school art teacher. She was born in China to British missionary parents who lost their lives in a Japanese internment camp in Hong Kong during WW 2. It was there that she married her first husband....they were both 16 years old.....he died in the camps too. Mrs Bland was tall and blonde and enthusiastic about art and living. She encouraged me to follow my own interests and tastes in all things. She raised two children, outlived her second husband and retired to Italy with a third husband. She left this world for the next one a few years ago and many of us, her former students, aging Third Culture Kids, born and raised in HK and now scattered over the world but linked via online social media, mourned her passing. I hope to meet her again someday........somewhere.

 

[Laurie]

A food parcel from Canada.

It arrived in 1943 when rationing was pretty dire.

It contained things I'd never heard of (I was 5 years old).

I remember even now how red the apples were.

I have never forgotten that Canadian kindness.