Here I am in the First Grade and Sister Agnes is drilling us on our Catechism. We must learn a certain amount before we can receive our First Communion. "Who is God?" "God is the Creator who made all things." "Where is God?" "God is everywhere." Ok, I bought that. Then I asked what was to me an obvious question. "Who made God?" Sister Agnes said, "Nobody made God." I said, "Nobody made God? Then how can He BE? Somebody had to make Him." Sister Agnes almost had a stroke. She could not answer my question and didn't like it. I had to sit in the principal's office until Poppy could get away from work and pick me up. I'm sure he must have been told that his daughter was a heretic.

That was the beginning of many years of questions that received no satisfactory answers, and got me into a whole MESS of trouble. I just couldn't understand why these adults were lying to us. Or were they lying? Didn't they know? Didn't they remember where they came from? Could it be that they really didn't know what they were telling us?

Some teachers considered me precocious and way too adult in my thinking. One of the things that I just could NOT believe was that God lived in the little house on the altar.....the Tabernacle. Not only that, but they had squashed his body into a little white wafer. How'd they DO that? They did this to GOD??? Oh my.....I was in big trouble. Now I KNEW that I took a wrong turn somewhere! You couldn't do that to God. That was impossible! Something was VERY wrong here. It was about to get worse!!!

I almost didn't receive my First Communion and was almost thrown out of school. When they told me that we were going to eat God's body and drink His blood, I freaked. Cannibalism! I was too young to know it by it's name, but I knew the concept and knew that I didn't belong here. Poppy was again called to the school and was told that he & Mama were extremely poor parents. He was also told that I would have to go to another school. I was too disruptive. MY parents, poor parents?????? Not on your LIFE!

Poppy talked to the Pastor of St. Anne's Church and convinced him that I should be allowed to finish the rest of the school year. Now, that Pastor (I forget his name) took a liking to me. Guess he liked my spunk. He spoke with Sister Agnes and I returned to class the next day. Since I was able to almost recite the Catechism verbatim, I received my First Communion.

During that school year, I fell in the play yard and received a Mal Concussion. While I was in and out of consciousness, I could feel myself leaving my body and coming back into it. While out of body, I spoke with my angels. They told me I would be all right. They, also, told me that people here on Earth didn't remember their beginnings. My questions would cause some of them to think. They told me that I would find helpers along the way. Mama and Poppy were to be the main ones to help me during the years of growing up.

Did I cave in to their teachings? No way. Mama explained that it wasn't really God that we were eating. It was just a leavened bread that was used as a symbol of God's body. Well, I gave in to Mama because I loved her so much. If it was just bread...

The following year I started at a new school - St. Catherine's. In Second Grade, we began to be taught about Jesus. My teacher, Sister Eugene Emily, was a gentle and loving woman. I liked her right away and thought, "She won't lie to us." WRONG! She believed the same way as Sister Agnes, except she wasn't mean about it. She did have a way of telling a story, though. Sister Eugene Emily told the story of Jesus' birth with flair, elan, and great emotion. She had a way of speaking that created pictures in our minds and we were THERE. We felt the cold of that holy night. We saw the shining star over the stable. We saw the three kings, the shepherds, and all the people who were traveling to see the newborn King. We saw the angels hovering overhead and heard their melodic voices. They were singing joyously because the Son of God, Jesus Christ.....our brother.....was born. The King of Heaven and Earth, God's Son, our Brother and our Savior was HERE! Here on Earth. Oh, what a marvelous time for humanity that must have been! Yes, I really DID think like that when I was in the Second Grade. Because of that nun, I have held a deep and abiding love of Christmas.

During those early years, after moving from the houseboat, we lived in a small, two-bedroom house that sat on an acre of fertile ground. We raised Banty chickens and rabbits. Mama raised and bred Siamese cats. We usually had a whole kindle of kittens running around. We had a fenced barnyard and Poppy rented the barn and pasture to a policeman friend of theirs. I remember that his name was Paul Green and I was in love. He was SO handsome. When I was six, I asked him to wait for me to grow up so I could marry him. No matter that he was already married.

Paul needed a place to board his cow. Now, to a very young child, all horses are male and all cows are female. Just like all dogs are male and all cats are female. Right? At six years old, this was my reality. Paul told me I could name the cow anything I wanted, so I named it "Pauline." Imagine that! I couldn't figure out why everybody was surprised by the name and why they had a hard time keeping straight faces. As it turned out, Pauline was a BULL!

Pauline did not like Poppy at all and would chase him from the pasture, head to the ground with nostrils flaring and snorting. He tolerated Mama. She could walk freely about the pasture and barn, but she could not come close to him. He would back away and avoid her. When I'd go out to the fence, climb up on it and call Pauline, he'd come running. He'd move up very close to the fence and I'd hop on his back. Away we'd go. Mama and Poppy would hold their breath until we came back to the fence. They'd scold me and tell me how dangerous it was to ride on a bull. Not too hard, though, because Mama used to ride Brahma Bulls in rodeos when she was young.

There's no doubt about it.....I was a "tomboy." I'd rather be climbing trees, playing "Cowboys and Indians," and riding on the tractor with Poppy. I wasn't very much interested in dolls and such, although I had plenty of them. My three favorites were "Betsy-Wetsy" dolls. Does anyone remember them? I named them, Vicky, Linda, and Ricky. They were really the only ones I ever played with. When I grew up and became a mother, I named my children Vikki, Linda, and Randy. The name Ricky had already been used in the family.

I did the usual kid things like being a Brownie, then a Girl Scout. My badge sash was filled front and back. I always seemed to sell the most Girl Scout cookies, in our troop. Heck, I'd take them to church with me on Sundays and sell them there. It worked great. My favorite thing of all, though, was singing.

It was what I did best. There were so many groups that I sang with. Always in church and school choirs. My favorite hymn was "Panis Angelicus." It would send shivers all through me as I listened to the sweet, pure voices echo throughout the cathedral. I had an excellent singing voice and dreamed of someday being a famous singer like Kate Smith or Mahalia Jackson.

The "Mickey Mouse Club" was my favorite show on TV. Remember Annette, Darleen, Bobby, Karen and Cubby? I'd sit on the floor with my mouse ears on and watch them sing and dance. Well, I wasn't much for dancing, but could sing with the best of them. I had a huge crush on Jimmy Dodd. I loved the serials like "Corky and White Shadow" and "Spin and Marty." Westerns were my favorite type of movie or show. "The Lone Ranger," "Hopalong Cassidy," Roy Rogers and Dale Evans, etc. The first book I remember falling in love with was "Angel Unaware" written by Dale Evans about their little girl who died.

In the third grade, I went to another new school, "Blessed Sacrament," in Seattle. There I met and loved my all time favorite teacher.....Sister Virginia. She liked me from the start and to be honest, I was "Teacher's Pet" that year. She was so loving that I did everything possible to be the best in all the subjects we were being taught. Spelling was a snap! In reading, I was many years ahead of my classmates. English grammer was fun. Science was a BIG interest and I did well. Arithmatic was another story entirely. Dumb as a box of rocks! Just couldn't get the hang of it. I had a mental block about it that was as big as a house! History was boring. All those names and dates of people and events that had happened in the past. Who cared? Not me. Geography was absolutely fascinating, though, and I could draw wonderful maps. Religion was my favorite subject, though.

Sister Virginia didn't get all upset when I'd ask questions or give my opinion about something that was being taught. She was quite interested in my "take" on things. Sometimes we would have lunch together and I'd talk and talk and talk. The neat thing was.....she listened to me. I think she was a bit of a renegade nun, now that I look back. She didn't treat me like a child was normally treated. You know, "Children should be seen and not heard." She'd often tell me that I was so much older than my years and had some very interesting thoughts about God and creation. I think she might have rather dreaded teaching me what the church had to say about Jesus.