A respectable amount of time after the youngest in our family was born, Papa announced we were moving to Denver, Colorado. Of course, moving, or as it was known in the military, "rotating" was not uncommon to us at all, and our friends in Clinton were moving too, so we packed up the green (ugly) station wagon and trekked across the prairie to the edge of the Rocky Mountains. The Air Force was generally "family-friendly" and usually scheduled rotation for the summer when school was out, so we arrived just in time for me to start second grade.
Granny and Papa bought a house first thing (odd because I'm sure we knew we were short-termers). It was brand new with a clear view of the distant blue mountains, including snow crested Pikes Peak. The entire neighborhood was under construction, heaven for me and the neighboring 9 year olds. We explored the empty fields and watched as the subdivision came to life, first when the road graders plowed what was to be the streets and then when the carpenters gave shape to the homes-to-be. We didn't just watch either, we rode on the bulldozers and scavenge scrap wood and other building materials tossed by the workmen for our own construction projects.
We moved in too late in the year to plant grass in the dark brown prairie dirt, and for several weeks before the first snow our yard was covered with the naturally occurring sage brush that grew almost two feet high (easy for a 9 year old to hide in). I remember pulling the brush later that year, and Papa's constant reminder, "be sure to get the roots." We stacked the stalks to make walls for forts from which we tossed dirt clods at one another (me and the other 9 year olds again).
My best friend, Steve (who knows where he is now because Air Force families move so much) never changed his socks. In fact, he simply refused to remove them from his feet unless forced, something his mother pointed out to me at a sleep over. That night, she insisted on washing his socks (mine too), and once in her hands, she banged them on the table to show me that they were hard as boards. I tried it for a while, but just couldn't stand the discomfort.
Granny and Papa bought a house first thing (odd because I'm sure we knew we were short-termers). It was brand new with a clear view of the distant blue mountains, including snow crested Pikes Peak. The entire neighborhood was under construction, heaven for me and the neighboring 9 year olds. We explored the empty fields and watched as the subdivision came to life, first when the road graders plowed what was to be the streets and then when the carpenters gave shape to the homes-to-be. We didn't just watch either, we rode on the bulldozers and scavenge scrap wood and other building materials tossed by the workmen for our own construction projects.
We moved in too late in the year to plant grass in the dark brown prairie dirt, and for several weeks before the first snow our yard was covered with the naturally occurring sage brush that grew almost two feet high (easy for a 9 year old to hide in). I remember pulling the brush later that year, and Papa's constant reminder, "be sure to get the roots." We stacked the stalks to make walls for forts from which we tossed dirt clods at one another (me and the other 9 year olds again).
My best friend, Steve (who knows where he is now because Air Force families move so much) never changed his socks. In fact, he simply refused to remove them from his feet unless forced, something his mother pointed out to me at a sleep over. That night, she insisted on washing his socks (mine too), and once in her hands, she banged them on the table to show me that they were hard as boards. I tried it for a while, but just couldn't stand the discomfort.
©2006 David R. Childress. All Rights Reserved
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