What Was I Doing When I Was 10

I was in Mrs. Ferrell's 5th. grade class. I remember her as being kind and giving me the extra attention I needed to understand math. I remember coloring with magic markers and making abstract designs with my friend, Suzanne. I remember playing battling tops in the back of the class on rainy days.

Mrs. Ferrell asked me to play Mary in the Christmas pageant but I heard Lisa Stanley complaining that I was the teacher's pet so I refused to play the part. Lisa played it instead. I remember the last Prisoner of War from the Vietnam War stepping off the plane. We made P.O.S. (Prisoners of School) signs and pasted them to our notebooks until "they" made us take them down.

We moved into the house that my parents built that year. I had my own room painted pink which is my favorite color to this day. We met Rusty and Sissy (the next door neighbors) who would become as close as my real brother and sister as we all grew up together. We spent the days playing wiffleball, flying kites, playing monopoly and hide and seek. We rode our bikes in the endless circle which was a path we had mapped out instead of utilizing both our yards for some unknown reason.

I think that was the year we build our famous clubhouse only to have it torn down a few months later. It was the bestest clubhouse ever! I read voraciously as I did for my entire childhood. I remember watching Nixon resign on television. My parents told me it was an historic event that I needed to watch.