20153006 Morning Edition

Good Morning from the deck,
Cigarette in hand, coffee at my side, sitting in my recliner. It is a not so hot that I cannot move morning. Pain level is still holy crap with a few other words thrown in, but I have hope this morning.
The good news, I am up before the alarm this morning.
The crack I just heard was either gun fire, my back popping, or fireworks. Since it’s the 30th of June, I’m betting on the firework. Of course, I’ve been wrong before. My earliest memories of fireworks involve the neighbor, Junior Sagness, my brother Paul and me. Junior was watching us kids for some reason. He was a smoker, and we didn’t have any punks for our fireworks. We used his cigarettes. When I was that little, Junior was always older than dirt. We were always going to be little, and he was one of my Uncles by proxy.
Other Summer memories include riding our bikes over to the Halverson’s, and collecting cans. We would play “Dukes of Hazzard” on our bikes. Mike, Craig and Kari were siblings 2 miles over. Larry and Nancy were their cousins a mile and 3/4 over. We had so much fun. Then there were the sleep overs at Nancy’s. We would play with dolls, and get up early. I still remember brushing our teeth together in the mudroom. It was a lovely time, and there was no evil in the world.
Another memory, is my earliest. Mom worked late, and she was sleeping on the couch in front of the soap operas. I made a “nest” behind here legs with my dolly, one of her books, and would play there until she got up. I was safe. I was also naughty. It was one of those mornings, when I asked her for a root beer. She told me to get it and I did, but I shook the crap out of it on purpose. I never got a licking for the sweet sticky spray she got, but maybe I should have. I still love root beer.
The best memories though, aren’t of Holidays, but of family and friends. The morning that we got the call that my next younger brother was born. I was excited! Or when that same brother threw his baby bottle of chocolate milk into the microwave by himself, and it exploded. When the next younger brother came home from the hospital, and he was cuter than the dickens. My nephew, as a baby played Jesus in a church play. Walking, as a teenager, with my baby sister in my arms, I was barefoot, and we went down the gravel road one mile and back. Or when that same baby sister, Skunkbait was her nickname, came to spend the night at my first apartment. I miss those days.
I don’t want to stay down memory lane for too long, but those are some of my favorites.
There are also the bad memories too. Drifting down memory lane brings those up at times, and I would rather just leave those where they are, in the past.
Life’s too short to dwell on the pain. Dad and I live each day as it is. Yes, he would rather be 40 years younger. I’d rather be 20, but it is what it is. We live with what we have.
That’s just the way of things.
Have a good day, I will pester you later,
Louise Ann Benjamin