tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-51903112011-08-10T10:44:18.803-05:00Random RedheadMemoirs from a South Side neighborhood '78 to '89.
Life as I knew it in urban St. Louis.She Dances in Dragonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10516981271944741323noreply@blogger.comBlogger1221100tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5190311.post-43413907375088069892011-08-06T19:51:00.000-05:002011-08-06T19:51:28.929-05:00I'm working on formatting all these stories, editing out the junk, cleaning up the spelling errors, etc.
Read while you can, because eventually I'm going to delete it all. Well, everything except the stitches. You guys seem to LOVE looking at those stitches in my foot.She Dances in Dragonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10516981271944741323noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5190311.post-616469960744902902010-09-22T10:22:00.001-05:002010-09-22T10:24:58.479-05:00*update*Birth son mentioned years ago here found me on facebook. We're friends. Went to visit his family this summer. He came to visit us the summer before. Life continues to be fascinating.She Dances in Dragonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10516981271944741323noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5190311.post-29907918740835013572007-01-20T06:29:00.001-06:002007-01-20T06:29:33.255-06:00test'She Dances in Dragonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10516981271944741323noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5190311.post-1138567711366654452006-01-28T14:35:00.000-06:002006-01-29T14:48:31.376-06:00ChallengerMy high school algebra teacher would usually start class with a joke. 20 years ago today, he walked into class looking very grim and said, "Did you hear that the Space Shuttle blew up?"We responded, "No! Tell us about the Space Shuttle blowing up!" We thought it was a joke, but it wasn't. Our teacher brought in a television set and we spent the class watching the news.She Dances in Dragonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10516981271944741323noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5190311.post-1137002878446872762006-01-11T09:25:00.000-06:002006-01-29T13:48:45.070-06:00Rebuilding an Engine, Part OneThere are a few things I learned during my dating years. One of them was never date an alcoholic. And another was never rescue an alcoholic. I did both. This is the "dating" part of the story versus the "rescue" part of the story.One of my boyfriends owned a late 1960's mustang fastback. I'm likely to get lynched for saying this, but I really don't remember what yearShe Dances in Dragonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10516981271944741323noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5190311.post-1134144696410337252005-12-09T09:15:00.000-06:002005-12-09T10:11:36.436-06:00Black Market LunchWhen I was in public school, lunch was doled out according to the number of lunch coupons you had. You could buy a week's worth of coupons, or you could buy them daily. Mom thought I brought my lunch every day. I never told her that I usually got my lunch on the black market. Because some of the more enterprising 8th graders would make copies of their lunch coupons and sell She Dances in Dragonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10516981271944741323noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5190311.post-1133305244609287202005-11-29T16:29:00.000-06:002005-11-29T17:00:44.620-06:00The Dirty Book StoreThe dirty book store sat at the corner of Jefferson and Sidney, right next to Trader Bob's Tattoo shop. Trader Bob's is still there. The book store (thankfully) is not. My sister and I threw a little party when the book store closed. We bought Big Gulps from 7-11 and spent the whole day standing around that corner; claiming it as our own. Because the area around the dirty bookShe Dances in Dragonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10516981271944741323noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5190311.post-1127522330816523122005-09-23T19:09:00.000-05:002005-09-23T19:38:50.823-05:00Foot UpdateDr. Pozzi granted me 6 physical therapy sessions. I'm going to ask for more. Bit by bit I'm getting better. But damn, it's frustrating. I have stretching exercises and toe exercises that I to every day. I can walk without my cane now, but I really have to concentrate on walking properly. Twice a week, I see my therapist. First she chants, "Toe DOWN! Toe DOWN!" as I walk to her station.She Dances in Dragonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10516981271944741323noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5190311.post-1125339841008115002005-08-29T13:21:00.000-05:002005-08-29T13:24:01.006-05:00And on a side note...The injury reminded me just how beautiful the world is. I was happy for weeks. Everything made brought a smile to my face. Isn't that strange? I certainly wasn't happy about having stitches in my foot, yet I couldn't not be cheerful about everything else.She Dances in Dragonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10516981271944741323noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5190311.post-1125339667978785882005-08-29T11:00:00.000-05:002005-08-29T13:21:08.013-05:00no commentYou may have noticed a lack of interesting stories from my past recently. It's because I've been living an interesting story right now. Wanna hear? Then read on!About 3 weeks ago, I stepped on a broken mason jar and sliced my foot open. Oddly enough, it was while I was on the phone with my doctor's office. When I looked at my foot, I thought I'd cut it all the way across the arch. I She Dances in Dragonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10516981271944741323noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5190311.post-1122613274490786832005-07-28T23:45:00.000-05:002005-07-29T00:01:14.493-05:00Dr. Seuss Does DeathDon't pump me full of chemicalsand bury me in the ground.Just toast me 'til I'm ashesand spread me all aroundDon't need a final resting placefor folks to come and mournI'd rather fertilize the Earth;a part of me rebornInto a flower or a tree,or maybe just some grass.Eternity inside a box?I think I'll take a pass.She Dances in Dragonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10516981271944741323noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5190311.post-1121406493913247952005-07-15T00:40:00.000-05:002005-07-15T00:48:13.916-05:00OMG!I forgot Soulard Farmer's Market, the whole Soulard area, Pevely Flea Market (hour drive to buy other people's crap)... Argh! I'm sure I'll think of more...Downtown, including Union Station, the train depot turned shopping mall, get some Hodges Chili if you visit... Look at all the people wearing red for the Cardinals baseball game, I'm sure there will be one during your stay... There's just She Dances in Dragonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10516981271944741323noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5190311.post-1121405346417162242005-07-14T23:08:00.000-05:002005-07-15T00:29:06.426-05:00For SarsparillaWhen you visit St. Louis, I highly recommend some of our totally free museums. We also have quite a few dirt-cheap museums. Most are less than $10. That's what, 6 Pounds?Don't bother with the Arch, unless you like to look at a city from high up.If you like art, The Art Museum (creative name, eh?)has a fantastic collection. Admission is free, although there is a fee for any special She Dances in Dragonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10516981271944741323noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5190311.post-1120847505525870002005-07-08T13:31:00.000-05:002005-07-08T13:31:45.530-05:00The Multi-Use RoofSt. Louis is great because it has a multitude of flat roofs. When you combine them with narrow gangways, you get a daring method of transportation. If you can leap 6 feet, you can traverse an entire block without touching the ground.Since most of our flat roofed buildings have a facade; you can hide from the cops, sunt@n t0pl&ss, or bombard your friends. They're also a great She Dances in Dragonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10516981271944741323noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5190311.post-1120437533259381042005-07-03T19:38:00.000-05:002005-07-03T19:38:53.263-05:00Hey, St. Louis! We're having a little bit of a drought here, and tomorrow is the 4th of July. Which means cheap fireworks will be lighting the sky for the next few nights. If you don't water your lawns; they'll be lighting your grass, too.I know it's a hassle, but you might want to water your roof, too. It's been a long time since St. Louis was so dry... But trust me; debris in your gutters or She Dances in Dragonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10516981271944741323noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5190311.post-1119334874841086532005-06-21T00:45:00.000-05:002005-06-21T13:31:41.896-05:00More Interesting Stuff About My DadDuring my father's stay in the brig, he wrote long letters to my mom. She wrote medium-length letters in return. With a toddler (my sister) running around the house, it was all she had time for. Some of their communications discussed the naming rights of the baby to be. (me)Mom thought that if I were a boy, I'd be named after my father... But what if I were a She Dances in Dragonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10516981271944741323noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5190311.post-1117579475958708782005-05-31T16:37:00.000-05:002005-05-31T17:44:35.990-05:00PTSDI was reading a Frontline article about how the military deals with killing, which led me to look up post traumatic stress disorder; and what I found was fascinating.I know I have PTSD. I've known for a long time, but I'm not exactly sure what caused it in the first place. It wasn't the stuff that I don't talk about here because it embarrasses certain family members who choose to believe thatShe Dances in Dragonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10516981271944741323noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5190311.post-1116341517070991412005-05-17T09:11:00.000-05:002005-05-17T09:51:57.076-05:00Ruminations. I turned 36 a few days ago, and I must say... I couldn't be happier. Sure, I look in the mirror and see a few laugh lines; and there are some interesting white streaks in my red-orange hair. But in general, I look in the mirror and see myself. I wonder how much of that is genetic, and how much it has to do with attitude?What got me thinking about this was not the 10 year old who She Dances in Dragonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10516981271944741323noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5190311.post-1114797219344018982005-04-29T12:10:00.000-05:002005-04-29T12:53:39.346-05:00The Fall Of SaigonI would have been not quite six years old at the time. I remember that mom and dad would watch the evening news, and sometimes they'd argue about it. Saigon falling to the North Vietnamese definitely sparked an argument. Mom and dad would go into the dining room to argue, and I'd be left to watch the news alone. At least until mom sent me to play elsewhere. She didn't think a 5 She Dances in Dragonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10516981271944741323noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5190311.post-1113244822976574302005-04-11T12:34:00.000-05:002005-04-11T13:40:22.980-05:00Music.If you check my profile, you'll see that I'm not a fan of country music. That's because I associate it with the bar across the street. We could hear the jukebox from our front porch; they always turned the music up on the weekends. As the night would wear on and the drinking would get heavier, the music would become more and more maudlin. There were endless versions of some poor slob who's She Dances in Dragonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10516981271944741323noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5190311.post-1112892630337142322005-04-07T10:26:00.000-05:002005-04-07T11:50:30.340-05:00The Worst Thing I've Ever Done.This month's Blogging For Books subject is ... Cruelty. What a quandary! To tell, or not to tell? If I bare my deepest act of cruelty, I could lose every friend I have. But if I don't take this opportunity... It's the old "tree falling in the woods" thing. You know, if I did something awful, but no one knows... will I still be seen as good? I guess I'll never know She Dances in Dragonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10516981271944741323noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5190311.post-1107655188479141862005-02-05T19:59:00.000-06:002005-02-07T09:48:36.993-06:00Desegregation
St. Louis began it's desegregation program when I started the 6th grade. The year was 1981. The city quickly created magnet schools to try and get more volunteer students, and to keep the courts from creating a plan of integration. The kids in my neighborhood attended either Notre Dame Catholic School, or the nearest public school. I didn't know anyone who went to Holy Cross She Dances in Dragonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10516981271944741323noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5190311.post-1107624627929485432005-02-05T11:06:00.000-06:002005-02-05T11:30:27.930-06:00Conflicted
I'm really conflicted about what to write next. What started as a series of amusing stories became therapy for me as I worked through my memories.
-I just realized that I still haven't told about skipping school, the disaster that the St. Louis public shool system was in the 1980's, my neighborhood's reaction to desegregation, racing down the highway at 115 mph, the yuppie rehabbers She Dances in Dragonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10516981271944741323noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5190311.post-1104870092523951212005-01-04T13:26:00.000-06:002005-01-13T11:41:04.736-06:00Surprise, Surprise
I was surprised to see hits from Ecology Of Absence, I wondered who had been hitting them from here. I was even more surprised when I saw that I hadn't linked them yet. I had meant to from the first time I visited and saw a post about a place I'll never forget. I'll never forget it because I discovered it by accident while driving with my son. We had gone to a skating party atShe Dances in Dragonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10516981271944741323noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5190311.post-1102960974795526122004-12-13T09:22:00.000-06:002004-12-13T16:21:58.476-06:00Life As We Know It
I'm having an interesting discussion on my other blog about the situation with our returning soldiers, and it flashed me back to my old neighborhood and all the homeless we had there.
A soldier comes home and discovers that he/she no longer fits in society. They tend to believe that only another soldier understands this feeling. That's not so. I've never been in the military.She Dances in Dragonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10516981271944741323noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5190311.post-1100707807844126592004-11-17T10:06:00.000-06:002004-11-17T10:10:07.843-06:00Woot!
I'd like to thank whoever did a Yahoo search for "classy common redhead". Considering the freakish (and sometimes disgusting) search hits I get; reading this one in my site stats was a pleasure. It gets better, though. I clicked the link, expecting to show up on page 16 or so... nope! I'm Number One!
Wootwootwoot!She Dances in Dragonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10516981271944741323noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5190311.post-1100628500548435092004-11-16T09:05:00.000-06:002004-11-16T12:13:51.040-06:00Living in the State of Virginity
My sister and I kinda stood apart from the rest of the neighborhood, in that we weren't going to have sex until we were damn good and ready. You would not believe the peer pressure involved. By the time I was 12, everyone I knew (except my sister, and the girl next door) had done it, or was actively trying to do it.
At twelve years of age, I didn't even want to She Dances in Dragonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10516981271944741323noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5190311.post-1096942841988197662004-10-04T19:31:00.001-05:002004-10-04T21:20:41.990-05:0018
On May 14th, 1987, I celebrated my 18th birthday. There was no big party, no cake. I had something better. I had my temporary voter registration card. It was a moment I'd been looking forward to since mom took me to the polls with her before I started school.
I remember the voting place in the basement of Long School. We walked to the school, and there were people everywhere. I remember theShe Dances in Dragonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10516981271944741323noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5190311.post-1095051093085913212004-09-12T22:42:00.000-05:002004-09-24T12:23:25.810-05:00On Dealers
On my street, most of the apartment dwellers sold drugs. I remained unaware of this until I transferred to public school. Oh, I knew that a few people sold drugs; and I knew that everyone owned a gun or two. But I didn't realize how readily available drugs were on my block.
That all changed when I invited my friend (the one who died in the previous story) over to my house. He told She Dances in Dragonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10516981271944741323noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5190311.post-1088742246143305182004-07-01T23:23:00.000-05:002004-07-01T23:24:06.143-05:00The Day My Best Friend Died
Sometimes people can be horribly cruel; and for no better reason than that their own lives are miserable. If you haven't guessed from reading this blog, I saw a lot of cruelty... But this story is about the cruelest thing that happened to me.
When I transferred to public school, I made a friend. Well, ok; I made several friends and one best friend. We hung out after She Dances in Dragonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10516981271944741323noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5190311.post-1088573465807050492004-06-29T20:33:00.000-05:002004-06-30T00:31:05.806-05:00More writing is forthcoming, I promise
Right now I'm busy setting up an online storefront. Heck, that makes for a good story...
When my dad left, we moved in with Grandma (as you may recall from the archives). I think mom sent us to ballet class out of guilt. I know she couldn't afford it. It's possible that her brothers and sisters chipped in. They are those kind of people.
However it came She Dances in Dragonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10516981271944741323noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5190311.post-1088027346618766332004-06-23T16:20:00.000-05:002004-06-23T16:49:06.616-05:00The Decay Of The Olympic Torch
When I was a kid, I got to see a runner carrying the Olympic torch. We had to get our parents' permission, because it meant leaving school grounds and walking 2 blocks through a crummy neighborhood in order to see a bit of flame for a few seconds. Mom got all excited when I brought the permission form home. She had to tell me all about the history of the carrying She Dances in Dragonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10516981271944741323noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5190311.post-1084385724986430952004-05-12T10:44:00.000-05:002004-06-23T16:52:44.863-05:00Ways to make money
Last weekend, we went to pick out a kitten. Driving through the subdivision that held the kitten's home; we passed a lemonade stand. I insisted we stop so I could buy some lemonade. The hubby-man thought I was nuts, but he dutifully pulled over so I could trade a quarter for a 10 oz. cup of lukewarm Crystal Light. (bleah)
So why did I do this? Why did I buy, and then drink, She Dances in Dragonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10516981271944741323noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5190311.post-1083686645806449482004-05-04T11:04:00.000-05:002004-05-04T11:42:40.966-05:00More On Prostitutes
Recently, Channel 2 news "exposed" prostitution in Creve Couer Park. Golly! There are men having sex with other men? In a public park? Here... in St. Louis? *gasp* I never knew!
Get over yourselves, channel 2. Go back to chasing Alderwomen who pee in trash cans. Quit scaring the many citizens who enjoy their parks. Better yet, use those investigative reporters to cover what'sShe Dances in Dragonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10516981271944741323noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5190311.post-1082126908320016382004-04-16T09:48:00.000-05:002004-04-16T09:52:21.000-05:00The Thing About Hoosiers
I've taught my son a bad word, and I'm not proud of it. It worked it's way in when I wasn't looking. It never even occurred to me, because it's such a common term in St. Louis.
The word is "Hoosier", and it doesn't mean "A graduate from the Universtity of Indiana". At least not in St. Louis, it doesn't. All my life, I've heard this word used daily. I never thought twiceShe Dances in Dragonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10516981271944741323noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5190311.post-1082036760091395852004-04-15T08:46:00.000-05:002004-04-15T08:49:51.420-05:00Congrats to Josh and Nats
Their baby girl was born Sunday, she's a whopping 10 lbs 7 oz. So pop over and offer them congratulations!
She Dances in Dragonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10516981271944741323noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5190311.post-1081553584749429992004-04-09T18:33:00.000-05:002004-04-09T18:36:48.890-05:00Trying my hand at poetry. Visit St. Louis Bloggers to read some others' poetry
St. Louis Sunset
The setting sun
Touches the facade
Of my 19th century apartment
Painting the limestone
With red and gold hues
Works of man
Reflecting nature
She Dances in Dragonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10516981271944741323noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5190311.post-1080938557060682722004-04-02T14:42:00.000-06:002004-04-15T08:57:38.123-05:00Fixing Up Cars
There were 3 classes of teenagers in my neighborhood; kids with no car, kids with a car that went nowhere, and kids with freedom -aka a car that runs. Thus a favored pastime was fixing up cars. I participated in it myself. The idea was to spend an entire paycheck on a car that didn't run, then have your friends push it to your house. Sometimes they pushed that car for miles. It She Dances in Dragonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10516981271944741323noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5190311.post-1079560694742336452004-03-27T16:59:00.000-06:002004-03-27T16:59:15.060-06:0080's Clothes
Writing about my childhood during the 1980's just wouldn't be writing without the obligatory "I can't believe I wore that" entry. So for all you fans of 80's fashion; here ya go!
My earliest fashion memories stem from the late 1970's. Back then, clothing was comfortable and casual. Much like it is today. Children wore t-shirts and terry cloth, denim and velour. The colors were blandShe Dances in Dragonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10516981271944741323noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5190311.post-1079124224355409122004-03-12T14:43:00.000-06:002004-03-12T14:46:51.186-06:00ok, Now really! Who goes looking for "Sexist Redhead on the internet"??? Why don't you search for a sexist blonde or brunette, for a change. Redheads are not the epitome of life, you know. Geez, stop surfing the net, and grow an imagination!She Dances in Dragonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10516981271944741323noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5190311.post-1075088222725954242004-03-12T14:39:00.000-06:002004-03-12T14:39:30.920-06:00The 9 year old prostitute
This is one of those stories that I've started and stopped a half dozen times. This time I'm going to finish it no matter how much it hurts.
My best friend had some cousins who lived over on the next block. The older two were both glue heads, the youngest was a prostitute. Her father had been selling her off to friends since she was a toddler. When she was 9, she She Dances in Dragonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10516981271944741323noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5190311.post-1077554794743586042004-02-23T10:46:00.000-06:002004-02-23T10:49:17.686-06:00Looking Back
Driving through my old neighborhood, I see that both apartments we used to live in are boarded up. It's as if they're waiting for something. Solid brick buildings, with their 1880's interiors; standing silent and strong... waiting. I want to pull over and park, walk around the overgrown back yards, touch the spot where I buried my parakeet and climb the silver leaf maple just one She Dances in Dragonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10516981271944741323noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5190311.post-1077485295603428572004-02-22T15:28:00.000-06:002004-02-22T15:30:57.576-06:00Last one
I'm out of the running for Blogmadness. Voting is on hiatus, due to something completely unrelated to the competition between myself and Ipse Dixit. I think we both played fair. I really enjoyed the competition, and I will continue voting for the survivors when Blogmadness continues. Thank you to everyone who participated. I encourage you to continue.
Welcome to anyone who found this She Dances in Dragonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10516981271944741323noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5190311.post-1077205062362090382004-02-19T09:37:00.000-06:002004-02-19T09:40:20.060-06:00Blogmadness Update
I'm in round 6, and I'm up against the very fine entry "I Am A Sexist Pig: I Open Doors For Women" by Ipse Dixit. I know it's a fine entry because I've voted for it in every round. This time, of course, I'll be voting for myself.
If you click the link above, you'll see two pink boxes. Each box holds 2 entries, beneath which it says Vote!. If you click Vote! You'll see both She Dances in Dragonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10516981271944741323noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5190311.post-1075160954320776922004-02-18T10:40:00.000-06:002004-02-18T10:42:07.983-06:00Tru-Buy
Big nods to Vanessa's Blog for the inspiration to write about the "grocery store" we used to shop at. I would never have thought of it, if she had not entered "Lidl" in BlogMadness. Thank you, Vanessa!
Tru-Buy was the biggest grocery store in the neighborhood. There were others. There was the confectionary 3 blocks west of my home, and there was the place a half-mile away where you She Dances in Dragonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10516981271944741323noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5190311.post-1077119869696142772004-02-18T09:57:00.000-06:002004-02-18T10:00:26.560-06:00Elimination Round, Here I Come!
You Don't Know Jackson won his competition against me, so I've been bumped to the Elimination rounds. I never hoped to get as far as I have. I mean, I think my writing is good. You think my writing is good. (Thank you!) The question was -do average people think my writing is good? Because, of course; you all are way above average. :)
In answer to that question, She Dances in Dragonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10516981271944741323noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5190311.post-1076827877336279852004-02-15T00:51:00.000-06:002004-02-15T00:53:48.936-06:00Blogmadness Semifinals are underway
This time around, it's "The Race War That Wasn't" vs. "Scenes From The Other Side Of The Tracks" Both entries are great, read 'em and choose! Remember: There's no registration requirements, voting is anonymous, and there's only one vote per family.
Don't forget to read the other fine entries in the Winner's round 4 and the Elimination Round 5. All 32 are She Dances in Dragonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10516981271944741323noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5190311.post-1076046993521346272004-02-05T23:56:00.000-06:002004-02-05T23:58:53.856-06:00Pregnancy
"If you don't want your baby, we'll try to find a home for it." Said the woman on the phone.
That was the point where I lost control. Looking for adoption agencies in the phone was hard. Actually talking to the agencies was even harder. For days, the phone book had sat open on the kitchen table, right underneath the avocado colored phone we had picked up at a thrift store. Every time She Dances in Dragonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10516981271944741323noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5190311.post-1076048311463628742004-02-05T23:18:00.000-06:002004-02-09T09:03:41.686-06:00The other half of the story
Catholic Charities was extremely rude. They treated me like I was garbage. I am not garbage, and I've never had a problem pointing that out to people. So when the woman on the phone spoke to me like I was less than the dirt beneath her fingernails, I let her know a few things.
I am white.
I am intelligent.
I am drug-free.
I do want my child. I also want my child to She Dances in Dragonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10516981271944741323noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5190311.post-1075870074975603532004-02-03T22:47:00.000-06:002004-02-03T22:50:11.873-06:00Comments are down. (sigh)
In reference to the previous post:
Oops, my bad. Pete and Manny created BlogMadness as a non-popularity based contest, where you take your best post from 2003 and pit it against the best post from other blogs. They got 116 entries. Mine is in the "Love" region. At the moment, it's in the "Winners Round 3" part. Go read them! I've found some really good blogs to add to She Dances in Dragonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10516981271944741323noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5190311.post-1075868226922493642004-02-03T22:17:00.000-06:002004-02-03T22:19:24.216-06:00It's been a while
First off, THANK YOU to everyone who has and/or will vote for "The Race War That Wasn't" in BlogMadness. It's gone up against some pretty well known authors, and it's still in the running! Thank you for voting in the spirit of the competition, for voting for the entry you deem best; whether it's mine or someone else's.
Secondly, I apologize for not writing anything recently. She Dances in Dragonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10516981271944741323noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5190311.post-1074479401413481992004-01-18T20:30:00.000-06:002004-01-18T20:31:57.403-06:00Saturday Morning Cartoons
Mom bought a TV Guide from the grocery store every week. Why she did this is beyond me. We got a total of 6 channels; ABC, NBC, CBS, PBS, channel 11 and channel 30, which was usually full of static. Channel 11 was, without a doubt, my favorite channel. They showed horror movies late at night, and mom would let us stay up on Fridays to watch. Now that I'm a mother myselfShe Dances in Dragonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10516981271944741323noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5190311.post-1074325104721310572004-01-17T01:38:00.000-06:002004-01-17T01:41:23.983-06:00Everyone Knows To Stay Away From The Pervs
Mom didn't go to the bar. Mom rarely drank, and she absolutely hated beer. She called it "piss water". She looked down on beer drinkers, viewing them as only one step above winos. This kept us pretty isolated from the rest of the neighborhood. All my friends went to the bar to buy cigarettes for their parents. Mom sent us all the way to the gas station.She Dances in Dragonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10516981271944741323noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5190311.post-1073928890438683962004-01-12T11:34:00.000-06:002004-01-12T11:37:22.326-06:00Playing With Fire
My sister and I were pretty independent kids. We had to be, since mom came home from work at about 6 o'clock at night. We were intelligent and well behaved. We knew when something was a bad idea. But knowing a thing and heeding your own advice on it are two entirely different things. As a result, my sister and I made some mistakes.
Most were minor, like putting a roast in the She Dances in Dragonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10516981271944741323noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5190311.post-1073198103108357872004-01-04T00:35:00.000-06:002004-01-04T00:42:02.280-06:00Getting Out
I suppose every generation in every poor neighborhood dreams up ways to get out. They all believe that they are somehow better than the generations that came before, and they all think they are the first to plan their escape.
The neighborhood eats these people alive.
Every once in a while, I'll run into someone from the old neighborhood, and we'll discuss the people we knew. Denny She Dances in Dragonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10516981271944741323noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5190311.post-1072945281909900192004-01-01T02:21:00.000-06:002004-01-01T02:22:54.483-06:00Apologies to the St. Louis Bloggers who read me, for the bad timing with the Quinn story. I hadn't checked STLBloggers, and didn't know Mae and Matt got to celebrate a new addition today. Congrats, you two! You're in for a fabulous roller coaster ride!She Dances in Dragonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10516981271944741323noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5190311.post-1072936742895149912003-12-31T23:59:00.000-06:002004-01-01T00:00:34.810-06:00This is kind of my therapy blog. The stories I write down are simply anecdotes from my life; until I write them, that is. The following story is for me, but I'm willing to share. I'm putting it here for two reasons. 1. It's a story that I want to tell. 2. The woman about whom I'm writing does not read this blog, although her Hubby does. I don't want to bring any pain to either of them. To Mr. J, She Dances in Dragonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10516981271944741323noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5190311.post-1072486086951921792003-12-26T18:48:00.000-06:002003-12-26T18:49:32.140-06:00First Boyfriend, First Kiss
In Catholic school, I had earned the nickname "Medusa" for my wildly curly red hair. Some genius in my class pulled one of my bouncy locks one day and commented, "Your hair is like snakes. Medusa!" The nickname stuck, and didn't do a whole lot for my self-image.
Then I transferred to public school, where nobody knew my nickname. I was "the new kid", and it was great.She Dances in Dragonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10516981271944741323noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5190311.post-1071685950458457642003-12-23T17:32:00.000-06:002003-12-23T18:07:16.076-06:00I changed the date and removed the duplicate comments. If you haven't been here in a few days, there are new stories below my request post.
A Request
I have written enough material for two books already, and I'm not half done with the stories. I've been stuffing the raw tales into Microsoft Word and doing some refining. Some of my stories must absolutely go into the book. I insist on it. :p
She Dances in Dragonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10516981271944741323noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5190311.post-1071977552804739152003-12-20T21:32:00.000-06:002003-12-20T21:33:50.513-06:00Pre-Neighborhood Santa Story
I rarely got what I wanted from Santa, but I always got something I liked. The last year I truly believed that Santa was a man in a sleigh, making improbable deliveries to Christian children worldwide, was the year my dad left.
He left us while we were at summer camp, and that Christmas I asked Santa for my dad and a house. I actually wrote a letter addressed to theShe Dances in Dragonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10516981271944741323noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5190311.post-1071765091081973042003-12-18T10:31:00.000-06:002003-12-19T16:53:02.216-06:00Discovering Drugs
When I was 14, I was invited to a party in the downstairs apartment. I asked mom if I could go. She said ok, because I would only be right downstairs. I met Kenny out on the porch, and he told me he thought I was old enough to "learn how to party" and that was why he had invited me. We went inside and he introduced me to his friends while mixing up a screwdriver.
This was my She Dances in Dragonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10516981271944741323noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5190311.post-1071178574890948392003-12-11T15:36:00.000-06:002003-12-11T18:51:18.450-06:00Snow
Poverty looks like peeling paint on wooden windows, broken glass patched with tape, flat tires, and barren yards where even the weeds fear to grow.
Poverty smells like stale beer, cooked cabbage, urine and Roach-Ex.
Poverty feels like despair. Day in and day out, it seeps into you and weighs you down.
Snow is everything that poverty is not. Snow is white and sparkling, it covers everythingShe Dances in Dragonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10516981271944741323noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5190311.post-1070085830747507422003-11-29T00:03:00.000-06:002003-11-29T00:05:47.186-06:00Theft
St. Louis hosts a great 4th of July bash. It used to be called the V. P. Fair, but the name has been changed the Fair St. Louis in recent years. Why the name change, you ask? I don't have the foggiest idea. We all still call it the V.P. Fair anyway.
V. P. stands for Veiled Prophet. Every year, some St. Louis business man gets to dress up like the pope with a veil covering his face, and She Dances in Dragonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10516981271944741323noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5190311.post-1069985449271518212003-11-27T20:10:00.000-06:002003-11-27T20:12:45.920-06:00Thanksgiving With Family
As previously mentioned here, I have a large family. I have 2 Aunts and 5 Uncles. So thanksgiving at grandma's house was always a crowded affair. Grandma would cook the biggest turkey in the Universe, and leftovers were unlikely.
When we moved from Grandma's house to the apartment on California, we started having Thanksgiving dinner at our place. I believe mom had had She Dances in Dragonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10516981271944741323noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5190311.post-1069482866691329812003-11-24T10:02:00.000-06:002003-11-24T10:03:20.763-06:00Stamp Collecting Without a Babysitter or why Famous Barr has rubber doohickeys on their escalators
Once upon a time, my mom worked at the Famous Barr downtown. She frequently told us about the emergency stop button on the escalators, and the accidents she saw while working there. Then dad left, stuff happened, and we wound up living in a 1 bedroom apartment on California.
Mom had long since She Dances in Dragonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10516981271944741323noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5190311.post-1069470756649897552003-11-21T21:12:00.000-06:002003-11-21T21:15:48.000-06:00I wasn't always this sane
(Oh, the places I could go with a title like that...)
Turns out, I'm going somewhere really gross. Don't read this if you're faint of heart, or don't like pain. I warned you.
When you grow up in a neighborhood like mine, it tends to be stressful; and stress does weird things to people. Stress takes whatever little idiosyncrasies one has and turns them into full blown She Dances in Dragonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10516981271944741323noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5190311.post-1068751967566193272003-11-14T14:59:00.000-06:002003-11-14T15:00:38.763-06:00Marathon Chess
As I grew older, I spent more and more time on activities that separated me from the rest of the neighborhood. I stopped visiting the game room, where we used to hang out by the jukebox and burn each other's butts with lighters. (a variation of a hot-foot, I guess) I ceased going to neighbors' garages, to look vapid while actually learning to fix cars. No longer did I drive my She Dances in Dragonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10516981271944741323noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5190311.post-1068350062851870682003-11-13T16:40:00.000-06:002003-11-13T16:40:53.403-06:00The little girl who lived downstairs
I find that I can not write this story in my usual vivid style, but I want it told because it speaks volumes about the "protect the children, adults can fend for themselves" mentality of my neighborhood. So here's the story in it's more concise form:
The downstairs neighbors had 4 children, 3 girls and a boy. The youngest girl was 5 years old when she She Dances in Dragonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10516981271944741323noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5190311.post-1068356105626949022003-11-08T23:35:00.000-06:002003-11-08T23:35:27.233-06:00The neighbors downstairs
December in St. Louis is usually annoyingly cold and snowless. We rarely had a white Christmas. What little snow we did get would melt quickly, since the usual December high was 45 degrees. I used to head off to school with a dusting of snow making the world look like it was covered in diamonds, my hair freezing solid; but on the walk home at 3:00, the snow would be goneShe Dances in Dragonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10516981271944741323noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5190311.post-1068083604450189872003-11-05T19:53:00.000-06:002003-11-05T19:53:41.686-06:00This is neat
The Open Directory Project is the largest, most comprehensive human-edited directory of the Web. It is constructed and maintained by a vast, global community of volunteer editors.
and it's pretty durned cool, too. How would you like to search for a blog or journal about, say... shamanism, without having to look at stupid ads or web-crawler sites? I sure would. Go Netscape!She Dances in Dragonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10516981271944741323noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5190311.post-1067922372815996982003-11-03T23:06:00.000-06:002003-11-03T23:06:28.263-06:00Halloween
October 31st was my favorite day of the year. The week preceeding Halloween was filled with the planning, then making of a costume, carefully plotting out the most efficient candy routes, and listening to mom tell us at least twice a day which houses we must not visit.
When I was 5 and my sister was 6, we dressed as gypsies. We didn't tell jokes, we had a little chant instead. "We are She Dances in Dragonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10516981271944741323noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5190311.post-1066915880743360882003-10-26T13:34:00.000-06:002003-10-26T13:34:15.450-06:00Vendettas
The South Side Code included rules for vengance. It was generally "an eye for an eye" kind of thing, but a few actions went beyond those paramaters. The example I'm thinking of is when a very nice boy from a "mafia" family was found pistol-whipped nearly to death in a park. The whole neighborhood was abuzz with talk about how the L family would get their revenge on the R family. The She Dances in Dragonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10516981271944741323noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5190311.post-1065731393230984182003-10-09T15:29:00.000-05:002003-10-09T15:29:53.090-05:00Why I hate Spaghetti
Every Sunday, we had dinner with Grandma and Grandpa. Grandpa was born in Sicily, at the turn of the last Century. "Old Fashioned" doesn't even begin to describe him. He served in both World Wars, and was married twice. His first wife died in childbirth. Their son was stillborn. Grandma took cooking lessons from an old Sicilian woman, so she could prepare foods from his She Dances in Dragonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10516981271944741323noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5190311.post-1065154316951700202003-10-02T23:11:00.001-05:002003-10-07T09:53:01.610-05:00Prison Tag
My 5th grade gym teacher taught us a game called "prison tag". The base form of the game is simple. Take a group of kids and split them into 2 teams. Team 1 are jailers, team 2 are prisoners. Everyone starts out standing in the designated jail space, then the prisoners "escape" while the jailers cover their eyes and count. When the count reaches 100, the jailers move out in pairs or She Dances in Dragonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10516981271944741323noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5190311.post-1065154294676450232003-10-02T23:11:00.000-05:002003-10-02T23:11:34.716-05:00The Games We Played
We were really no different from children in better neighborhoods, in that we played games just like any other kid. The war games were a bit more intense, perhaps... and games played as teenagers were all about showing your strength and toughness... but we played like children around the world play. We rode our bikes and hung out at the park and did normal child like things. She Dances in Dragonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10516981271944741323noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5190311.post-1064878474733805702003-09-29T18:34:00.000-05:002003-09-29T18:34:34.456-05:00A reposting of Wednesday is Dumpster Day with bright and shiny new editing
Every school morning, sis and I would leave the house and walk 3 blocks to Notre Dame Elementary, where we went to school. Every morning our route would take us past the place where men loaded their food trucks. My mom called them roach coaches, so I’d always look for roaches crawling over the ice in the bins. The men She Dances in Dragonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10516981271944741323noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5190311.post-1064725964719289062003-09-28T00:12:00.000-05:002003-09-29T14:18:16.966-05:00Street Entertainers
My neighborhood held a nearly endless variety of entertainment. It was totally free. All you had to do was look out your window to see the amazing Hoosier show. You didn't need a barker, brightly colored posters, or even circus lights. A pair of ears was all that was necessary to alert you to the upcoming entertainment.
Monday was hangover day. The only exciting sights on She Dances in Dragonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10516981271944741323noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5190311.post-1064414315364113212003-09-24T09:38:00.000-05:002003-09-24T09:38:35.166-05:00A survey for my readers: Do you prefer the stories about me (Christmas Downtown, the Price of a Good Education, etc.) or stories about what I saw but didn't have much to do with? (...And I'm keeping your stick, too. etc.)She Dances in Dragonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10516981271944741323noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5190311.post-1064165332749178332003-09-24T09:34:00.000-05:002003-09-28T02:33:25.376-05:00The California Bum
There was a homeless man who routinely slept at the bus stop near our home. He had a good spot. It was a building with a sheltered corner stoop. His area was a full 6 or 8 feet across, so he had room to stretch out if he wanted to. He had wild grey hair and a bushy grey beard. He always wore a military green overcoat, slacks and tennis shoes. He had a small bag with him She Dances in Dragonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10516981271944741323noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5190311.post-1063734920007440912003-09-16T12:55:00.000-05:002003-09-16T14:11:41.746-05:00Christmas Downtown
Every December we would take the California bus downtown. Mom tried to take us on a day when it was snowing, because snow makes the trip complete. We would ride through gentle white flakes and get off at Locust street. The air was always crisp and refreshing after the stifling heat and smells of the bus. It was great to join the crowd walking around Famous Barr, looking atShe Dances in Dragonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10516981271944741323noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5190311.post-1063137138478958572003-09-09T14:52:00.000-05:002003-09-09T14:54:25.663-05:00Crossing The Street
Once upon a time, we lived in a 2 family apartment that faced the bar. We stayed there until the woman who owned the property passed away. Her daughter inherited the place, and decided she didn't want to rent to pet owners anymore. This posed quite a problem since my family included a dog, a parakeet and several hamsters. Our new landlady gave us 30 days to find a new She Dances in Dragonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10516981271944741323noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5190311.post-1062917133644113372003-09-07T01:45:00.000-05:002003-09-07T01:45:33.533-05:00Fighting
Violence was part of life for me. I saw it daily, and learned that the human body can take a lot of damage before it gives out on a person. I never wanted to inflict that kind of harm on my neighbors, and sometimes it gets thrown in your face. When faced with a fight or flight situation, my response has always been to stare it down. The first real fight I got into was with my best She Dances in Dragonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10516981271944741323noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5190311.post-1062911317419818292003-09-07T00:08:00.000-05:002003-09-08T12:18:24.650-05:00Why You Shouldn't Skip School or How I Lost My Virginity
It was a good day to cut school. The sun was shining in a cloudless blue sky. The air was warm, but not muggy. Being in a river valley, St. Louis tends to have air thick enough to swim in. I decided to walk to N's bus stop instead of mine that day. If I got out of the house early enough, I'd take her bus. I got to walk past run-down She Dances in Dragonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10516981271944741323noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5190311.post-1062909323853010122003-09-06T23:35:00.000-05:002003-09-06T23:35:23.790-05:00Apologies to my readers -and thank you for reading me! I hope you understand that these tales come to me in chunks. Sometimes it's hard to look back on my past, sometimes it's easy.
In the interrim, here's a joke I found recently...
How can you tell when a redhead has been using your computer?
There's a hammer stuck in the monitor.She Dances in Dragonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10516981271944741323noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5190311.post-1061992971570554962003-08-27T09:02:00.000-05:002003-08-27T21:58:21.436-05:00surreal moments (non-neighborhood story)
There are moments in my life when I know something is a bad idea, but I'm swept into doing it anyway. When this happens the world seems dark and surreal to me. This story is about one of those times. It's not related to my neighborhood, just a thing that happened to me. It's been sitting in the back of my head since I wrote "The Price of a Good Education"She Dances in Dragonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10516981271944741323noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5190311.post-1061860335547091182003-08-25T20:12:00.000-05:002003-08-25T20:12:15.553-05:00They wanted to burn down the Cup Factory
When I was 17, my boyfriend loaned me $800 to buy a car. This led to me working the only job I hated, but that's a different story. When the car was paid off, I became a delivery driver for Dominos Pizza. This was lots of fun, and profitable too. I could bring home $60 to $80 a night on weekends, and I received a paycheck for about $175 every other week. She Dances in Dragonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10516981271944741323noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5190311.post-1061440382280477032003-08-20T23:33:00.000-05:002003-08-20T23:33:02.176-05:00Bicycle Freedom
Before we moved onto California Avenue, my sister and I both had bikes. Mom bought them for us the Christmas after dad had left. Mine was electric blue, J's was pink and white. When we moved, J and I immediately set out to explore our new neighborhood. We found a small park 2 blocks to the North, and a candy store 3 blocks West of our new home. Given a choice, we would have She Dances in Dragonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10516981271944741323noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5190311.post-1061266502152591182003-08-18T23:15:00.000-05:002003-08-18T23:15:02.166-05:00Envy Part One
There were many things I envied as a child. I wanted an Atari game system, and a Merlin. I wanted a vacuum cleaner and real gold earrings. I wanted a dad who would go off to work, so I could have my mom at home. Wanting these things wasn't going to bring them into actualization, and I did just fine without them. Sometimes it was painful to see my friends' birthday and christmas She Dances in Dragonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10516981271944741323noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5190311.post-1061003381817366172003-08-15T22:09:00.000-05:002003-08-16T00:03:35.950-05:00Shopping
When we were children, back-to-school was an exciting time for us. We would take last year's uniforms out of storage and try them on to see if they still fit. Then we'd go to St. Francis De Sales church and buy used uniforms, if the old ones couldn't be let out any more. We would walk 8 blocks to Cherokee Street and buy our school supplies at Woolworth’s. Then we would wait.
She Dances in Dragonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10516981271944741323noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5190311.post-1060906418013914492003-08-14T19:13:00.000-05:002003-08-16T00:05:45.146-05:00Walking
Whenever we had extra cash, it was always a toss up as to whether we should spend any of it on bus fare. When it was below 20 degrees, or above 90 degrees, we rode the bus to our destination. Any other time, we walked. (If you're interested in my old neighborhood, you can go to your favorite online map site and get a map centered on a single address. I just went to mapsonus.com, and She Dances in Dragonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10516981271944741323noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5190311.post-1060469317055962422003-08-09T17:48:00.000-05:002003-08-16T00:12:32.376-05:00The Price of a Good Education
My sister went to St. Elizabeth's High School. It was an all-girls Catholic school. It offered Latin as a language, that's how elite this school was. She bought her uniforms herself. She did charity work to help offset the cost. She worked as a coat check girl on the weekends and baby-sat weeknights and did all her homework and kept her grades up. Her eyes were She Dances in Dragonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10516981271944741323noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5190311.post-1060462393120015562003-08-09T15:53:00.000-05:002003-08-16T00:19:19.116-05:00Public School
When I was young and went to Catholic school, there was never a question about whether I would actually go or not go. School was school. It was the way of the world. Mom went to work and we went to school. Then one day I overheard mom stressing about our tuition payments. It was going to cost $3000 next year, and she wasn't sure she could get enough assistance. This was in the She Dances in Dragonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10516981271944741323noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5190311.post-1057730562425150842003-07-09T01:02:00.000-05:002003-08-16T00:20:21.623-05:00Summertime Brownouts
Eventually, as the years passed and I grew closer to adulthood, more and more of my neighbors acquired air conditioners. This would have been great if the electricity had been up to handling the increased load. Unfortunately, it was not. So we would get brownouts.
We would be sitting inside with a fan blowing 85 degree heat on us when all of a sudden the TV would She Dances in Dragonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10516981271944741323noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5190311.post-1057384249166731132003-07-05T00:50:00.000-05:002003-07-05T00:58:47.673-05:00Independance Day
You would think that a neighborhood living under the crushing weight of poverty would not spare any money for fireworks, wouldn't you? That might be so for other areas, but my neighborhood was full of Hoosiers, (see glossary) so our 4th of July would start in mid-June.
Most kinds of pyrotechnics were illegal in the city of St. Louis, so getting ahold of some meant a daring run She Dances in Dragonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10516981271944741323noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5190311.post-1056768676544056332003-06-27T21:51:00.000-05:002003-06-27T22:55:06.913-05:00Hanging Out
A favorite pasttime in my neighborhood was "hanging out". This meant being anywhere with nothing to do. We would hang out at the gas station and giggle over the mechanic's cute butt. We would hang out on a porch and stare at the bus people. We would hang out at the used car lot and pretend to be bus people ourselves, but the best place I ever found to hang out was a house that was She Dances in Dragonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10516981271944741323noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5190311.post-959030402003-06-21T18:30:00.000-05:002003-06-21T18:30:06.316-05:00Charity Work
During the early years of living on California Avenue, it seemed that every month we went to the St. Vincent De Paul Society. They would give us food and toilet paper. They would also give Mom a check to help pay the bills. She hated asking for help. It was just one of those odd parts of life for us. Every Sunday we'd drop a dollar into the Vincent De Paul poor box, then once a She Dances in Dragonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10516981271944741323noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5190311.post-958049752003-06-18T16:29:00.000-05:002003-06-18T16:29:27.636-05:00Eating
If you haven't guessed from previous writings here, we were poor. We were not destitute, we were the kind of poor where you make $100 a year too much, so you can't get food stamps or AFDC. Practically every meal was home cooked, and dinner fell into 3 basic categories- 1/2 lb hamburger with noodles, Rice a Roni stuffed into green peppers, and Totino's party pizza. We had Totino's once a She Dances in Dragonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10516981271944741323noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5190311.post-949196122003-05-26T20:58:00.000-05:002003-05-26T20:58:54.156-05:00It Came In A Plain Brown Wrapper
My cousins came to St. Louis to visit for a few weeks, so for 14 glorious days we got to see how suburban teens acted. It was fabulous! I got to see my cousin, M (the eldest of us 4) topless. She was dancing down the hallway singing, "I have watermelons, you have mosquito bites!" Her breasts were, indeed, pendulous.
I was 13, and just beginning to discover that She Dances in Dragonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10516981271944741323noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5190311.post-948199342003-05-24T02:19:00.000-05:002003-05-24T02:19:50.300-05:00testShe Dances in Dragonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10516981271944741323noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5190311.post-948198702003-05-24T02:17:00.000-05:002003-05-24T02:17:23.840-05:00Riding The Bus
Growing up, we had 2 methods of transportation, our feet and the Bi-State bus line. Saint Louis sits right at the edge of Missouri, and Illinois is just a short hop across the river. The two states have busses that run between them, and all over the cities and counties around them. Each bus line is named for the biggest street it drives on, or a neighborhood it travels through. TheShe Dances in Dragonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10516981271944741323noreply@blogger.com0