My Childhood

I was born in Bakersfield, California the last of three children (an oldest brother and an older sister). I don’t remember living there at all since my folks moved when I was 18 mos. old. However, I returned most summers (yes, when it was 120 degrees in the shade) to spend a month or so with my grandparents. They took all the grandchildren camping for two weeks every year—sometimes on the beach, sometimes in the mountains and once on the desert. Each family of children had a huge canvas tent that was our bedroom. We cooked everything over the campfire. My grandfather played some kind of joke on us every morning and took us hiking or swimming most of the rest of the day. But I get ahead of myself.

My Dad was a Medical and X-Ray Technologist so went to where he could get a job. My folks are Seventh-day Adventists, so I think they were looking to work in some church-sponsored field and the church only had a few hospitals at the time so we moved a lot. From Bakersfield we moved north to Corning where my Dad worked at a community hospital. The only thing I remember about Corning is standing in the kitchen with a tray of glasses with iced lemonade. Someone was arguing and I remember wanting to figure out how to make it stop. No my folks were not contentious, but my uncle was and I’ve wondered if it may have been him.

We moved to Paradise when I was 3. My Dad worked at an Adventist Hospital there and I spent a some time in the laboratory with him, doing menial jobs like trimming the corners off of x-rays and spinning capillary tubes for hematocrit readings. I remember so many great things about Paradise, skinny dipping at every waterhole (naked kids swimming was not the mortal sin that it is in Utah), putting pennies on the railroad tracks in the morning when we walked to school and picking them up—smashed flat--on the way home, lots of camping, with skinny dipping, of course. Probably the most memorable thing is the number of houses we occupied. We lived there 8 years and lived in 13 different houses. My Mom bought us each a wardrobe trunk and we could only keep what we could put in those trunks. We were so good at using every square millimeter of packing space. You might think that would be hard on a kid, but I loved it. Every new house was new territory. Our adventures ranged from Manzeneta brush forts to tree houses in the oak trees, from climbing to the tops of 50 foot Ponderosa pines in a wind storm to sheltering under a granite boulder in a lightening storm. My best memories are of the days we spent wild and free. My folks were good parents, but not overly protective. I had jet-black hair and black eyes, so, in our wild games I was always the Indian and reveled in the reputation I got for being a true savage. I was a holy terror to my brother and sister. I wanted nothing worse than to be a boy with all the privileges and adventures that were my brother’s because of his gender. I wore his clothes, pinned together so they would stay on and braided my hair (it had not been cut since I was small and the braid hung down past my butt) and slicked VO5 through it so I looked like a boy from the front. His tennis shoes were huge on me and I could hardly stay upright on his bike, but I was determined. It’s pretty funny now, but at the time, I was dead serious about being a boy.

When I was 10, my Dad got a new job in Sonora, so we moved. We had to leave our German Shepherd behind until we got a house (my folks bought her when I was three months old, so I thought she was my hairy brown sister). She quit eating when she saw us drive away without her. She died no more than a week after we left. I’ve always been convinced she died of a broken heart—I know I nearly did.

In Sonora, I made friends quickly and my best friend shared my “savage” preferences. By now, swimming in the buff was a sin, but Jeanette and I did it every time we could without getting caught. We’d sneak up behind my sister and her friends and unhook their bikini tops and swim down to put them on the drain at the bottom of the pool. If the older girls couldn’t swim down to get the tops for themselves, they spent the day huddled in a corner shielding their breasts from view. We thought it was great fun. Now, I’d call it mean. My folks both worked by now, so we came home from school every day to some routine jobs, but when we were done the time was ours. We played a game on bikes much like capture the flag, only we captured each other. We had opposing teams riding through the woods and the streets. When we saw a member of the opposing team, we’d give chase. If you could bring the front wheel of your bike in line with their rear wheel, they were captured and had to go to your prison. We’d make forts in the blackberry brambles into which we’d put our unfortunate prisoners. Breaking out your buddies from prison was the best part. Believe me, it’s been years since I did anything as exciting. I fell in love for the first time in Sonora—just before we moved to Montana.

I was 14 when we moved to Bozeman. Montana captured my heart. Anytime you talk of home, I yearn for Montana. My brother and I became very close. His friends were my best friends; I had little tolerance for the boring things girls did. We all skied probably 3 times a week, and more if we could. In the summer we floated the rivers and backpacked every peak. He taught me to rock climb and glissade, to winter camp in snow caves and ice skate. And he taught me how to judge men. He was a kind and compassionate man and I was hopelessly devoted to him. Our family was desperately poor as many Montanans are (except the movie stars). Somehow it made no difference. We shopped at St. Vincent DePaul’s. We’d get the biggest clothes with good fabric for a few pennies, then tear them apart and make ourselves whatever we fancied. My Mom is an accomplished seamstress, so we made everything except our jeans and shoes—prom dresses, over coats, and school dresses. It was so creative. I still have many of the beautiful dresses we made. It was colder than a witch’s tit there, but we learned to dress for it. I still tried to swim in every water hole, but the cold was pretty daunting. I got a reputation for taking swimming dares that got me in trouble once or twice. There are some hot springs in Bozeman that are wonderful in winter. We started the Polar Bear Club—you sit in the 120 degree pool till you are red as a lobster then run out and roll in the snow. If you have ever done it you know it is no big deal since you can’t feel the cold, but whatever you do, don’t step on the metal doorsill. You’ll leave most of the sole of your foot behind. Once on the drive home, I bumped my wet (well, actually, frozen) hair on something; it was so cold it broke.

My brother went off to college at an Adventist college in Walla Walla, Washington in 1969 and I followed him two years later. My sister didn’t go to college and stayed in Bozeman. My brother and I were both homesick (I left a boyfriend in Montana), but we had each other. That year my brother was killed in a mountaineering accident—actually he fell and before they could rescue him, he froze to death. I had a hard time caring about much after that, so I volunteered to go as a student missionary for the church. When I walked into the office, they asked me where I wanted to go and I said, “Anywhere.” They sent me to Japan.