Tuesday, August 11, 2009

Saving Yesterdays


Along with my scrap booking project I decided to dive into my Adobe program and attempt making a slide show of the lives of my two brothers and myself. From a very early age I have always wanted to be just like my older siblings although two years separated each of us.
My oldest brother would have rather not have a little brat brother following in his tracks. He had some strange ways of showing his brotherly love for me. There was the time he invented a little game called "grab the treasure" where all his friends or any kid in the neighborhood could join in. The only requirement was that what ever each individual treasurer-ed, items such as pocket knifes, marbles, balls of string, chewing gum, spinning tops, etc. would all be place in one pile. A bucket then placed on top and everyone would go hide and count to a hundred then run as fast as possible to grab all the treasure under the bucket when big brother lifted it. No one knew that as we all hide our eyes he replaced all the treasures with slimy garbage and somehow he made sure I would be the first to get to the bucket. Once when we lived in Texas as I was just a bare foot child he made a dummy of old clothes, stuck a knife in it and poured catsup over it to scare me.
As we grew older and both had jobs working in the local theater in Pagosa Springs Colordado, he ran the projectors and I took tickets. I couldn't understand why every Sunday matinee some one would be waiting to fight me, as I found out later my dear brother was taking bets with the local kids to see who could beat me up.
The middle brother "Jerry" was always my best friend and we tried to be each others care taker. He was my mentor when I tried to keep up with the older boys on the football team and covered up for my bad behavior so my parents wouldn't find out.
When the two brothers left home and joined the Navy my heart was broken and I felt so abandoned. With no one left to keep me out of trouble, I found plenty to get into and broke my Mother's heart, I'm sure. As I tried once more to follow in their footsteps, I joined the Navy too, and my basic training took me to Great Lakes where brother Jerry was in trade school. He was there throughout my boot camp and helped me learn the Navy way of doing things. Upon completion of my basic training, I was assigned to a minesweeper that just happened to be the same one my oldest brother was on and we served together for two years.
I hope that as I complete this endeavor and leave a photo record it may be enjoyed by those I leave behind.

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