New Beginnings! 1960

Starting off a new year brings back vivid memories of 1960, when Mother and I started off not only a new year but a new life and a new family!  Following their Christmas Eve wedding and opening presents on Christmas Day, I have sketchy memories of sleeping in the back of the car as we drove through the night from Indiana to South Dakota.  And here we are...ready to unpack our belongings and start our new life.  I had new grandparents, new aunts and uncles and a whole bunch of excited new cousins to play with.

What a lucky little girl I was!  As you can tell from the picture, it didn't take me very long to settle in to my new dad's arms.  I think my dad would have agreed with this little poem I found, written by a Madison, Wisconsin poet.  We started where we stood, and oh, what a life my parents built!

Start Where You Stand

by Berton Braley

Start where you stand and never mind the past,

The past won't help you in beginning new,

If you have left it all behind at last

Why, that's enough, you're done with it, you're through;

This is another chapter in the book,

This is another race that you have planned,

Don't give the vanished days a backward look,

Start where you stand.

As a preface to the poem below--my dad DID make the bookshelf in this picture!  In fact, he built the whole house....

What Dads Do 

by Judith Viorst

Make bookshelves.

Make burgers.

Make money.

Make funny faces that make you laugh.

Scratch your back when you can’t reach where it itches.

Lift you up on their shoulders.

Snore when they’re sleeping (but they say they don’t).

Pitch – but not so fast that you can’t hit their pitches.

Play tickles with you when you feel like a silly person.

Snuggle up close with you when you feel like a sad one.

Dads explain electricity

And peninsulas

And help you count the stars.

I wish I still had one.