The Very Nice Man had the notion to get as many people as he could to post some childhood photos today. Hating to be a party pooper, I decided to participate. Any excuse to dig through old photo albums, eh?
I've actually posted the above photo once before: a different version of it, however, back on Halloween, two years ago. I had remembered my first Halloween outing on the the day that Frisky (the dog in the photo) was hit by a car, and I was sent out on my first trick or treating adventure in compensation. I was four years old. You can get the whole story in My First Halloween. Since I have lost track of the previous scan, I decided to re-scan the photo and include it here along with the others. Besides, I think I look very cute in this one. We lived with grandpa and Uncle Charlie at the time, but, although you will see him three times in this blog, I don't have very many photos of Grandpa in the archive, and it is probably the only one of Frisky.
However, I am standing beside Grandad in the following photo. The other two people are Uncle Bill and Aunt Sadie. They were really cousins; my grandmother was their aunt. Because Bill was born without thumbs, his mother pretty well discarded him at birth. He was raised by Sadie's parents (a brother of Bill's birth mother, I believe). Bill and Sadie lived together their whole lives, whatever that may have entailed. This picture was taken in the dining room the grandfather's house in Montreal. The above photo shows the front steps.
I think I was either seven or eight in the Christmas when the above photo was taken. I'll guess at seven because I look pretty young sitting there on the floor. We had moved away from grandpa and uncle by then, and they were spending Christmas Day with us. It seems that I got a hockey stick for Christmas. That's Uncle Charlie sitting beside grandpa. Oddly enough, although there may have been other non-short distant relatives in England or elsewhere, grandpa was the only tall antecedent who I ever encountered; my parents and all of my other grandparents were diminutive folks. Uncle Charlie, his son, was the shortest of the lot, however. He was a really nice and fun-loving fellow though, and I have always appreciated the fact that he was in my life. Grandpa lived to be 78 years old, but poor Uncle Charlie didn't make it out of his fifties.
Below, you see me with him, quite possibly at another Christmas. Despite the recurring theme — hockey —— I do look a little older than in the above photo. I'll guess nine or ten. I'm thinking nine because I think I got a bike for my tenth Christmas. Obviously, the photo depicts that we were enjoying a very snowy Christmas that year, but I do remember another Christmas around that time when it was like this year —— no snow, very green. In fact, it rained on New Years in the year that I am recalling. I only remember it because I can recall my mother saying that it rained on New Years Day and snowed on Easter Sunday that year.
And that's my contribution to Fun Monday. I presume that you'll find a list of other participantsnts at The Electronic Firefly.
