CITY LIFE
"That's it," he says. "No more bottles for you."
Leaning over the crib, the baby smiled briefly, "Uh-oh," only to dissolve into tears as Dad smacked my bottom sharply. It was the last bottle I was given. At 9 months old, I was weaned in a day.
My babyhood had been spent happily shoving bottles out through the slats of my crib as soon as the bottles were empty. I never did have much patience. One by one the bottles broke on the cement floor. Until the last one went "Bye-bye." I do recall conversations contradicting the ideas of the controversial Dr. Spock and his book, Baby and Child Care, published only two years before I was born. None of this pampering and listening to the needs of the baby for my parents! Nope. I was on a feeding schedule and we were doing things the old way. Unfortunately for me, I really liked things my own way, even pushing empty bottles out of the crib.
In the wake of World War II, Dad had returned from the war and went to work in the auto industry in St. Louis, Mo. He and Mom married and lived in the basement apartment of a three-flat. Children were not allowed, but the landlord made an exception because he liked my Mom.
I spent my pre-school years on Spring Avenue. Dad and his brother-in-law (who was also his cousin) co-purchased a small four room cottage and two plots of land up the street. They divided the cottage down the middle: two rooms on one side for us; two rooms on the other side for them. The shared refrigerator on the back porch belonged to Aunt Lois; the washing machine they both used belonged to Mom. The tiny space didn't seem so small for my cousins and I. There was plenty of outdoor space and my grandparents' house next door. As for the land, they agreed to help one another build the houses, first one then the other. For fairness, they tossed a coin. Heads got first pick on the land; tails went first in construction. Uncle Gene won the toss; he picked the highest piece of property; our house was built first. We were able to move in before my sister was born when I was three and a half.
Mom always spent lots of time with my sister and I, reading books, reciting nursery rhymes and singing songs. Kindergarten was fee-based and optional so Mom taught us the prerequisite skills for first grade. By age three I had most of the Dick and Jane books memorized and could "read" them perfectly. By age five, I could actually read the words and could spell and write basic words. I was terribly disappointed in the fall before I turned six that I couldn't go to school with all my friends on Spring Avenue. The birthday cutoff was the day school started, September 4, that year. My birthday was November 30. Left behind with my young cousin and baby sister, I felt abandoned.
