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Our House to Boo’s
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\pard\ql{\plain\f21\fs24\cf1 Between The terrace of our house and Boo’s, there were stepping stones, flag stones roughly rectangular, except for a larger one, of a different kind of stone before the steps to my aunt’s porch. It was roughly the shape of Kentucky. I knew fa}
{\plain\f21\fs24\cf1 irly early the shapes of the states, because someone had given me a map puzzle of the US, each state a piece. I learned the shapes of the states from this jigsaw. I would get confused about the square states of Colorado and Wyoming. I liked the long ne}
{\plain\f21\fs24\cf1 ck of Idaho. Texas was a marvel. Jigsaws were popular then. Western landscapes, deep woods, jagged mountains. Forest fire lamps, with rotating shades. Beside the Kentucy shaped flagstone, in the corner between steps and house, was a tree small tree tha}
{\plain\f21\fs24\cf1 t produced white cluster blooms in the spring. Later in the summer, tent catapillers would spin their webby nests and, I learn later, if left alone, would fly away as gnats or some other winged insect. Metamorphosis. But before this could happen, Unc}
{\plain\f21\fs24\cf1 le Maury would usually make a torch of rolled up newspaper, and burn the webs.
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\pard\ql{\plain\f21\fs24\cf1 It was on that particular rock I learned the definition of “on purpose”, and one of the physical properties of silicon... Boo or Nana, or both of them had bought a little glass figure of a swan. I think it had been the work of an artist at Wo}
{\plain\f21\fs24\cf1 olworths Five and Dime Store, who would demonstrate his art, spinning the melted glass from a minature glory hole into fanciful shapes. But this glass ornament was given to me, and I let it drop on the Kentucky shaped stone. It shattered into pieces and}
{\plain\f21\fs24\cf1 some glassy dust. Aunt and grandmother were taken aback. I claimed it was an accident. They knew better and told me I had done it on purpose. I lied, of course. But I knew I had done it. They used the term “on purpose” and “delibera}
{\plain\f21\fs24\cf1 te” several times. This is the way a vocabulary grows. There was no physical punsihment, but I felt guilty, and covered that guilt with arragance. “I can do damn well what I want to do and get away with it...” I am so special.
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\pard\ql{\plain\f21\fs24\cf1 Our terrace was a great place. Edged with rought brick, the paving tiles were orange red, six inches square. A brick walk led to the street, the bricks were set herring-bone style, and were rough and dark red, like the terrace brick. A border on each s}
{\plain\f21\fs24\cf1 ide, where Mom and Dad would plant tulip and dafadill bulbs in the fall where they would come up in the late winter, and often be in bloom by Easter. At the corner of the terrace was a tall furr tree, almost as tall as the house. Every December, Pa wou}
{\plain\f21\fs24\cf1 ld bring a string of full sized colored lights from the basement and drape them in the tree. It was a wonder to behold. Those lights were exactly like the strings of Christmas lights strung across the streets of the downtown distric in Concord of those }
{\plain\f21\fs24\cf1 days. It was said that Pa had gotten his string from the city, knowing someone that was in charge. He had talked them into giving them to him for his purpose. (The tree died, but we kept the lights.) Later they became footlights for the stage that H}
{\plain\f21\fs24\cf1 ugh Craig and I set up in the basement when we were in the eighth grade.
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