Earliest Memories

I think I remember when my sister was born. I was seven weeks from being three years old. I am not sure if it is real, or just my imagination. If imagination, where did it come from as it was too realistic for a three year old.

I am very little. The adults tower above me. I try to be invisible so as not to be chased out of my parents' bedroom where my mother lay. Daddy, Granny, Aunt Jean and others are crowded into the small bedroom along with the mahogany furniture. There is not much space left between the dressing table, double bed with head and foot boards and the large, mirrored wardrobe.

I am wearing a little dress and my feet are bare.

The baby is being held up by her little pinkish legs. She has been smacked on her bare bottom and there is a tube hanging down from her tummy. The tube is a bluish grey.

That is the total of my memory of this event. I may never know how it came to be written on my brain. I must try to find out where my sister was born as that will verify the truth or otherwise of this memory.

The second earliest memory is of a little pair of black, buckle up, leather shoes.

Mummy took me into her bedroom, to the wardrobe and lifted a pair of shoes out of a box. They terrified me and I started to scream and draw away from the footwear being offered for me to wear.

The frightening thing about them was the huge spider clinging to the front of both shoes. To this day I don't like spiders near to me, especially ones that are large and hairy.

What Mummy did not realise was that I was myopic and the spider shaped pattern of holes punched into the toe end of the shoes looked to me like spiders sitting there; there was just no way that I would let them near me. After all, who wants to walk around with two large spiders that may decide to run up my legs.

I do not know what happened afterwards as there are photographs of me wearing shoes that look like the spider shoes. I am pictured above with my cousin, Pat Clarke, and my doll, Patsy, in the driveway of our home on King Street, Bridgetown, Barbados.

My third early memory is that of a 'boyfriend'. Imagine! I was not yet attending school but I liked the face of a boy who used to attend the Daily Meal School for poor white children. He had blonde hair and blue eyes and would wave to me when school was out as he walked past our house. His name was Leonard.

He wrote me a note one day and that is how I discovered his name. I could not read so had to have Aunt Jean read it for me. I was teased about my 'boyfriend' thereafter. The note accused me of being vexed with him as I had not waved the previous day. I guess he was too far away for my myopic vision to see his friendly communication.

In the photograph above, the playground of the Daily Meal School is behind the fence to the left of the picture. My sister and I liked to watch the children at play and enjoyed gazing at them as they walked by on their way home after school.

To read more about the Daily Meal School, visit the Barbados Museum web site at http://www.docstoc.com/docs/15922691/Museum-Book-3