Happy memories from your childhood

[Mr. Laser Beam]

Also, I dunno if this qualifies as a "happy" memory - probably more like ironic - but I got my ass whipped when I was nine, for seeing ST:TMP!

(well, to be fair, it wasn't for seeing that movie, just that my dad had dropped me off at the theater to see something else, then I realized that TMP was playing there so I went into that screen instead. So that meant I wasn't there when he came to pick me up. I think he was justifiably pissed at me. Still, it's a bit of a badge of honor, to have the last spanking I ever got, be for a Trek film. )

 

[Australis]

Ooo, here's a good one (well, for me):

As stated earlier, lived out in the country when I was a kid. We made a trip one night into town to an open-air cinema, where we watched 'Those Magnificent Men In Their Flying Machines'. For a 10 year old, it was a lot of fun and a great way to watch movies. May have seen 'Mary Poppins' there too.

 

[Bears Discover Fire]

Probably the happiest experience of my childhood was the simple pleasure of picking up a drool-soaked tennis ball by two fingers and flinging it as far out over the sandbar as my little kid muscles could fling, with my mud-caked cocker spaniel barreling gleefully after it. I can't see tennis balls, golf balls, baseballs, Squeez-it bottles, bite-sized rocks, etc without feeling a rush of bitter-sweetness at the memories of playing 'ball' with Lady. We had to put that dog down almost ten years ago and I still miss her like it was last week.

Another favorite memory was playing 'catch the bus' in the pool with my dad. He'd position a raft on one end of the pool, then throw my sister and I clear across from the other end, aiming for the raft. If he missed and we ended up in the water, we 'missed the bus'. Speaking of good poolside memories, I once dumped a bottle of dishwashing detergent in the jacuzzi to see what would happen. The 6 foot mountains of foam and bubbles that overran our 1/2 acre back yard in mere minutes remains one of the most amazing things I've ever seen.

My family did a lot of traveling when I was a kid. I have wonderful memories of eating cinnamon rolls on a Catamaran off the coast of Maui, watching an artist paint Hummels at Epcot center, stepping on the spongy lawn of my grandpa's lakeside Michigan cottage. Good times. I wish I had the money to travel again.

As much as I bitch about the bad things that happened (and they did happen), my childhood was a pretty neat time. I miss being a kid and never had any desire to become an adult.

 

[Australis]

Sometimes, if you're lucky, you look back and think, don't you sometimes wish those days lasted forever?

<sigh>

 

[Miss Chicken]

Ooo, here's a good one (well, for me):

As stated earlier, lived out in the country when I was a kid. We made a trip one night into town to an open-air cinema, where we watched 'Those Magnificent Men In Their Flying Machines'. For a 10 year old, it was a lot of fun and a great way to watch movies. May have seen 'Mary Poppins' there too.

I remember seeing "Those Magnificent Men in Their Flying Machines" as a child and loving it. I enjoyed it far more than most of the movies Mum dragged us along to see i.e. Song of Musc, My Fair Lady.

But even better still i enjoyed going to the school holday matinees where nearly the whole audience were rowdy kids throwing Jaffas and other sweets. We would get to see serials - westerns, adventures, sci-fi. We had to go back the next week to see the next episode.

 

[RandyS]

I just thought of another one.

One day when I was about 11, I was sitting in the backyard of my grandparents (now mine) house next to my grandpa, and we were talking. I don't remember about what. My grandma was over by the fence watering her rose bushes when their neighbor stuck her head over the fence and demanded imperiously that my grandma cease her watering immediately because it was getting into her grass. Without even looking at her, grandma raised the hose and drenched the woman, then calmy went back to her yard work. We could hear the woman walking across her yard toward her house, sloushing water around in her shoes. My grandpa and I laughed the rest of the day.

Now, you might think Grandma was the one in the wrong, but that's not the case. At this time, this lady was making life hell for everybody in the neighborhood. She had yelled at the kids in the area for riding their bikes past her house. I also got yelled at for being in my wheelchair. She called the cops on the guy next door to her for BBQ'ing, claiming that the smell was keeping her awake. We could hear her yelling at her husband more than once because the sound of his breathing bothered her.

Word of what my grandma did got around the area REALLY fast, and everybody congradualated her for weeks. NOBODY liked this lady.

 

[Mr. Laser Beam]

i enjoyed going to the school holday matinees where nearly the whole audience were rowdy kids throwing Jaffas

"Indeed."

 

[Australis]

Jaffas - confectionery. About the size of a marble. A hard shell (like M&M only much harder), orange colour, chocolate inside. Very popular with the discrening preteen lolly eater. Clive James recounts the time he went to see a stage play for school featuring some famous English actor who, as he put it, "led with his groin". When he was in a swoon or death scene or similar, a couple of the kids pelted his power bulge with Jaffas, and he had to hobble off stage.

 

[freak]

My 10th birthday party. That was the year that I invited lots of friends from grade school, plus my best friend who happened to be my next door neighbor. I invited an odd number of girls though and two of them ended up in a big fight, thus having one of the girls lock herself in my bathroom most of the night. Mom told her "either make up or you're going home!". I remember we had a talent show and I loved Madonna, so I was trying to find her "Vogue" tape, but ended up doing "Like a Prayer" instead.

 

[Sephiroth]

I remember once, we went to a friends birthday party, I was 7, and they had one of those inflatible bounce house things, and i did it for so long i got sick and puked CHEETOS, i hadn't had cheetos in like 3 days

 

[Miss Chicken]

One of my happy memories is the very long walkathon I went on with my sister when I was 11 years old. It was to raise money for UNICEF.

We walked from South Hobart to a place called Conningham. which was about 15.5 (25 km) away. My sister and I walk from about 9 in the morning until 4 in the afternoon. I believe that about 300 people took part in the walkathon including two teachers and about 20 children from my school. It wasn't an official school outing however.

As we came into the township of Snug I was telling my sister that i couldn't go much further and I wanted to stop at my aunt's place. As we approached my aunt's she was standing outside with soft drinks and some some little cupcakes that she had especially baked for us. She had been looking out for us for more than 2 hours and she kissed us and hug us and told us how proud she was that we had managed to come as far as we did. She told us she had that many people had pulled out of the walkathon and she hadn't seem many children our age pass by, Her encouragment help is decide to go on and walk the reaining mile and a half to the end.

When we went back to school on the Monday the principal praised the 20 or so odd children that had taken part in the Walkathon and called out the names of the children who completed the Walkathon so they could stand in a place of honour during the school assembly. I was the only girl who finished the walkathon though about 4 or 5 boys did (my sister was in highschool at this stage, not in my school).