Elyria for a Year

That was the year I started school, Edison Elementary School, first grade. Miss Beady was my teacher’s name… I think; I was so traumatized by the experience that my memories of that year are more like the slow-motion running, the unfamiliar surroundings and quagmires of a bad dream, a nightmare you can’t wake up from.

We had a huge Weeping Willow in the yard that we often played around and under. It seems like an apt symbol for that year, where I learned to fear its switches in my mother’s hands and my father’s razor strap, among other things. I will share a few more memories of our time in Elyria later in this record, too. I guess it wasn’t all bad, though. I did learn to ride a bicycle that year and had the cinder-filled knees and elbows to prove it… no sidewalks in that development, only cinder pathways… Who plans these things?

I think Dad had started working for Holland Furnace Co. while we were there. That may even be why we moved there. That’s important because Dad made a career out of it by opening his own business. But we’ll get to that soon enough.

To be Continued

–LE