My first memory

I got to thinking today about my earliest memory, and here's what I came up with. Forgive me if I can't remember too many details. Or, rather, I'll remember details, but they will be so odd and random and unimportant that you will be scratching your head (right along with me), wondering why my brain chose to remember those particular things. (Mom, feel free to correct my shoddy memory.)

I was young--about 3 or 4 years old, probably. Well, I guess it would have had to be younger than 3, because I don't remember my brother David (who was born 9 days after my 3rd birthday) being around. We were vacationing in Hilton Head Island, off the coast of South Carolina. My dad used to travel a lot for business when I was a kid, and he took the family whenever he could.

For whatever reason, I participated in a type of daycare program while we were there (not sure what my mom was doing). I don't remember the name, but it was something like The Alligator Club. It was right on the beach. We did all that typical daycare stuff--played games (I remember that was where I learned to play "Red Light, Green Light"), ate snacks, and colored. I remember coloring a picture of an alligator on a piece of peach-colored construction paper. (See? Odd, random, and unimportant.)

When the weather was nice, we played outside. One day, I was sittting on the shore, working on a masterpiece of a sandcastle. It was going to be the most beautiful sandcastle in the world, I was sure of it. Until disaster struck.

Think about it--what is the worst disaster that can befall a sandcastle? Right--a huge wave rolling in and obliterating it. Which is precisely what happened.

And where was I when all this happened? Sitting right in front of the sandcastle, with my back to the ocean, completely unsuspecting. I can still remember the feeling of utter surprise and terror as that wave covered me from head to toe. I opened my eyes, and I can still remember how it looked--the way the world shimmered and swayed in my vision--and the way it felt--holy crap, my eyes stung from that saltwater.

I'm not entirely sure what happened next, but I'm sure it involved me running to the teacher, wailing and sobbing as though my very world (along with my sandcastle) had gone tumbling down around me. (I was a very melodramatic kid.)

OK, so it seems funnier in my head, but the moral of the story is this, kids: Never turn your back to the ocean. And never open your eyes in saltwater.

All right, since that was kind of lame, how about another one? I was a bit older--elementary school, probably about 2nd or 3rd grade. There was a group of us kids playing in the playground after school, waiting for our parents to come pick us up. A friend (let's call her Laura) and I were building a volcano out of the sand, and nearby, 2 boys (one named Thomas, I'm sure of that) were doing the same. Being the giggly little 2nd-grade girls we were, Laura and I came up with a brilliant plan--we would make our volcano erupt, which translated as throwing sand at the boys. We whispered to each other and suppressed our snickers as we prepared to carry out our dastardly plan.

As most plans like that go, we decided to launch into action after a brief (but hushed) countdown. But before we could reach "1," those devious, conniving little boys stole our brilliant plan and attacked first. Their timing was meticulous--just as we turned our heads toward them, with mouths open to holler our battle cry, a tidal wave of sand hit us both square in the face. (Are you seeing how these stories are related?)

You can guess what happened next, right? It did involve much wailing and sobbing, along with finger-pointing and accusations. I distinctly remember that when my mom got there, I boldly lied to her, sobbing about how those mean, nasty boys had attacked us without any provocation at all, and no, of course the thought of throwing sand at them had never crossed our minds, Mom, never--we were innocent victims of a brutal attack.

I also remember my mom's remedy to cleanse my searing eyeballs--opening my eyes in a huge bowl of salt water, freshly prepared by her. (See, that's what made me think of this story after I told the first one.) I remember it, once again, being excruciating, but that was probably because I already had 12 million grains of sand lodged in my eyeballs.

So, there you go--2 stories for the price of one. Buy one, get one free. Not only my first memory, but my first lie. You're just learning all sorts of fabulous things about me, aren't you?