My Memento Story

By Lara Perkins

It was very easy for me to recall a special memento from my childhood days with which to write a story. There are so many mementos from my childhood because I had a wonderful childhood full of love, fun, and encouragement which created many happy memories.

Many years ago one summer during my elementary school years, my family moved from the Acity@ into the Acountry.@ My family included my parents and my younger sister. Being in a new home with a big, new backyard and new neighbors, my sister and I found many exciting things we could explore and discover. We didn=t know any neighborhood kids yet so we entertained ourselves for the summer and looked forward with a little anxiousness to the school year ahead. We were determined to make this a great summer.

At the very edge of my parents= property was an acre of trees separating us from the next house. We called this Aour woods@ and we were in the woods nearly everyday in good weather. We happily discovered a fallen tree that had been hit by lightning and knocked over several years earlier. The tree was huge enough to walk across and get to the other side and far enough off the ground

so that you could sit on it and your feet would not touch the creek below.

We spent many summer hours climbing on the tree, running on it, balancing on it, and swinging back and forth to it from the thick vines which hung from nearby trees. We played Tarzan, He-Man and She-Ra, Pirates and Princess all the time, anything our imaginations let us come up with to do.

As our parents began to make friends with our neighbors and we made friends with their children, the fallen tree became a popular place for us to take our friends and play. Soon all the neighborhood kids wanted to play there all the time. This helped us a great deal in making friendships early, before the school year started. My sister and I were so happy to already know familiar faces as we entered a new school. We felt much less anxious and fearful.

I sometimes found myself as a teenager back in the woods, sitting in a quiet spot to think or read, or shedding a few tears over some tragic, adolescent event. It was always a safe, quiet place to be that held so many memories.

The fallen tree is a childhood memory of mine that I will always treasure.

Today my sister and I still reflect and reminisce about the tree and every time we visit our parents= home, we must go back to the woods and visit the tree, though today it is much smaller than I remember! I hope to someday have my children visit their grandparents and play in the woods upon the fallen tree. What a gift that would be to give to the next generation!