Memorie's Pages. [Nixie's Scrapbook]

[Montaine]

Page two, this is going to be a good one, I just know it.

[Cascade]

Boobies.

[Nixie]

What was church to me? After reading something Seven posted in another scrapbook, I was reminded of my own time spent growing up in a small church built in a small town. What was church to me back then when I was little? I hated that every Sunday my sisters and I had to dress in uncomfortable dresses because, supposedly, it was only right to get all dressy for something that happened every single weekend. Something about respect, I guess. But anyways, once my parents woke us up and helped us dress, I started to get excited about going to the morning service and seeing everybody I knew. Aside from a few snot-nosed kids, everybody was great. All smiles and hugs and laughs. Everybody knew everybody and I always felt like I was among family. Granted, I as a little girl and got bored easily, sitting in those pews, waiting to be dismissed for Sunday School classes... And when it was eventually time, all the kids would stampede downstairs. The classes were fun though; usually consisting of a story from the Bible and some arts and crafts thing afterwards. By the time the classes and service were finished several hours would have passed, but that didn't mean it was time to go home, oh no! Afterwards my parents would catch up with the people they had already talked to just a few days back. And my sisters and I would go play games like "Tag" and "Hide and Seek" with all the other kids. When I was little church was just a place for fun, friends, and stories. I have many other memories from that place, but for now I'll just start with this one.

[Montaine]

See now this makes me happy. This is what I always thought a church should be. I always took umbrage with the concept of the Church with a capital C telling people what to believe. I always thought a church should be a gathering of a community, people with similar interests and beliefs getting together to discuss such things and make friends and enjoy themselves in an environment tying it all together. For me and mine our communities were based around our school and our road, as we never had the church experience. It's nice that you got that sense of community as a kid, and it no doubt had some effect on how you are as a person these days.

Liking the scrapbook.

[Nixie]

Imagination thinks we can fly... Alright, so I have this plastic bag sitting on my bed from when I bought some granola after work tonight. When I turned on my fan and it started making that crinkle noise those bags always make, I was reminded of something. When I was young, my sisters and I spent a lot of time out in the backyard doing various fun thing that little girls did. Not really the typical girly girl stuff though; we tended to be a bit more rambunctious than that. Calling us 'tomboys' wouldn't be far off... Anyways! Inside my sisters and I somehow got to talking about the different dreams we had where we were flying. Do you guys remember having those kinda' dreams? They sounded like oh so much fun, we just had to try it. That's when we got into all the plastic grocery bags and took them outside to the picnic table we had in the backyard. First we tried wearing the bags like backpacks and jumping off the table. Then we tried wearing one on each arm. And when that failed, we figured maybe if we ripped the bags a bit to make it more like an open parachute, then it would work! That failed too, of course, so we tried wearing several bags like that. We must have looked so silly jumping down from that table over and over again, haha. In the end we tried wearing them like shirts. Ripping holes in the bottoms so we could stick our arms through handles. Tried making some funky looking pants too... We did various other 'flying' things like that too. I remember the old green house on the corner where my family and I used to live. It was a two story and my sisters and I always had fun on its staircase. One day we were given our very own umbrellas; we thought they were the best things in the world in that moment. But, oh the tragedy, it wasn't raining! Now how would we test them out? By trying to 'float' down the stairs of course! So we piled a bunch of blankets on the platform where they turned to go down into the living room to make sure we would have a soft landing. Once we were satisfied with the squishy...ness, we all hurried up to the top of the staircase and formed a line. My youngest sister was maybe three at the time, so she stood about halfway down the first stretch of steps and jumped from there. My second youngest sister stood a few steps up from that and jumped. Me, being the oldest, just had to out awesome them... and so I stood at the very top... Older sisters gotta be cool, right? haha I even surprised myself when I actually landed in the blankets and not on the stares above them. It looked like such a long jump, and felt so exhilarating. Anyways, as you all could probably guess, our umbrellas didn't help us 'float' down Mary Poppins style, but nor did they revers on themselves. It was still so much fun though. We were giggling and smiling the whole time, and even though it might have been dangerous our mom didn't even try and stop us! Thankfully nobody got hurt... Actually I think my youngest sister did.. by mommy dearest took care of her. I think it was just a carpet burn anyways... Do you guys have any 'flying' stories? And I don't mean the ones where you had to ingest/smoke some questionable substance. XD

[Wart]

When I was really young I had the chance to go to Disney World in Orlando, Florida with my family. There was some sort of festival of dreams sort of thing going on there, and the big theme of it was achieving your dreams. In different areas of the park there were different "stations," with different activities and crafts. I remember the entire time I was there, I had decided that my dream, or wish rather, was to fly. There was nothing I wanted more.

During parades and events I'd sit there and I'd close my eyes and wish with all the might a little kid can muster that I'd be able to fly. It came to the point that my parents and younger siblings actually got really irritated at my persistence with it. Whenever we walked anywhere, I'd run and jump as high as I could, hoping that at any time I would jump and not be forced back down on the ground.

I spent so much time focused on this little dream of mine that I can't even remember much of anything else about our time there.

I really sort of envy that younger me. As impossible as such a dream is, I had such a strong, unbreakable belief that I could achieve it. I miss that kind of simple innocent hope.

Older sisters for the win, by the way

[Nixie]

Wart, it's those kind of memories and stories that I can't help but smile about. Childlike imagination and faith are two things I wish everybody could keep growing up. They are so amazing. It's such a shame that life and time can slowly take them away from us. Thank you for sharing one of your own memories in my scrapbook! <3

[Bob Barton]

Poke poke