We stayed in Galva through Christmas of 1958. I remember the colored lights, and Mom letting me help put tinsel on the tree for the first time.
I turned seven a month later. Soon after that, it was time to move again.
I liked living in Galva a lot. It was different from the farm in a lot of ways.
City streets instead of gravel roads.
Walking to school. I loved school — especially learning to read.
I had school friends to play with. Some lived close enough that I could walk to their houses after school.
Dad sold his milk trucks, and soon we were on our way.
We moved west again, this time just east of Aledo along Illinois Route 17.
Our new home sat halfway between our old farm near Viola and where Mom had grown up, northwest of Aledo in Millersburg.
It is the same general area I had always lived in, except for the nine months or so we lived in Galva.
As much as I liked living in town, I was also glad to be back on the farm, even if it wasn’t the same farm. This time, Dad wasn’t farming. We moved into a tenant house next door to Nellie Briggs, the lady who owned the farm. Someone else farmed the land for her.
Our little tenant house was much smaller than the stately white main house, but it was cute and very well kept. It had only two bedrooms, but we made it work with our bunk beds.
There was one thing about this house that worried me, though. The heat came from pipes in the walls, which I wasn’t used to. I thought the heat meant it could catch on fire, but Mom assured me it was safe. She said the house was heated by a system of water pipes in the walls. It was warmed by the coal furnace in the basement.
Just in case, though, I always had a backup plan — in case we ever did have a fire. I would smash the window next to my bed with Jocko, my teddy bear.
Fortunately, that plan was never needed.
Not long after we moved into the tenant house near Aledo, Mom took me to register at Frew School.
Through My Eyes, Gently 