Chapter 3

To grow up in such beauty was a blessing...and a challenge. My brother and I were reaching that school age...what would my parents do in a community with no school and limited jobs. Our community had a post office, store, and road house...

 They enrolled my brother in a school that was almost 30 miles away in a native village. It was difficult for him I remember, he had a learning disability, and back in the early 80's, it just wasn't something that people in rural Alaska didn't know about. I was reading by the time I was three, so the early grades were so easy for me, and he struggled. I remember feeling bad for my big brother, and my parents were so frustrated that he wasn't learning at a faster rate. They enrolled me in a semi-home school. Once a month, I had to be driven 67 miles into a testing center to where the actual kindergarten class was held. This was a challenge in the winter when the weather would dip to temperatures of sometimes -60 degrees. But my parents believed in a good education. My Mom still has tapes that she recorded of me saying nursery rhymes. We listen to them every few years, and have a good laugh. There was another little girl in the same program as me...I have a vague recollection of hating her for almost three years because she forgot her lunch and our teacher gave her my banana. So not a big deal, but I was apparently really wanting that banana. Little did I know that little girl would introduce me to the fashions of the 80's in the third grade. Extra hairspray, 3 pairs of neon socks pulled and scrunched over my stone-washed jeans, big and bright t-shirts...I think that living in that rural of an environment, we were wearing these long after they went out of style. I completed kindergarten in this fashion, first grade I went to my first public school. My parents moved closer to a school that year, where my dad worked as a cook. I loved school! So many kids, and so much to learn. I also had my first crush that year. I used hide on the bus, with my brother in the seat across the aisle, he would then ask the boy I so loved to sit across the aisle from him. When he did, I would sit up. He was so cool, and would just shake his head and move to the back of the bus. Perhaps my being a first grader and him being a fourth grader had something to do with my failed attempt and everlasting love. I got over him my second grade year, when my folks moved back out to our homestead and I was homeschooled. My Mom had infinite patience with teaching my brother and I. She kept a rigid schedule, and was a GREAT teacher. Somehow, she managed to make sure that we always had art supplies and science projects. She found desks for us, and became that year, my inspiration for organization. This was also the year that my parents took over a 'road house'. This was the communities bar/restaurant/grocery/gas/mechanic stop. They ran the restaurant part of it. There was nothing I loved more than going to the restaurant with my Dad at 5am on the weekends to help set up the kitchen. Then he would cook me a wonderful breakfast, whatever I wanted, and I would help wait tables, serve coffee, hand out food, and do dishes. My folks were hard workers, and often worked seven days a week to support our family. My mom was a cook/waitress/accountant for the restaurant, and she kept all the bills in a large ledger book. She would give me my own ledger page and I would budget out my weekly $5 allowance. Little did I know that this would help shape the career that I chose, and the financial choices I have made in my life. And what a beautiful place to learn these things.