The Toddler

The story starts with a young person, a boy person, a very sheltered and very protected person, a boy person that had a very well protected and secure youth. Perhaps, too protected, too secure, if not squelched, but protected never-the-less.

This boy person had two parents. They lived in a two story apartment with their dog, Gingersnap, a wire hair terrier, who was entering an age when he wanted to rest. And perhaps the parents wanted to rest a little bit more, too. They were not young, they had already entered middle age.

The mother did not work. She stayed at home. She worked very hard at home. She had already had a fruitful teaching career, and now it was time to be a mother as well as a wife. It was time for her to stay at home. It was after the depression of the thirties, and they had been through hard times. Now there were good jobs -- very good jobs. There was a war going on. The father worked in the nearby city, the seaport -- now a military seaport. He worked for the military. He car pooled to work, everybody did! It was wartime. There were shortages. Things were rationed and scarce. Gasoline was rationed. Everybody carried ration cards. And they saved. Spending was not the habit of the day --saving was. People bought US war bonds. They put their money away.

The boy had two grandfathers in the same town. Also, almost all of his five aunts lived in the same town, at least at various times. How more secure and provincial can a person be? His childhood was a very easy life. He was spoiled, he was spoiled rotten. He was the center of the universe. The whole world revolved around him. He was ego centered and he was never told to be other centered, never. He would have to learn such things the hard way, through life. He would follow a very naive course where he had to learn nearly everything the hard way. Such was this life.

Please reduce your expectations to read a story that includes a diverse collection of characters. Such works require much more talent than the present writer can provide. Some writers are just not sufficiently observant of others and of their behavior. Such writers are completely devoid of discerning the motivations of others. It is not a very good way to live one's life. Such is the case.

There is an old story that has been related about the early sickness of the new born baby. It seems that he was not gaining weight as an infant. Obviously a doctor was in order, however, the family of the father of the newborn child was not accustomed to utilizing the services of the medical profession. The father's own mother had indeed died earlier in the same year because she refused to be "cut open" by a member of the medical profession. And the father's decision was effectively communicated to the mother who did not drive.