A TODDLER DAUGHTER......

Yesterday I chronicled only a few months of my daughters life.  I want to continue to tell you about her. 

Just like it.

As I returned to work at Duke, my next door neighbor took care of Leah.  She had lost a baby and desperately wanted to be pregnant.  It was in many ways perfect  because she was so diligent in her care.  One incident was very depressing.  Every day my little girl was dressed with frillies.  We were letting her wear her gold ring.  One day when I came home and picked Leah up, the ring was gone.  It had been mine as a baby.  Well, the search was one for the records.  My husband even raked the path from our house to theirs.  It was never found.  She cared for her until Joe finished college and went to work.  His friend Bill Holder, who had quit medical school, worked for Center for Disease Control and loved what he was doing.  He was in the department that handled sexually transmitted disease.  After an interview in Atlanta, he was hired and assigned to Fayetteville, NC.  It was time to move.



VA across from our house.



I was reinstated in the VAH in Fayetteville and he started his career.  We found a really cute house, less than two blocks from the VAH.  The search for someone to care for Leah was easy.  A supervisor at the hospital was the sister of the local ob/gyn doctor.  He was older and had an empty house so I inherited Elizabeth.  She was just what we needed..  Always on time.  Leah loved her.  I shall never forget one afternoon when I came home her was Elizabeth and Leah at the kitchen table eating a healthy portion of "chitterlings".  Both were enjoying them so much.  It was all I could do to keep my stomach still. 

Being a toddler and stubborn is a real combination.  It is during this 2-3 years of her life that I began to understand the individual she would become.  Two examples come to mind.  On one occasion, she was on the back patio.  She was the victim of a folding beach chair.  It collapsed.  She couldn't sit upon it and sing, as were her habit.  She worked as I watched for thirty minutes to put it back together.  That is a terrific amount of concentration for a two year old.  She still has that persistence.  It has served her well.

The second remembrance is one that taught me a big lesson.  We had a group of people over in the very small house.  I carefully put Leah to bed as Joe finished the cleaning, We read a story and I tucked her in.  As the party got going, she peeped out the hall door to see what was happening.  The tenth time I took her back to the bed, I gave her some swats , she just dug her heels in and I would no more than get back and she would be peeping.  The next time I took her back to her room there were tears in my eyes.  I told her that if she didn't go to sleep and stay in her bed, I couldn't entertain my friends.She had helped me get everything ready and was so curious as to how they were liking it.    She put her little hand on my back, patted me, and said something to the effect, "mommy I love you, I don't want you to be sad."  I knew then that with a little explanation, she would be happy to cooperate.  We did not believe in spanking and I had come so close with that pat on the behind.  When I was little, the done thing was switching and spanking. I just felt that there had to be a better way and my little toddler proved it.

We moved from that house to a larger one a few miles away on Kenwood Dr.  Next door to the Teals.   It is a time that I remember as really good.  Leah started to preschool.  Mrs. Haney's school sent a bus to pick her up and away she went.  She had a set of tags that I still have to this day.  A big safety pin...colored tags ...One for the bus, one for the classroom, etc.  It was not a good preschool because it simply concentrated on behaving properly..She learned how to eat with several forks, stand in a receiving line; to this day I do not know why she needed to know that at that time more than reading. .  It was the best in Fayetteville.  Her next door friend Monte went there also.

Then we had to move again.  We were renting and we made a vow that the next house would be bought.  It was fortunate we found a house right around the corner on Rodwell Road. She could keep her same school and friends.  Leah had a terrible time with the little girl whose backyard backed up to ours.  She had a playhouse that was all wired with electricity and was carpeted.  She didn't let her playmates touch anything.  Give me a break.  We had a grape arbor in the back yard.  We loved picking the grapes.  Mrs. Faircloth came to help.  She would come before Leah left for school, get her on the bus, and have cookies ready when she came home.  She also cleaned our house. 

 We cried when we had to move to Philadelphia.  Leah was going into the second grade.