Looking back on my early life, I can say things seemed pretty normal to me, and I can’t say I lived much different from any other kid in my neighborhood, but I never felt like I fit in with the majority of students that attended the elementary school I found myself walking to everyday. Perhaps it was because of always being the shortest kid, and being shy at the same time, but i was never bullied or mistreated. I was a quiet kid, I did my lessons and followed the rules, and as long as I wasn’t the center of attention, and stayed out of trouble, I was happy, and chugged along just fine.

By the time I entered Terry Parker in the seventh grade, I began to realize I was not among the usual of students, and I found myself in the more progressive of classes. I loved math, history, and even my English classes, and by the time I was in the tenth grade, I was invited into the National Honor Society. My parents, being only educated to the eighth grade, really had no concept that I was in any way exceptional and deserving of anything special. If they were proud of my accomplishments, they never said so, just signing my report cards with no comments to me or my teachers. I do remember one time, before we moved to Arlington, my mother was called into school to pick up my sister, who had been spanked for bad behavior, when she was just in the second grade. Not long after this incident my mother rather scathingly said to me, “If you are so smart, why don’t you help your sister with her school work?” Which turned out much easier said than done. I remember the two of us lying on the floor, with her assignments spread out, and me trying to explain some simple mathematics to her. Of course, she had not learned even how to count properly, and was very resistant to me trying to drill her on her multiplication tables, and how to add and subtract simple numbers. It lasted about ten minutes before she went into a rage and began to throw papers and pencils everywhere, calling me all sorts of nasty names, punctuated by slaps and punches to my body.

From that point on, it seemed my sister and I had no interactions without it ending in a fight, in which she was the one throwing the punches, so to speak. Mostly, I decided she was on her own, when it came to school work, because I preferred spending my time alone with my school work, or playing outside with a certain Boy Scout friend who lived down the street.

First Male Friend

The Riverside area we lived in was mostly an older, more settled area, and finding a friend my age was not an easy matter. The friend whose name was Paul, was about the same age as me then, about ten, who was kind and gentle, and we spent many hours together playing with his small model race cars, or playing hide and seek, or other games children play together. He even invited me to one of his boy scout retreats, and I had my first and only experience camping out with a Boy Scout troupe. That my parents allowed me to go still amazes me, but I suspect the boy’s mother extended the invitation to my parents, for she must have assured them I would not be sleeping in the boy’s tent.

Later that relationship ended tragically for us both, when I asked Paul if he would like to listen to my records, all children’s tunes on my little record player. Daddy came home and found us, sitting on the floor in mine and my sister’s bedroom, with my records all around us, listening to music, and singing along happily to all the favorite tunes of children of that day, For no reason, to me, Daddy went into a rage and grabbed the boy by his ear, and dragged him downstairs and out the front door, while my aunt’s dog Lucky barked and howled, at Paul or my Dad, I don’t know. All I know was that we were doing nothing wrong, and now Paul would probably never be my friend after that. Actually,the next day I went down the street and knocked on their door, but no one answered, and I finally gave up, heart sick that Paul had been treated so poorly, and now I had lost my only friend.

First Female Friend

Sometime after that, when I was approaching eleven, I met a sweet girl who lived just a block away, in one of the houses along the river front. The girl and I, I don’t remember her name now, were instantly good friends, and she shared her afternoons with me, when she didn’t have art or music lessons, from then on, until one day she invited me to her birthday party at her family’s house at Jacksonville Beach. She had shown me how differently some people lived, different from my poor family, for their house was so elegantly decorated, but we had so much in common, being good students with many like interests, and I found her an interesting and fun person to be with. My mother told me I had to ask Daddy if I wanted permission to go, but I was terrified to ask him anything, so I went to my Aunt Frances, somehow thinking I could bypass my parent’s permission, if I could get her to say it would be okay. Well, she said she didn’t see anything wrong with it, but it was up to me if I wanted to go without their permission. So happily, when the day came, I showed up at my friend’s house, and piled into the van with a few other neighborhood kids, and happily set upon what to me was nothing less than another magical experience. I had never had a birthday party myself, didn’t even have a present for the girl, but she didn’t seem to mind, and I had a wonderful time, little suspecting what awaited me when I returned home about 10 p.m. that night, when I proudly showed up with a couple of prizes I had won in games at the party.

Immediately, I was sent to my room, and to my horror found my sister in bed, still crying from all the bruises she had obtained from Daddy’s big black belt that we both dreaded with righteous fear, she, who had nothing to do with my shenanigans, and who knew nothing about my whereabouts. For once, my sister and I were joined in mutual understanding, that this punishment of her was not fair at all, and so unkind. Why my Dad seemed like such a good guy to all the rest of the family and to his friends, was a total mystery to me, although I knew he had his moments of kindness, and I truly treasured those few times when he would sit me on his lap, and tell me how much he loved me, once even asking me what I wanted to be when I grew up. I was about five years old that particular time. Apparently that love did not extend to trust, something I found utterly missing in my life, on his part, and now on mine.

Happy Days Begin as New Friends Made

Shortly after that, we moved to our new house in Arlington, and a much happier period in my life began. It seemed I always had friends, from that time on, but mostly just a few close friends, who either lived on the same block, or a few friends from my classes at school, who lived close enough that we could ride our bikes to one another’s houses after school. Probably my best friend from school was Janet S. whose mother was from Sidney, Australia, a lovely lady that served me and Janet coffee in the morning, after spending the night over, with a few pastries for breakfast. For some reason, my father nor my mother seemed to mind me spending the night over at special friend’s houses, as long as it was not on a school night. That seems strange to me now that I think about it, that they would even make that restriction, when I never gave them any trouble about my grades or my school work, and never got into any kind of trouble at school. But parents must be parents, and mine certainly felt they had to restrict my sleeping over with girl friends.

Friends in Neighborhood, Introduction to Cayce and Tarot

Janet was probably my best friend, besides Cindy , and she remained my friend throughout the seventh grade through to even many years after we graduated from High School. She was also a good student, and never got into trouble, and we used to read books to each other, on those times when she happened back in Jacksonville, after getting married to a Navy guy herself. She always seemed to enjoy having me read her Tarot cards, as one of the rituals, we did for each other, on those times she was able to visit her family in Jacksonville. My friend Susan, the one who lived across the street, married one of the brothers who lived down the street, whom I will call David, and perhaps he was the one who introduced her to the Tarot. I’m not sure, for she was the one who brought me my first book on Edgar Cayce, when I lost my first baby, after falling down the steep stairs in the old house we lived in, with his parents and brother and sisters, after he was discharged from the Navy. I was only six months along in my pregnancy, and was taken to a Woman’s Hospital in Boston, where they tried to stop the contractions, but after twenty-four hours, I finally lost consciousness, and when I woke up, was told the baby had not made it. While I spent a few days recuperating, I tried reading the Edgar Cayce book, but it was very difficult reading for me, at the time, trying to understand what this all-knowing voice was saying, that came out of Cayce’s mouth, after putting himself in a trance. For that reason, he was called the “Sleeping Prophet.” So, I had to wait until I was around 29 before I came back across the teachings of this enigmatic man. It seems that at many junctures in my life, I was introduced to elements of what I call the Occult, and it took me many years to finally be able to piece all this together, into a kind of life philosophy I could use to guide my beliefs, and my life. Susan later gave me my first Tarot Deck, along with an elegantly illustrated book, that explained what all the Tarot cards meant, and how to interpret them in a spread.

Janet and I were both intrigued by the readings, even though we both relied solely on the interpretations given in the book. Non the less, the readings always seemed to hit right on, on what was occurring in our lives, and seemed to also hit on a hidden side to the lessons our life experiences were giving us. Sadly, to me, even that long-lived friendship finally came to an end, when Janice wrote me a letter, saying that she had found Jesus, and no longer wanted to risk her soul by associating with me, or with those Devil cards. I think this was around the time I had been studying astrology, and I was really getting deeper in the Rabbit hole of occultism. I still missed our yearly or so visits, and I never heard from her again.

Susan’s and my friendship had never been that close,but I realize now I owe her a lot, introducing me to Edgar Cayce and the Tarot, and once I graduated from high school, and found out my parents had no intention of sending me to college, or even helping me, once I graduated. So I took some night courses to learn how to use a typewriter, and found myself looking for a desk job, something I definitely had wanted none of, but I found I had little choice in the matter. I did manage to take a Civil Service test, and got a GS rating as a clerk-typist, but my typing was atrocious, so I finally landed a job as a mail clerk at the Internal Revenue building in downtown Jacksonville,where I worked until I met Richie, my first husband, a sailor who had served a short time on the aircraft Roosevelt at Mayport near Jacksonville.

Magical Things to Come

In my next segment, perhaps I will deal with that nine year marriage, and how events finally led me to start searching for answers more seriously, and how I found myself hooked by what I prefer to call philosophies and different teachings, that give us a lot different view of the mystery of life from that which we are spoon-fed by various religions, especially Christianity. Not that I would tell anyone that it has no value, no, not at all. But we all have to decide what it best for ourselves. Actually, the Cayce teachings keep bringing me back around to Christianity, but which his readings give a little bit different perspective than to what we are told Jesus taught. I’ll try to explain it all, in a way, I hope will not offend anyone, but I would like to forewarn you, that what I have discovered as truth, may not be to your liking at all. Free will is our greatest gift from the Creator, and our mind is the next greatest gift, in my opinion, and I encourage you all to investigate all these things I plan to tell you about, and come to your own conclusions.