The thousand mile journey

My family moved into 5404 in November 1955, at least according to the dates on the photographs of Jackie and me standing by the front door.  It was not my  families first home, but it would be the last where we were all together. And despite so many years hence, and living in many other homes, I still feel it was "home."  Now, there are no family members alive but me of my early years, and only my cousin Al for our mid and later years.  So, as Kate and Donna both advised me, I need to write down our family history before it is lost entirely.  And as they both suggested, a blog seems like the best way to do it.  I can add to it in small bits about small or large topics, it won't get lost or destroyed in any disaster and can be accessed by anyone interested at their leisure.  I hope, and expect, that as I go along, I will become more proficient not only in the writing, but also in  making this site more interesting. As the proverb goes, the thousand mile journey starts with the first step.  Well, here goes.

I discovered my earliest memory  maybe 10 years ago.  I was walking through a hall in Good Samaritan Hospital when a passed a large, wheeled,  stainless steel crib. Now, these cribs are used for babies going to the operating room and then recovery room.  Inside the crib was a latex surgical glove, blown up and tied so that it had become a balloon.  And on the palm of the glove was drawn, I suppose by a marker, two eyes and a very happy smiling mouth.  And then it hit me, that was my earliest memory, of being in a recovery room in such a crib, with such a smiley faced glove balloon.  I do not know how young I was with my early surgeries. I am pretty sure I had two or three between several months and 2 years.  So I am guessing the memory is in my first or second year. It is not a bad memory, more of a happy  or neutral one.  And I can't even say how often I would see that image, because that is what it is, an image, a mental tone poem of that smiling balloon face, and being behind or in front of silver bars.  And if I had chosen another profession other than being a doctor, I very much doubt I would ever have understood that  vision, that memory.