Growing up as the youngest child on a farm, my earliest friends were my siblings. After that, it would probably be Ryan Haynes, who was a year younger than me and lived on the Haynes family farm a mile south of us. And of course, my cousins--the (Clyde) Conrads and the Navratils, principally, were the two families of cousins we played with the most.
In August of 1961, when I was a few months away from turning four, they changed the ward boundaries of the two Taber wards and created Taber Third Ward, and that was the ward we were put in. I do not remember anything pre-Taber Third Ward, and I don't remember the stake meeting at which that change was made, but I do know that the Taber Third Ward was a very happy place for me. At the time, the church year followed the school year, so the children who would be four years old by the end of the year all started what was probably the Star Class that September. I don't remember any earlier than that, but that was the year of my first church friend. Her name was Dorothy Anderson.
I looked up about the creation of Taber Third Ward in the Taber Stake History book. Apparently, they were going to make the dividing line for the wards right down highway three, but they instead jogged the line to the south a bit so that the Arthur and Irene Anderson family would be in the Third Ward and so that Arthur Anderson could be the bishop. He is the first bishop that I remember. The counselors were Wayne Gough and Lindon Litchfield. My dad was one of the ward clerks. (I realize that I actually do have earlier memories, because before my dad was a ward clerk, he was a seventy, and assigned to be the traveling companion to the stake high council, and I can remember visiting other wards--maybe branches--with him sometimes, like Rosemary or Vauxhall.)
I loved Dorothy so much! She was the same age as me, and it was so nice to have a girl who was genuinely active (as in, at church every week) in my class. Our age group was boy-heavy (Lloyd Bennett, Kyle Hall, Randy Sparks, Randy Jensen, etc.) and many of the girls were in families that were not able to attend consistently due to distance and circumstances. Because of our fathers' responsibilities at church, and because we were both farm girls, that meant that we often played together at the church after our meetings were over, but our dads were still occupied. Our mothers chatted (this would have included Sister Litchfield because they were a farm family, too) and the children played. Sometimes, I would go to Dorothy's house between Sunday School in the morning and Sacrament meeting at night, and sometimes she would come to my house. I really liked Dorothy's entire family.
Her dad, Arthur, was a tall and very nice man. He was a school teacher and a farmer at the same time. Later in life, he would be my typing teacher in high school--and that was strange to me, because he was always Bishop Anderson to me. Her mom, Irene, was one of the sweetest, kindest women ever. She had a kind smile, and spoke always in a quiet, calm manner. I even remember conversations with Dorothy's two grandmothers, Grandma Anderson and Grandma Mercer. Dorothy had three older brothers: Jerry, Ray and Keith, and an older sister, Shirley. She had a younger sister, Brenda, and quite a bit later, a brother Rodney who was born while at least one if not more of the brothers was serving a mission.
I remember playing inside and outside at Dorothy's house, and play that involved her sisters while at her house, and my sisters while at my house. I have no pictures except those in my mind, but definitely a sweet feeling in my memory about those golden Taber Third Ward years.
This lasted for five years, until 1966. When they changed the bishopric of Taber Third Ward, they also changed the ward boundaries, and went straight down highway three, putting the Andersons back into Taber Second Ward. I do remember the stake meeting at which that happened--I remember them having us stand ward by ward as they revealed the new boundaries, and I remember feeling completely awful to see that Dorothy and her family stood with Taber Second Ward, while I stood with Taber Third Ward. So that was the year that I was almost nine, and going into the class known as the Gaynotes in Primary (a girls only class.)
I was not completely devastated because by then my cousins, the Clyde Conrads, had moved to the farm a quarter mile north of our farm, so I had Margaret and Marie in my ward. But the loss of Dorothy was a very hard thing for me, still. In my classes after that, I was never completely comfortable. The other girls my age and I just never clicked the way I had with Dorothy. I had other friends, but they were always either a year older or a year younger, so sometimes I would be in classes with them, but sometimes not. I did not have any consistent girl friends exactly my age in my ward after Dorothy was gone.
And we did not go to the same elementary school--I was at Dr. Hamman, and she was at Central. So it was difficult to maintain a friendship. We were always friendly after that, but it wasn't the same. She landed in with some girls like Ronalee Bennett, and I think she had good strong female friendships in her ward--I hope so--but I did not.
I mean, mine were okay--I was friends with Joan West (Bennett), Susan Gough and Christine Litchfield, all of whom were a year older. Christine was in my grade and my school, so we were pretty close, but at church, we were not usually in the same class. And Christine was sick a lot. A LOT. So not consistently present at church or school. Younger than me were my cousin Marie, Brenda West and Melanie Gough. And I really like all of these girls, but again--we just were not in the same classes consistently.
My friendships with the older girls were difficult because Arlene was the year older than they were, and so they were sometimes in classes with her, so it was hard for them to decide who to be friends with. For example, one year when I was in the same Sunday School class with the older girls, I invited Susan Gough to come home between church sessions and play with me. I had just been to her house in a similar fashion a few weeks before, so I wanted to have her over to my house. She said she would need to ask her mom, of course. We were together, but got lost from each other in the crowded hallways, and by the time I found her, she had somehow found my sister, and now it was the two of them together asking her mom if she could come to our house. She came as Arlene's guest, and I was ignored or left out the entire afternoon. So yah. Things like that made the not-the-same-age friendships hard.
I was uncomfortable with friendships at church from 1966 on. And I was equally uncomfortable with friendships at school, and had been since 1963, when I started school. It happened that in my grade at Dr. Hamman, the girls would often split into two conflicting factions, with Jody Wenbourne as one of the faction leaders, and the other faction--seemed to have revolving leadership. But no surprise, I DESPISE conflict. So I would just go my own way in order to stay out of whatever dispute there was. Sometimes, I was successful in being a diplomat and diffusing the tension, but mostly, I just took refuge either by playing with younger children--I had been told in no uncertain terms that I was NOT to find my way to my sister--or I would help teachers in the classroom. By Grade Four, I was working in the library pretty much every free minute before school, at recesses and at noon hour. Or working as a patrol in grades five and six. So, I kind of avoided the whole friendship at school thing. Which is kind of sad. Because my only friends were really my sisters and my cousins. (Later in life, Melanie Gough told me she thought we Conrad girls were snobs, that we only wanted to be with each other. We didn't mean to come across that way--for me, they were my lifeline. I had absolutely no confidence in making friends by the end of elementary school.)
I was excited to start junior high because I thought "Maybe now I can make some friends!" I was excited that I would be in the same school as my childhood friend Dorothy--maybe we could be close friends again! It would have been 1969--only three years since the ward boundary change had taken place. I hoped that I might be able to reconnect with her.
She was not in my home room in grade seven, but I was so happy to have made friends with Lyn Valgardson, who was a second ward girl. And also Nola Jensen, who I think was in a Barnwell ward maybe? I am not sure. I spent a happy couple of weeks enjoying these new friendships. And then our family was going to go to Utah for a week. We were taking my brother Bruce and my sister Colleen. Maybe just Colleen. I would have to check the dates. I remember the day we were leaving clearly. Nola and I walked to the Taber Supermarket and ate lunch at their lunch counter. There were some men smoking nearby, and the smoke blew into my hair and it just STUNK. As soon as we got home, we were supposed to leave for Utah. We were planning to drive to Great Falls, stay over night there, and then head down the next morning. Because my hair smelled so bad, I insisted on washing it--I could not stand the way I smelled, and I didn't want to be stuck in a car with me. So I went with wet hair, and it happened that there was a winter storm. It was very cold and snowy even though it was only September. (BYUs semesters then began at the end of September, and the end of the semester was in January. Which is totally weird, but that is how it was. Then February through May.)
I got very sick and had a really bad cough and laryngitis, and even after we got back from Utah, I had to miss some school days due to being unable to speak. So it was at least two weeks that I was gone. I went back to school hoping that my friendships would be able to continue from where I had left off, but the girls had made other friends, and I had actually nobody. Sometimes I had Cindy Fallon and her cousin Donna Layton, but they were not really my group--they were just nice to me. But Margaret, my cousin who is Arlene's age but only a grade ahead of me, took me into her circle of friends, so I had someone for lunch hour, at least. But I still felt a bit like a charity case, you know?
So, I never did become good friends with Dorothy again. She had her own group of friends, and they were always really nice to me, but I was not one of them, if you know what I mean. I was not one of any of the thems in my school. So, all of those years, grades seven through twelve, I continued to feel uncomfortable at church and uncomfortable at school, which is kind of sad, because I did not really learn to make friends. I think I tried--maybe I didn't try hard enough? I don't know. (And that was why I tried and succeeded to graduate early, in January 1975, and was delighted to leave and did not go to my own high school graduation, setting our family precedent of not going to high school graduations!)
But I am grateful for those five years, 1961-1966, during which I had a friend! I am thankful for having known Dorothy and her family, and for the good influence they were in my life. I am thankful to have reconnected with Dorothy on Facebook. And to have this interesting connection with her family and our cousin ALeda Mitchell and our son-in-law Allen (that I talked about in the last blog post.)
In August of 1961, when I was a few months away from turning four, they changed the ward boundaries of the two Taber wards and created Taber Third Ward, and that was the ward we were put in. I do not remember anything pre-Taber Third Ward, and I don't remember the stake meeting at which that change was made, but I do know that the Taber Third Ward was a very happy place for me. At the time, the church year followed the school year, so the children who would be four years old by the end of the year all started what was probably the Star Class that September. I don't remember any earlier than that, but that was the year of my first church friend. Her name was Dorothy Anderson.
I looked up about the creation of Taber Third Ward in the Taber Stake History book. Apparently, they were going to make the dividing line for the wards right down highway three, but they instead jogged the line to the south a bit so that the Arthur and Irene Anderson family would be in the Third Ward and so that Arthur Anderson could be the bishop. He is the first bishop that I remember. The counselors were Wayne Gough and Lindon Litchfield. My dad was one of the ward clerks. (I realize that I actually do have earlier memories, because before my dad was a ward clerk, he was a seventy, and assigned to be the traveling companion to the stake high council, and I can remember visiting other wards--maybe branches--with him sometimes, like Rosemary or Vauxhall.)
I loved Dorothy so much! She was the same age as me, and it was so nice to have a girl who was genuinely active (as in, at church every week) in my class. Our age group was boy-heavy (Lloyd Bennett, Kyle Hall, Randy Sparks, Randy Jensen, etc.) and many of the girls were in families that were not able to attend consistently due to distance and circumstances. Because of our fathers' responsibilities at church, and because we were both farm girls, that meant that we often played together at the church after our meetings were over, but our dads were still occupied. Our mothers chatted (this would have included Sister Litchfield because they were a farm family, too) and the children played. Sometimes, I would go to Dorothy's house between Sunday School in the morning and Sacrament meeting at night, and sometimes she would come to my house. I really liked Dorothy's entire family.
Her dad, Arthur, was a tall and very nice man. He was a school teacher and a farmer at the same time. Later in life, he would be my typing teacher in high school--and that was strange to me, because he was always Bishop Anderson to me. Her mom, Irene, was one of the sweetest, kindest women ever. She had a kind smile, and spoke always in a quiet, calm manner. I even remember conversations with Dorothy's two grandmothers, Grandma Anderson and Grandma Mercer. Dorothy had three older brothers: Jerry, Ray and Keith, and an older sister, Shirley. She had a younger sister, Brenda, and quite a bit later, a brother Rodney who was born while at least one if not more of the brothers was serving a mission.
I remember playing inside and outside at Dorothy's house, and play that involved her sisters while at her house, and my sisters while at my house. I have no pictures except those in my mind, but definitely a sweet feeling in my memory about those golden Taber Third Ward years.
This lasted for five years, until 1966. When they changed the bishopric of Taber Third Ward, they also changed the ward boundaries, and went straight down highway three, putting the Andersons back into Taber Second Ward. I do remember the stake meeting at which that happened--I remember them having us stand ward by ward as they revealed the new boundaries, and I remember feeling completely awful to see that Dorothy and her family stood with Taber Second Ward, while I stood with Taber Third Ward. So that was the year that I was almost nine, and going into the class known as the Gaynotes in Primary (a girls only class.)
I was not completely devastated because by then my cousins, the Clyde Conrads, had moved to the farm a quarter mile north of our farm, so I had Margaret and Marie in my ward. But the loss of Dorothy was a very hard thing for me, still. In my classes after that, I was never completely comfortable. The other girls my age and I just never clicked the way I had with Dorothy. I had other friends, but they were always either a year older or a year younger, so sometimes I would be in classes with them, but sometimes not. I did not have any consistent girl friends exactly my age in my ward after Dorothy was gone.
And we did not go to the same elementary school--I was at Dr. Hamman, and she was at Central. So it was difficult to maintain a friendship. We were always friendly after that, but it wasn't the same. She landed in with some girls like Ronalee Bennett, and I think she had good strong female friendships in her ward--I hope so--but I did not.
I mean, mine were okay--I was friends with Joan West (Bennett), Susan Gough and Christine Litchfield, all of whom were a year older. Christine was in my grade and my school, so we were pretty close, but at church, we were not usually in the same class. And Christine was sick a lot. A LOT. So not consistently present at church or school. Younger than me were my cousin Marie, Brenda West and Melanie Gough. And I really like all of these girls, but again--we just were not in the same classes consistently.
My friendships with the older girls were difficult because Arlene was the year older than they were, and so they were sometimes in classes with her, so it was hard for them to decide who to be friends with. For example, one year when I was in the same Sunday School class with the older girls, I invited Susan Gough to come home between church sessions and play with me. I had just been to her house in a similar fashion a few weeks before, so I wanted to have her over to my house. She said she would need to ask her mom, of course. We were together, but got lost from each other in the crowded hallways, and by the time I found her, she had somehow found my sister, and now it was the two of them together asking her mom if she could come to our house. She came as Arlene's guest, and I was ignored or left out the entire afternoon. So yah. Things like that made the not-the-same-age friendships hard.
I was uncomfortable with friendships at church from 1966 on. And I was equally uncomfortable with friendships at school, and had been since 1963, when I started school. It happened that in my grade at Dr. Hamman, the girls would often split into two conflicting factions, with Jody Wenbourne as one of the faction leaders, and the other faction--seemed to have revolving leadership. But no surprise, I DESPISE conflict. So I would just go my own way in order to stay out of whatever dispute there was. Sometimes, I was successful in being a diplomat and diffusing the tension, but mostly, I just took refuge either by playing with younger children--I had been told in no uncertain terms that I was NOT to find my way to my sister--or I would help teachers in the classroom. By Grade Four, I was working in the library pretty much every free minute before school, at recesses and at noon hour. Or working as a patrol in grades five and six. So, I kind of avoided the whole friendship at school thing. Which is kind of sad. Because my only friends were really my sisters and my cousins. (Later in life, Melanie Gough told me she thought we Conrad girls were snobs, that we only wanted to be with each other. We didn't mean to come across that way--for me, they were my lifeline. I had absolutely no confidence in making friends by the end of elementary school.)
I was excited to start junior high because I thought "Maybe now I can make some friends!" I was excited that I would be in the same school as my childhood friend Dorothy--maybe we could be close friends again! It would have been 1969--only three years since the ward boundary change had taken place. I hoped that I might be able to reconnect with her.
She was not in my home room in grade seven, but I was so happy to have made friends with Lyn Valgardson, who was a second ward girl. And also Nola Jensen, who I think was in a Barnwell ward maybe? I am not sure. I spent a happy couple of weeks enjoying these new friendships. And then our family was going to go to Utah for a week. We were taking my brother Bruce and my sister Colleen. Maybe just Colleen. I would have to check the dates. I remember the day we were leaving clearly. Nola and I walked to the Taber Supermarket and ate lunch at their lunch counter. There were some men smoking nearby, and the smoke blew into my hair and it just STUNK. As soon as we got home, we were supposed to leave for Utah. We were planning to drive to Great Falls, stay over night there, and then head down the next morning. Because my hair smelled so bad, I insisted on washing it--I could not stand the way I smelled, and I didn't want to be stuck in a car with me. So I went with wet hair, and it happened that there was a winter storm. It was very cold and snowy even though it was only September. (BYUs semesters then began at the end of September, and the end of the semester was in January. Which is totally weird, but that is how it was. Then February through May.)
I got very sick and had a really bad cough and laryngitis, and even after we got back from Utah, I had to miss some school days due to being unable to speak. So it was at least two weeks that I was gone. I went back to school hoping that my friendships would be able to continue from where I had left off, but the girls had made other friends, and I had actually nobody. Sometimes I had Cindy Fallon and her cousin Donna Layton, but they were not really my group--they were just nice to me. But Margaret, my cousin who is Arlene's age but only a grade ahead of me, took me into her circle of friends, so I had someone for lunch hour, at least. But I still felt a bit like a charity case, you know?
So, I never did become good friends with Dorothy again. She had her own group of friends, and they were always really nice to me, but I was not one of them, if you know what I mean. I was not one of any of the thems in my school. So, all of those years, grades seven through twelve, I continued to feel uncomfortable at church and uncomfortable at school, which is kind of sad, because I did not really learn to make friends. I think I tried--maybe I didn't try hard enough? I don't know. (And that was why I tried and succeeded to graduate early, in January 1975, and was delighted to leave and did not go to my own high school graduation, setting our family precedent of not going to high school graduations!)
But I am grateful for those five years, 1961-1966, during which I had a friend! I am thankful for having known Dorothy and her family, and for the good influence they were in my life. I am thankful to have reconnected with Dorothy on Facebook. And to have this interesting connection with her family and our cousin ALeda Mitchell and our son-in-law Allen (that I talked about in the last blog post.)
