A Mixed bag....

It's hard to remember everything in order without forgetting some details. I complain about my memory, often I say it's 'sievelike'. That's how it sometimes seems to me.

Have you noticed that it's much easier to remember somethings more than others?

Somethings you just don't seem to need to think about at all, you just remember to do it, you may not even notice that you've done that.

My earliest school reports often comment, "Barbara is a very polite, quiet little girl".


How much does that tell you?


It tells me...

I was listening,

I felt unable to talk, even in classroom discussions,(but if I did, I was 'agreeable')

I was noticeably well behaved,

I spoke only when spoken to,

I sought no assistance,

I didn't mix and chat during classes,

Apart from being very well spoken and paying attention, I was unremarkable in every other way.



The Teacher Didn't Know Me.



By 9 or 10 I'd already realised that much of what I'd thought previously wasn't quite like that at all.

For example: Mum and Dad sometimes fought. It was scary. It tended to occur on Sunday. Dad would go out 'for a pint' and we would never be sure until he came home what kind of evening it would be.

Sometimes he'd sing, "Are you Lonesome tonight... did you miss me tonight...." and Mum would try her best to keep a straight face while he was on one knee before her.

There were other times....

I recall on more than one night, getting out bed and ... in my pyjamas, laying on the floor (covered in paisley lino) and trying to make out the sounds of my parents voices in the living room below.

"What were they arguing about?"

I suppose when you're small that parents are giants and disagreements between them are like the Clash of the Titans.



My Dad read 'The Morning Star' which was 'Red' and meant he was a 'Communist' but I was advised not to mention this.

I also learnt:

The longer you resisted temptation, the better the toast smelt - until you couldn't wait anymore and eventually retrieved it from (the darkness of) the wooden desk you'd kept it in till Milk Break.

Milk was just as nice warm but very different and was known to form blobs if left in the sun.

Being selected as 'Milk Monitor' involved some strange and prior mystical (apparently) event that I never met.

Pea soup actually had ham in it and wasn't green at all.

My Mum liked Pepper, but my Dad loved the Salt.

Vinegar, if poured into a large glass and left on a table could easily be mistaken (for a flat variation of lemonade) and be drank by a very thirsty child.

Perfume doesn't taste as nice as it smells especially after a stomach pump.

Even if it was your highchair first, by the time you've remembered long enough to realise it (at about 2.5 years old) you're already too big to sit in it comfortably or reclaim it.




Did I have any problems associated with APD?

Of course I did, here's one example:



I was playing out in the street with my friend,

My Mum called and we both ran up the steps of my front garden

As I stood before her, my Mum gave me my largest play basket.

I looked at it then looked at my Mum,

She said, "Here's a Shilling, look after it,"

adding, "I want you to take this shilling....."

and, "you can buy sweets with it"

I scratched my forehead, looked at the coin in my hand and the size of the basket.

I checked....

"You're giving me this shilling?" - "Yes"

"You want me to go to the shops with it?" - "Yes"

"I'm allowed to buy sweets with it??" - "Yes"

"I'm to put whatever I buy in this basket?" - "Yes"

"Am I allowed to take my friend with me?" - "Yes, now hurry along!"



I was stood with my back to the zebra crossing by our shopping centre, contemplating the last of the shilling (threepence) in my hand. Discussing with my friend the merits of various sweet shops we'd just been around.

Hearing, "Bar Ba RA!!!" I turned around to see my Mum cycling angrily across the road towards me.

When she was stood next to me she demanded,
"Where are the cigarettes that you were sent to buy for me?"

Ooops.....