Greetings From The Circus

I don't know if everyone knows my fascination with Harper Lee. I realize she is a very private person. I totally get that she doesn't want to talk to the media and be bothered by crazies like myself but I would so love to meet her. I am not a stalker. I am a Southerner. I do have some manners.
My love for To Kill A Mockingbird began in high school. I had a couple of really good English teachers who encouraged me to write, they were at the same time encouraging me to read. Since both required sitting still I avoided them both diligently. I did, however watch the movie with Gregory Peck and that little girl who was the spitting image of ME at that age. I connected with the characters in the film on several levels. I had no siblings but had playmates much like Scout. My cousin Len was my Dill and his brother James was Jem. After a few years, our little Gina came along but was more a princess than an explorer. We had no lawyer daddies but ours did go to work and understood that good and bad people came in different colors. We grew up looking for trouble in the neighborhood. We were given pretty much free reign of our street as long as either my mama or their housekeeper could be heard at mealtime.
We were strictly forbidden from Mr Taunton's apple trees, our grandmother took naps after lunch and went to bed with the chickens so there were times when the east end of our street where she lived, was off limits due to our propensity to loudness. Airport road to the west was too busy, so we were not allowed to ride our bicycles up there until we were teenagers. Other than that the kingdom of Vernon Avenue was ours. This was my Maycomb, just a little neighborhood a few miles from downtown, too far to walk but easily accessible in my mama's Impala.
I was, like Scout, a thinking child. I wondered a great deal about people and things. I am sure I embarrassed my mother on more than one occasion by wondering out loud in front of others.
But, I mostly wondered to myself. I was told at an early age that I had a vivid imagination. I always thought this was a compliment. Now as the mother of children with this same gift I wonder if it is the beginning of trouble. It can be a curse in a child who has no moral compass. Imagination and lying are close in nature depending on the situation. I pray they know the difference. I think I did for the most part. I think I was honest in my imagination. I could discern when things were possible or not, sometimes causing myself to be viewed as a coward. This was something my boy cousins next door were never accused of. No tree was too tall, no bike trick was too scary, no bee was too much a threat...of course, I was inevitably the one who always got stung. We set fire to stuff, tied strings to lizards (well, I did not do that because I had an open fear of them at the time), pilfered though things we had no business in, had wars with rotten tomatoes and plums. Summers seemed endless, falls and winters were mild and filled with school and holidays. With no central air or heat our windows were open many months of the year. We would whistle or whisper from house to house after dark. Many times our mothers would be sitting in one of our kitchens and we could play outside until bath and bedtime. Our daddies talked occasionally. They were brothers but had less to talk about than our mothers.
My aunt worked in an office, she wore pretty clothes and heels everyday. She was considerably younger than my mother but seemed much more sophisticated. She smoked, I really did not like the way it smelled though and never had the desire to try it even though I thought she looked very cool. Back in that day you could get little candy cigarettes to look like a grown-up. No one thought anything about smoking, even Andy Griffith did it.
I mentioned Mr Taunton's apples. He was a quiet man. I never heard him speak really. My mother talked to Mrs Taunton often and she seemed to like the kids but Mr Taunton accused us all of stealing his apples one summer. I was no part of it and was very offended to have been included in the brood of thugs. My mother was mad too. She did not talk to Mr Taunton for a while after that. She knew if I ever did anything wrong my moral compass would give me up every time. This continued even into my teen years. I would tell her if i was going "yard rolling" or was skipping school to go to the next town over to shop with girlfriends. She never questioned my motives. It is a rare and precious gift, to be trusted. I was given that gift and learned to nurture it. I never had to lie about where I had been or who I had been with. My dad had his doubts but for the most part knew I was an honest kid.
We had characters in our neighborhood but to ever write my story I will have to create new ones. I would never want to hurt the people I grew up around. They were sweet hardworking folks. I talk to people occasionally who lived around me. I am hoping they will share memories that will help me write a book about growing up in the south in a neighborhood that was real. None of us had perfect families, none of us were perfect people. I remember the raised eyelids and whispered conversations when the first black family moved into the house across the street from us. We all learned so much from them. We cried and hugged when a job took them away from us. I lost touch with them a long time ago. They returned up north with experience to tell about their years in the south, in a white neighborhood. I would love to find them now.
I started this entry about Harper Lee. I still would love to meet her. If you have connections, consider getting me in touch with her, not as a crazed fan, just as someone who loves her story and has one or two of my own.