Superstar

I'm listening to The Carpenters while I clean the house. To me, they represent my childhood in the 1970s. The feelings I had that the world was perfect, and everyone around me too. Nothing bad ever happened to me or anyone I loved. The most horrible thing was having an annoying little brother.

The summers were especially wonderful. There were children everywhere, it was sunny almost every day. We would bea at the pool all day and play out at night and catch fireflies while the grown-ups sat in folding lawn chairs and talked. The parents all took turns buying treats for all of us from the ice cream when he arrived at our block. My best friend Lisa and I would circle the block for hours, playing either The Carpenters music or the Captain and Tenille or her cassette player. This was years before Sony Walkmans and iPods.

My grandparents were always there. Always. It was wonderful that they lived in an apartment up the block from ours. They would pass by my bedroom window on their walk down to our side of the block. I would just get so HAPPY seeing them pass by, knowing they would be around. I was so blessed.