AmazonMidwife

When I was 11 years & 8 months, the 6th grade classes put on a play about Rip Van Winkle from our reader. I was cast as Mrs. Van Winkle and my three strongest memories from the performance were:

1. Scooter was in it. (We went to the same grade school, with 2 classes for each grade, but were only in class together for one year, 3rd grade. Guess the faculty could see that combined, we might not always use our powers for good. They probably should have warned our junior high & high school teachers.)

2. I was encouraged to be mean and loud and bossy, the latter two talents I had (have) aplenty which were discouraged elsewhere. And I even got to hit Russ Bailey in the butt with a broom! (of course that was the most vivid memory)

3. My mom sewed a cool costume for me to wear. This was a less vivid memory, 'cause my mom sewed a lot of my clothes when I was that age, so I took it for granted. Home Ec was one of her majors and she was an excellent seamstress, a quality I learned to appreciate most after she was gone & I had to sew all the kids' costumes & pjs with my meager junior high time in the home ec sewing room.

Time passed and lots more things happened that were more memorable than the play. (see #1 italics for a good example) I forgot all about the costume until I was cleaning out the house after my mom died. I found it in a drawer with some baby clothes and socks. (My mom saved lots of things, including many photo albums & scrapbooks with newspaper clippings, old report cards, etc. including photos of the play & a picture from our smalltown newspaper.)

Seeing the costume brought back a lot of the memories, as well as a greater appreciation for my mom as well as another pang of grief that she was gone. I took the costume, along with a couple pairs of her fanciest shoes for the Girl to put in the costume box. The shoes were a big hit---a pair of spectator pumps, some red heels & some pink flats---Mom loved her some shoes; we would say that she'd buy shoes to prevent other women from having them...until shoes became synonymous with Imelda Marcos.

But the costume was too well made, too special for me to give the then 5 year old Girl. I put it away, along with a couple other dresses that I had worn, one for my role in a cousin's wedding, and the one I wore as best maid to MamaDee's wedding. I found them again in January, when I was getting out some more sweaters to wear in the freezing cold. Seeing them gave me an idea which I described on Twitter as "just persuaded the girls' history class to write AND act in a playlet for the homeschool fair through the clever use of costumes."

Here they are after their performance:

Something finally struck me after seeing the Girl on stage yesterday. We make a big fuss over how tall she is, but she's almost the same age I was when I wore the costume (11 years 4 months) and I didn't alter it for her. I don't remember being remarkable tall at that age, (though I was taller than my 5'2" mom), but I suppose that the genes are the same. What do you think?