I was born in Madison at Meriter Hopsital on December 10, 1986. My mother, Gail Frank, was a single parent who had suffered a miscarriage a little over a year before my birth. My father was not a person my mother wanted around me, so she sheltered me from him until I was twelve-years-old.

The first home we lived at was next to my mother's good friend Melissia. I've never been able to remember the home we lived in, but I can remember Melissia's home with great detail. Her home was a small white house in bad need of new paint. The front yard was a complete mess as I recall, but I do believe today that I viewed all of the plants in her front yard as being messy. In the back yard she had a small stone walkway through her garden which ended in front of a small white shack. I lived next to her for only a few months.

The next place we moved to was a condo near Warner Park. We were the second to last house on the right, ground floor. Down a few condos was the home of a girl who I would become friends with over the couple years I stayed there.

I remember one night, my mother, our dog Aysline, and I were in the small kitchen area when my mother was feeding Aysline dog treats. Heh, I remember taking two from Aysline and eating them. That memory is the earliest I can remember in my life. I was a little over the age of one. Maybe one and two months or so. Prior to that, I have no memory of my life.

For a time while we lived in the condo, my great grandmother came to live with us. I never put it together that she was living with us ... but I did just now. My mother always told me that I wasn't much of a walker until my great grandfather's funeral upon which I began running and never stopped (or so she says). My great grandmother came to live with us because great grandfather had died. Hmm ... I never knew that.

I also remember there being a woman who lived with us. She was a girl who was living on the streets, and my mother took her in. I had always assumed that she was Sunny, the adult who lived with us that I liked. But Sunny was not this girl. Sunny was a friend of this girl. Had I viewed them both as the same person? Do feel that I did. Having spent so much time with Sunny, I gained a life-long wanting to associate myself with older people.

The girl who lived down a few condos I always remembered as being named Brittany. My mother forgot her name, so I am left to rely on my memory from back then. She and I always had great fun. She had a plastic green turtle in her yard. Turns out it was a SANDBOX. Oh the fun we had in the sand =D The day I moved to Janesville, I recall Brittany and I walking to the small park in the center of all of the condos, and we talked about nothing in particular. Come to think of it ... it wasn't a park at all.

A few lasting memories from back then both took place over the same night and morning. That night, it was storming out, and being a kid I was scared. I hadn't been sleeping out of my crib all too long yet, so I was still insecure about everything. While it thundered and lightning, I covered my ears and eyes trying to escape the loud and scary noises. It was at that time I realized that if you cup your hands over your ears and change the opening between your hands and ears, it would reflect the sound of your blood rushing through your head. For what seemed like an hour, I played with that and forgot all about the storm. Later on, however, I crawled out of my crib and to my mother's room. It was there that she sang me a song that was playing on the radio. "Shananana, shanananana, hey hey, goodbye." What bothered me about that song was how long the ending was. To me, it felt like an eterinity. To this day, I hate that song.

My grandpa John lived near Lake Verona. I had always assumed he lived on the lake, but I realize today that I thought that because you could see the lake from a window in his house. Grandpa John was always a cool guy. I loved him so much as a child. He would play with me, tickle me, make me laugh, and feed me raddishes. Mmmmn, raddishes. I used to love those so well. He always had a small bown of raddishes floating in water. I'd munch on them and eat up as many as I could. I enjoyed them for some reason, yet today I can't stand them.

I remember traveling out onto the lake with Grandpa John. I remember slowly moving through the no-wake zone and the water locks, and then I remember flying down the open lake at top throttle on the boat. Oh I always had such a blast! Grandpa John was such a kind and caring man ... I miss him today.

Throughout my time in Madison, I was going to a daycare school-like place where a woman named Mary ran the fun activities. I adored her and idolized her for some reason. Today, I cannot figure out why I liked her. I think what I saw in her that appealed to me was how well she worked with children. She always had something fun for us to do, and I think I adored her because of it.

One final thing I can remember from my time in Madison was our trips to the Madison Zoo. I LOVED the zoo so much! It was so cool. The smells were so interesting. Yeah, the smells of a zoo are apparently interesting. These days, the smell of the monkey cage scares me.

As a child, I lived a pretty decent and happy life. I was always taken care of, I had no problems with me, and I was a happy child with a secure bond to my mother. It was just her and I, and I loved it that way. At the same time, my perceptions of people and items varies from then and now. Now I can look back and think differently than I did then. How interesting?

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