No matter. Here is Meadowlark Elementary School, where I attended grades one and two:
Which of these memories most dominates? Wm. Pene du Bois' The Alligator Case, which actually reached out to me from the library stacks, and initiated a whole lifetime's worth of reading stuff, instead of actually doing stuff. Or, Mrs. Neufeld, my grade one teacher, who was remarkably, consecutively mean to me. Ask the folks. This is true. We don't know why.
Let's go for that first memory, domination-wise. Because just around the corner from the school, on this same spot (though not in the same building), we have the Jasper Place Branch of the Edmonton Public Library. I remember going in there, very small, and I remember that my eyes got very big.
Then there's this:
Meadowlark Elementary again. Just a gate in the fence, into the school yard. But it was here that Allison, the giant girl in my grade 2 class who was definitely more than 6 or 7 years old, caught up with me, and instilled a measure of female-related anxiety that lives with me to this very day. Sorry about that, Sharon!
