Gary's Childhood Interests

I have always been interested in the heavens since I was a little tiny kid. I used to love to spend summer nights lying on inter tubs at night and looking at the stars.

I loved to draw; especially birds and I loved to identify birds as well. I loved to draw hydroplanes as well. Hydroplane racing was big when we were kids! We had 3 channels in Seattle eventually, ABC, NBC, CBS; and that was it for years. When we had hydroplane races all 3 channels would cover the race. We didn’t’ have super bowls back then, but when a football or game was on TV only one station would cover it. But when hydroplane races came to Seattle all stations would cover it. You could just flip back and forth through the stations. I loved to draw them.
Later when I got older I took mechanical drawing in school I learned techniques and had straight edges and I would draw houses. That was really fun, I don’t know if I submitted them to contests or not. I loved houses full of windows, high and low, my houses had a lot of windows.

I was also knows for my good penmanship. I had to learn to print for the military and then for the fire service. All of our paperwork had to be printed and now I print for the bus so I am now illiterate in long hand. All I do now is sign my name, but I print everything else. I really enjoyed writing in long hand.

I also enjoyed telling stories. I wasn’t much pf a story writer but I could tell good stories. I could tell a story! I remember I could tell a sad story and I would have all of my cousins crying. I could tell a scary story and I would have them just about ready to leap out of bed and run to mom. Whenever we went to the Jones’ the four younger kids were our ages. When it was time for bed our parents would tell us to go to bed and the kids would say. “No, Gary has to tell us a story”. Our parents would grumble and say okay because they knew we were stalling. But we would get ready for bed and I would tell a story. A good story had to have a dog getting injured to have an effect on them or scary woods. I knew how to scare the daylights out of them, I would even scary the daylights out of me. I remember I would be telling a story and my voice would begin to shake cause even I would be scared.

I didn’t like to tell stories to the adults. When ever my older cousins would come in to listen I would quit because I would get embarrassed.
I would never tell them to older kids or adults. My fame spread all over the place.