Growing up in Brighton Park..

That is actually an under statement, growing up in Brighton Park was seeing life as i had never seen it before. Yes, i came from a rougher part of the city, but that did not mean I had done everything. Actually i had done very little. Yes, i did stuff around the house and I learned how to protect myself, and I learned the value of money. But I new nothing about love. Yes, i thought I loved that one girl but did I? Did I even know what love was, did she? I cannot answer for her since I heard that girls develop at about 4 years over the male of the same age, so I could say i new nothing of love but maybe she did. Well, now that I think of it, she must have since she went to Texas and got hitched.

Well, there was this girl in the neighborhood who became friends with my sister, she would come over and so would her brother. Her brother and I became friends, we still are. I really did not pay too much attention to her since I was not allowed to date, and I was not allowed to associate with those of another religion. She however apparently liked me. On one occasion she came over with her friends looking for my sister, my sister was not home but before I had a chance to say anything they were in my house, more than that, they were in my bedroom and her friend Anna Silva, had found the wedding invite and letter from Texas. I did not know til she was reading it aloud. Oh well, that was that.

As I became friendly with that girls brother, I went to there house. it seemed that she was always there, no matter what we were doing. After a while I did start to notice her in a different way. But I did not say anything since I felt out of my league. I had noticed one thing about this area which was different from my old neighborhood, that was that boys and girls were hanging out more and dating each other more. You would see them kissing in public and that only led one to expect other activity behind closed doors. i was not ready for that. I really did not know anything about sex and french kissing and all that stuff. You see, my sister and I were not allowed to watch any movies which contained any kissing and of course we were not allowed to go to the show, where I know many saw this and more on the screen as they practiced with their date in the dark show.

Well, things changed and rather quickly. I won't go into detail but that girl became the mother of my children and my wife. You see in my case my first love was really my true love. I now knew the difference in how I felt for this girl. Anyway in March of 1974 she and I were wedd. In October of that year, 45 days before her 15th. birthday and 51 days before my 19th. birthday our first child was born. A little girl with her mother's green eyes. Our second child did not come until 6 years later. We wanted to enjoy our baby. Yes, I recieved punishment from my church elders. i say that because they will have you believe that the punishment comes from God. But all I saw from God was my bride and a beautiful daughter. I was naive back then so I played by man-made rules. I was disfellowshiped from the church. I guess Catholic would call it excommunicated. Whatever you call it I was and after my daughter was born i was deemed fit to be a member again.

I was really in love with my life now. i truly loved my wife. And we were both crazy over our baby. I never imagined that the move from Grenshaw and from 26th. would mean so many life shaping changes for me....