Florida.  Mom had lots of relatives there, and still does.  Most of her eight brothers and sisters and their families centered in the small community of Citrus Park, then northwest of Tampa.  Tampa now has a toll road exit in this then lazy community.  Who's who?  Mom has only one full brother, Warren Muncey, who I've never met.  Her mother died of toxemia when mom was six years old.  I've always known that hurt mom alot.  She talks about her mother so fondly and nicely.  I sure home to meet some of these folks like her someday.

Grandpa remarried some time later and had seven more children; John, Jim, Donald, Peggy, Marie, Raymond, and Bill.  Grandpa foamed with character.  He reminds me of Paul, the apostle, I've been studying the last three weeks (July 1980).  His high, squeeky voice, in my day at least, rang the room.  He still knows how to tell a grandson what to do!

Mark, my brother, was about four years old when Grandpa teased him one day.  Exasperated Mark told Mon, "tell that boy to leave me alone."  Grandpa Muncey, you see, stood about five feet tall and made up in spirit what he lacked in height.  He always made his fingers look like one was cut off by folding one back in his hand.  I think he was proud that he could pull off this trick better than anyone else.  You see, he was missing the end of one of his fingers, lost to a table saw.  He didn't seem to care at all.  It added to his joke.

Later, in December 1969 or January 1970, at age 74, he held his blind son, John, shingle the roof of their house.  Grandpa fell, and would have fallen off the roof but John got a ladder and held him until the ambulance came.  He died within a few days.  That's the kind of man Grandpa Muncey was, one who wouldn't quit until the end.

The rest of Mom's family?  Grandma Muncey, the mother of seven, is still alive here in 1984 (I let this manuscript rest for a few years didn't I?).  She's the kind of Grandma you'd expect a grandma to be; a pleasant, cheerful person.  The kind of person who can both take care of apple pies and stubbed toes.  Uncle John, who you'll hear more about, shot a staple into a pop bottle at age ten, as the story goes.  The staple richoceted back and hit his eye, blinding him in one eye complete, and not helping the other eye which lost much of its sight too.

Uncle Jim and Aunt Alma have ten children.  They've lived in Citrus Park, Florida forever, it seems.  When I visited him while living in Florida when I was in eighth grade, he advised me not to move around the country like Mom and Dad continued to do . . . too expensive he said.  He recommended staying in one area and getting established.  I guess I've finally taken his advice, (1989 note) as I've returned to Arkansas and intend to stay here forever!  (2002: so much for that theory!  The Forest Service paid me too well to not stay in Arkansas, I guess).

Uncle Donald and Aunt Barbara lived near us at several places, including Citrus Park and southern California.  I remember camping with them in the high sierras.  OK, maybe the low sierras.  Seemed high to me!

Aunt Peggy and Uncle Donald also live in Citrus Park.  Still do!  They have seven kids between them.  I certainly don't remember all their names.

Aunt Marie and Uncle Marshall's family and ours spend more time together than the other families, and their kids are nearest my age.  More stories about them will come later.  

Uncle Raymond and Aunt Betty Jo lived in several places including the Tampa area, Yellville, and North Carolina, all near my parents at the times.

I don't know much about Uncle Bill or Uncle Warren.  Since the first draft, I've met Bill several times.  He now owns land in north Georgia where I've seen him.  I've met Uncle Warren's daughter too.

Our home in Florida stands on piers, a modest white frame house as many in Florida at the time.  One hot, humid day even your fingers would stick together.  Philip wants to know just how hot Florida grows.  So I find a thermometer and lay it on the porch in the sun.  I learn a lesson I'll never forget from my earliest scientific experiment.  Thermometers and sunshine don't mix.  The thermometer breaks.  Mom reminded me of another similar experiment.  I tried to fry an egg on the front steps, but I remember doing that in California a year later . . . maybe I tried to duplicate my results.

In school I join the children marching in the locally famous "Gasparilla" parade.  We go to a local park to practice marching.  It's fun but I can barely keep up.  Finally the big day arrives and we really march in the real parade.  All goes well until we arrive at the bridge.  I hadn't planned on this.  Going over water on foot scares me bad enough, but the holes in the grating make the water visible!  Little slots in the steel make me sure I can fall through into the water.  I see it!  The parade moves on but I hesitate.  Finally, I dash for my life over to the other side.  Ah!  Safe again!

School starts, first grade.  Mrs. Anderson, my first grade teacher, will later teach one of my siblings (Nancy?).  My parents worked hard to have five children in the private Adventist school.  I enjoy school, but the big kids are monsterous.

Mom had taught me the alphabet forwards and backwards (really!), so I would get a good start.  Two things impressed my little brain, the familiar row of green cards with the alphabet, and the tattletail box.  "Mrs. Alderman, Sherry has a nickel in her mouth".  And, plonk, your name's in the tattletale box.  Your name in that square on the board seemed like having to carry a big placard downtown saying, "I'm a tattletale!" to use first graders.  How horrible, avoid it like the plague.

One day, upon arriving home from school, everyone was in confusion.  What's happening?  The yard spilled over with serious looks, hushed tones, and a lot of bustling about.  Grandma Hyatt grew sick in California.  I finally gathered that much.  What should we do?  We might go out to see her.  But that would mean moving.  Before the sun rose we hit the road.  I would not return east again for five years.

A day or two later found us traveling by night thorough Louisiana.  At three in the morning, only Dad and I have our eyes open as we roll.  We peered thorough the fog; I had too much excitement to sleep.  "California here I come, right back where I started from".  "California or bust".  More than once we saw someon along the road with that sign changed to "California or busted".  Eleven of us packed, quite literally, a 1938 Chevy, two short of the Grapes of Wrath thirteen: Dad, Mom, Granma Kirk, Betty, Richie, Robert, Ellen, Philip, Gregory, Dorothy, and our pet dog, Mingtoi.  Mom calls it a hard trip, with everyone sick at their stomachs.  She remembers stopping "somewhere in Texas" to hang our cloths on a fence to dry.  Fortunately I don't remember that aspect of the trip.

Dorothy Joan, by the way, had joined us in Florida.  I vaguely recall wiating for ther to come home from the hospital.  As usual, I remember the wait better than the event.