A Million Little Pieces Of My Mind

As October approached, nights began to get too cold for camping. Plus, the kids had already started school in Reston; so Mary and I found a multi-level townhouse for rent in Reston's Inlet Court development, on the shore of Lake Anne. We lived there for the next year, at which time we moved into another, slightly larger townhouse in the same development. I continued to work at NASD, commuting to their offices in Washington, D.C. by Metrorail.

Both places had three levels. On the ground floor were the kitchen, living room, and the master bedroom which Mary and I took, of course. the second and third floors had two bedrooms each, meaning each kid could have their own room! Which they wanted to decorate.

I had been given an oil painting on canvas board by my mother's cousin Malcolm, a peaceful, snowy little farmscape. Karen took a fancy to it, and asked if she could mount it in her room. I gave permission, and she asked so confidently it never occurred to me that, at 9 years old, she might not know how. After all, surely she'd seen me hang a few pictures in all those years!

She hung the painting…by driving a 3-inch nail right through the image and into the wall! I hung it properly after that, making sure she watched for the next time.

John had a poster he asked if he could mount on his wall. I gave permission, but he'd asked so confidently I assumed he already knew how to do that. He was only 7, but it was only a poster and I figured he planned to tape it to the wall. That was my mistake, as I realized when we discovered he'd coated the back of the entire poster with a thick layer of Elmer's Glue, and stuck it to his wall, where it melded with the dry wall and became impossible to remove without damaging the wall.

The townhouse came with an enclosed patio, and, in those days before video games and other devices, the kids spent a lot of time outside "building" things. As Reston was still under construction back then, there was no shortage of cast-off building supplies for them to use. Or rest on.

Always on the lookout for bargains (a trait I inherited from my father), one day I came upon little wooden desks perfect for young students, and only $20 each! They did have to be put together; but I made it a family project and so the kids got to put their own desks together, learning a little about woodworking along the way.

They used those desks for years afterwards.