[most of this stuff probably fits after first grade or after second grade, but I wanted to get it down.]
Mom used to lock us out of the house. Now, I don't blame her at all. I think she should have locked us out more.
Ryan has a great routine about this, when he goes to the door and asks for a drink of water and Mom says 'Use the hose!'.
We used the hose a lot. We got our drinks outside.
We relieved ourselves outside a lot - an advantage of being a boy growing up on the farm. Once, when we were living at Gramma Meade's my kindergarten year, Mom smelled something bad coming from the basement. She asked her dad to check it out. He came back up and said 'You boys been pissin' in the drain?' and Kyle said 'Uh huh.'
Mom locked us out of the house, and we played outside a lot. A lot of it was OK. But I still wanted to be inside. I wanted to be in the air conditioning - we had a window unit. I wanted to watch soap operas with my mom. I got hooked on soap operas. When I was a kid I watched a lot of 'All My Children', 'One Life to Live', and, everyone's favorite, 'General Hospital'. We were ABC soap watchers. Strange, I know. I hope most of it was just wanting to be inside.
For a lot of years I felt guilty about my desire to be inside. I felt lazy because I didn't want to work on the farm. And don't get me wrong, I'm considerably lazy. But a big part of it was other interests. I would rather lay inside and read Hardy Boys then do farm work. Part of my aversion to outside farmwork was probably owing to my serious sinus problems and allergies.
I also feel that I'm not good at handyman and farm stuff. Sure, I can do some 'handy' things. I'm not at a total loss. But I'm not very adept, certainly not above average. Furthermore, since I'm not interested and not good at it, I don't remember how to do it the next time. Even if you tell me once, chances are I'll have to ask you again. I still can't remember if the oil in a car should be checked hot or cold. Same for the tires. It took me a long time to learn how to make coffee - how much coffee to put in for what amount of water. Most of the time, when I need to tackle something moderately handy, I call Dad or Ryan to talk me through it.
