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Having relatives in Springfield Gardens and Poughkeepsie, N.Y. made life a lot more tolerable than had I been confined to the streets of Brooklyn. It also made me see that there were better ways to live. I would sit in school in the city and dream of going away to the country. I never could understand why country kids dreamed of going to the city. I admit that for me it was a matter of the grass being greener elsewhere. For those country kids it must have been a "grayer pavement" sort of thing. I was a change of life baby and prided myself on the fact that I had a niece and nephew who were older than me. Their mother (my half sister) and I shared the same birthday, 25 years apart. It happens. On weekends my sister, Janet, and I would get to visit them in Springfield Gardens, Long Island, which to me was like a field trip into the country. Jan and I grew up with George and Flo. He was Sonny back then and she was Snooky. It got confusing, sometimes, since I was also Sonny in my early years. Parents weren't big on originality back in the thirties. I wasn't complaining, though, poor old Janet never got a nickname. Here are a few pictures to help get the feel of those days when life was simple ̶ except for WWII, of course. CLICK HERE to start and then just click each picture to go to the next one.
Jan, Mom, and Me in Poughkeepsie
From Right: Jan, Sonny, Me, and Snooky Still Growing-
According to Flo (Snooky), the girl on the right side of the
picture is Janet Deremer who lived down the street from her family in
Springfield Gardens.
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