Kindercamp and my first girlfriend

My first foray into the educational system - if you can call it that - was when I was, what, 4 years old (about 1969 or 1970) when I started going to Kindercamp, as it was called.

Kindercamp comes BEFORE kindergarden and is more of a daycare than actual education. I wonder if my parents paid something for that. It was housed downtown in the basement of the church behind the Shelby Post Office (yes, there's only one Post Office in Shelby) which was just down the backstreet from the Marvin Memorial Library and next door to the ice cream Drive In. They had/have a cool drive-through window, something unusual for those times. The drive in's name escapes me now but these years it has a kind of 1950s theme to it.

Shelby Post Office on North Gamble Street, corner of Whitney Avenue, Shelby Ohio

Mom would drive me every morning to kindercamp. While it was housed in the basement of the church (see building at far right edge of above photo) it was not a religious center of any kind. Seemed pretty normal to me. We had story time where we would grab our piece of carpet and lie down on the floor while listening to the woman reading a book about a dog or cat or both. I don't recall falling asleep during the reading but no doubt it happened.

And they had the best toys there. What's NOT great about spending 4 hours in a place when all these thousands of toys are new to you, you get to paint and paste and make macaroni "portraits", and also hold hands with the cute girls. I suppose some fights among the boys took place over WHO would get to play with the charp-edged metal plow toy but no one ever bothered or tested me.

I clearly remember my first day. I cried and cried, not wanting to go in, scared to death of this new and strange place. But after the first few minutes I was fine. And within a few days - or maybe weeks - I had my first ever girlfriend... errr.. girlfriendS - plural.

My first FIRST girlfriend's name was ANGIE. She was tall for her age too as I recall, and so very cute, black hair, beautiful smile. We never kissed, I don't think, but did look longingly into each others eyes and if you THINK you're boyfriend-girlfriend then heck, YOU ARE! In fact, we were boyfriend-girlfriend several times throughout the first few years of school but at that age its tough to be a one girl boy. hehehe...

Mom would pick me up at around noon and take me home or run errands. Funny, I don't remember HOW she came to get me but imagine she came on foot since we only lived about 8 or 10 blocks away - and since we only had one car and Dad took that to work. Surely we'd often go to Main Street's Ben Franklin store and 5 and Dime store to buy knitting supplies for her and a candy for me.

After our long walk home for my 2 little legs, Mom prepared a delicious lunch for me, with my best memories being of grilled cheese sandwiches and Campbell's Soup, my favorite being the chicken noodle soup. But those grilled cheese sandwiches, using Velveeta Cheese (was it reallllly cheese???) were the best.