I do not do good with facts, tending to get them all comfabulated somewhere, and to back it up with paper, well there are a dozen places I could have put those pieces of paper...in my living room alone. But I shall endeavor. The box full of all my old stuff from my lives gone by is the best place to start I think. A dozen little pictures flash through my mind of me putting bits and pieces of my life in it. I was born in Bridgeport General Hospital, located in Bridgeport, Connecticut. that is from my birth certificate and a hospital certificate with my footprint on it.  I have a baby book that chronicles my life up to grade school which I do not really remember. I was healthy and loved, from the entries I read in it. I have several pictures of my birthdays from this time period; I was spoiled too.
            I entered school in Center Annex School, in Seymour Connecticut, grades K-2. I have class pictures with those grades on them with the name of the school. I was cute and for some reason always laughing, go figure. I remember moving to Maine after that and living with my grandparents for a time. I have the class picture that says I went to school at Jefferson Street School during my third grade with a certain teacher from that class but that is a different story. My grandparents have long since sold the house, and  the school is no longer there, sadly. Long after I had moved away I fell down the marble stairs of the front entryway of that school and severely sprained an ankle. I figured it was a parting gift.
            We moved to Orrington, Maine in the middle of the school term, so I was not in Old Town a whole year. I have my brother's fifth Grade picture which says he was in South Orrington Elementary Fifth grade. He did not move to Orrington alone, much as he would have liked to have gotten rid of me, I just had to tag along. I do not know why mother gave me his pictures, I think to get them out of her drawers. I have a few more class pictures of different grades through the years in Orrington, I had a lot of hair.
            I participated in our country's bicentennial events as per the Orrington newsletter dated...OMG! 1976! I demonstrated the fine art of dipping candles. the picture of me in frontier garb working over a vat of hot candle wax is too grainy and yellowed to tell what the candles looked like but I think they were ok, little skinny maybe. I graduated elementary school in June of 1978. I have the graduation announcement stuck in my baby book
           I have a bit  more stuff from high school then I did my junior high years. A program from the basketball games at the Bangor auditorium, John Bapst High School letter from doing the rally squad, (think pom pom girl) Finally a copy of my high school diploma, which is stuck in the baby book with my eight grade graduation announcement. I have tenderly preserved my next document a DD-214 which says I joined the military on June 20, 1981. I remember that day and the bus ride that took me from my life as a daughter, sister, child, to my life as a sailor, wife, mother, and friend.

An Autobiography of My Life, by Me

I remember...with a factual back up ...I can do this, although I am much more able to do it when I have all my switches on. Maybe not at 4 in the morning, although I am usually up at that hour Wednesday I would be at work as evidenced by three years worth of time cards for Wed, mornings, compliments of the Piscataquis Observer. I do not do good with facts, tending to get them all comfabulated somewhere, and to back it up with paper, well there are a dozen places I could have put those pieces of paper...in my living room alone. But I shall endeavor. File box is a good place to start. I was born in Bridgeport General Hospital, located in Bridgeport, Connecticut. that is from my birth certificate and hospital certificate. I was enrolled in Center Annex School K, 1, ans 2. I have class pictures with those grades on them with the name of the school. I remember moving to Maine and I have the class picture that says I went to school at Jefferson Street School during my third grade. I remember a certain teacher from that class but that is a different story. We moved to Orrington, Maine, so I was not in Old town  a whole year. I have my brother's fifth Grade picture which says he was in South Orrington Elementary Fifth grade. He did not move to Orrington alone, much as he would have liked to have gotten rid of me, I just had to tag along. I participated in our country's bicentennial events as per the Orrington newsletter dated OMG! 1976! and I graduated elementary school in June of 1978. I have the graduation announcement stuck in my baby book, along with my high school one dated 1981 from Brewer High School. I have tenderly preserved my next document a DD-214 which says I joined the military on June 20, 1981 and was discharged on February 29, 1984. Let it be said that there is no moss growing on this rolling stone, my son's birth certificate says he was born on March 6, 1984. It was really a rather busy week for me. 
 I was married on June 23, 1984, and moved to South Carolina after that. So says the wedding announcement in the paper can't tell which paper though since I only have the article clipping. I had my daughter on July 27,1985. We left South Carolina for Guantanamo Bay, Cuba. I have the plane tickets still. On a side note, if you ever get the chance to live in the Caribbean...take it. The pictures you see in the movies and magazines are nothing compared to the real thing.
Left Cuba, kicking and screaming, for...Beeville, Texas. There is no document to prove I was kicking and screaming, but I really was; I just did not want to leave. However Beeville is where my youngest son was born. Shortly after which we were transferred to Pensicola, Florida. We lived there for a few years and the last year there we were lucky enough to experience our first hurricane, we were so amazed by the experience we had to repeat it again. I have clippings.
After the second hurricane my husband was transferred to North Carolina, kids school records. Three days after arriving there,  I experienced the third hurricane. That was nauseatingly fun. So much so that a few months later I tried again. I am the only person alive I think that has experienced 4 hurricanes in the space of one year's time almost to the day. Hurricane Erin in August of 1995,Opal in October of 1995, Bertha in July of 1996, Fran in September of 1996. There is a list somewhere of those hurricanes having struck Florida and North Carolina I am sure. I really hate hurricanes now and if I am ever in another one, I am going to get drunk and pass out, waking up after the storm has passed so I do not have to see it or hear it. I left my husband in July of 1997 and moved to Maine. Rental agreement and then later on school records of the kids. Divorce in 1999. Married again in 2005, moved to Dover in my own little trailer in November of 2005. Enrolled in college in January of 2010 and was on the Dean's List that first semester. Got knocked off the second semester by Chemistry. I was back on the honor roll for the third semester but not enough to pull up the C in chemistry that I received my second semester. There is something inherently wrong about adding letters.  Sewer pipes blew up, have the bill for that one, and that brings me here to today, where I live next to my river, surrounded by all the little bits and pieces of the proof of my life, kinda like all those picture negatives no one ever knows what to do with, that are just lying around, collecting dust, waiting to be a memory.

A Memory of Boot Camp

   As I stood there in the bright morning sunshine, I watched the long black car pull out of the parking lot, speeding off down the road towards the interstate. I was able to glimpse the back of my son's head in the rear window. He was turned around watching me with a stillness that belied his near panic at finally being shipped off to boot camp. Superimposed over this scene was another just like it some 30 years ago, almost to the day, when I was the one in that long black car, turned around looking out the window at my father. He who was the one standing there in the rain watching me being driven away. I bowed my head a moment and asked God to take care of my son, I no longer could. I had done my job and it was now his turn to live and learn and oh what an adventure he was going to have. If he survived boot camp. I wondered as I walked to my car if my father had said the same kind of prayer for me. I will have to ask him next time he calls me.
    Boot camp I thought about it as I had not for the last 30 years. How young I had been, naive. Just because you have graduated from high school does not make you an adult. I vividly remember seeing my Dad out the rear window of the greyhound bus. He was standing there all hunched up with his raincoat on, the day appropriately raining. I put the palm of my hand, fingers spread, upon the window. The last act of my childhood.
      I watched as Dad pulled his hand out of his pocket; palm up, fingers spread, he returned the gesture. The last act of a father to his adolescent daughter. I stayed turned around; watching until I could no longer see the crumbling old greyhound bus station, built of brick and mortar, standing sentinel there on the end of the bridge. I watched long enough to see my father wipe his face and slowly turn away.  I turned around then and thought about the new adventure I was going on, how it all began with this bus ride.
     It was a nice bus as buses go black leather comfy, squishy seats. I woke up as we were pulling into the station in Portland, did I mention the late night party the night before? My friends, being my friends, wanted to make sure I got off to boot camp in the right frame of mind, which was namely, hung-over. They had gone to great lengths to ensure that I would only remember the important parts of the trip. Getting on the bus, and then getting off the bus. Luckily, upon arriving at the indoc center in Portland, there were other hung-over teenagers getting off the bus with me; if I was in the wrong place, I would not be the only one. We were really a motley looking crew that is for sure.
     We were immediately met by a man wearing a tan uniform who hollered a lot. I wondered if he had throat lozenges in his pocket. He caught me wondering and wanted to know if I was retarded, his words not mine.   “No sir,” I said, at this point my eyes almost fell out of my head looking at him, “I am not.”
     “Then why are you not paying attention?”  he asked me, looking me straight in the eye.
     I swear the only thing I could think to say was, “because I like a challenge sir!..?” So NOT a good move. For the rest of my overnight stay in Portland, I was known as, ‘The Girl Who Liked a Challenge.’
     Portland was the place that a potential service member began their screening by any chosen branch of service. Think of it as separating the wheat from the chaff. That is where our teeth were initially examined, yup, I had some. We spoke to a psychiatrist. Yup, most of us could put three words together to make a sentence. There was a marine wanna-be that had to have the questions repeated a couple of times, he still passed though. Did I mention I was going in the Navy? A lawyer went over the final service contracts with us; yup I really did sign my name on this, this, and this, line. They sent us to a hotel while they typed everything up. Fortunately there was one of us of legal age to buy alcohol, and again we showed up at the office the next morning, miserable and motley looking.
     We were again counseled on contracts, we saw the doctor one last time, and then we all gathered in the blue room. I do not know if that is the name of it or not but the walls were deep blue, the carpets were deeper blue and the furniture was even bluer. The only contrast was the gold and brass accessories and the American Flag. We all had to stand and be sworn in to our perspective branches. Then handing us our orders and shaking our hands we were welcomed aboard the fleet, hustled out the door, and sent to the airport.
     The airport was interesting. I was excited because it was my first plane trip.  It was not a good experience. We were almost half way to Orlando when we hit a thunderstorm over the Carolinas. I do not know what the storm was like down below, but in our little plane above, the women and some of the men were screaming. things were falling out of the overhead racks, babies were crying, and I was writing my last will and testament. It was short document as I did not own anything.  I held the hand of a little old lady sitting next to me for the longest time.  When the plane finally landed in Orlando, everybody was still crying and hugging, even the stewardesses. They hugged the pilots. The fellow who met the plane asked how the flight was. I really wanted to say, I like a challenge, but I could not quite get it out of my mouth through all the blubbering. I believe he understood, “Not Good” though.,

Pipes Away!

 
     A year ago I bought my .19 acres on the Piscataquis River from a guy who out bid me at an auction put on by the town. The town claimed the property when the people living there in a different trailer had the misfortune of having a tree fall on their trailer; not being able to afford a new trailer, they had let the property go to the town. I hired a fella to demolish the old trailer and clean up the lot, which he did. He was also supposed to move my trailer to it and set it up, which at the last minute he could not do. Now I have to pay another person to move my trailer and set it up. He gets it moved over there but then he tells me he doesn't set trailers up. My son-in-law says, "I will do it for you, just make me meatloaf."  I thought for a minute and yup ok sounds good to me.
     I did not know that was the beginning of my downfall. I had originally paid the first fella to set the trailer up, then I had paid the second guy as well, but they don't do the setting up. My son-in-law tried to help and sort of got things level but not being a plumber, his pipes fell apart less than a couple of days after he swore it was all set. He tried to fix it the night they blew apart but I was pretty sure, when he went out with the duct tape and a flashlight, that he was out of his depths with the plumbing. My money for getting everything set up had run out since I had paid everyone to tell me that they do not 'do' setting up trailers, and my church finally agreed to help me out and that brought me to Greg, my plumber.
     Greg is a very nice man and a licensed plumber and he did the work of setting up my sewer lines and waterlines and insulating everything for me with heat tape, all for the grand total of $524.67. He came under  bid he says. I believe it. He was paid the bid anyway. I have been living in the trailer happily flushing ever since, up until about 3 weeks ago.
     Three weeks ago, I was admiring my beautiful clean river. I am not foolish to think that the water was drinkable clean but it was getting there, until I came along. As I am hanging out the laundry, I hear the distinct sounds of running water and after looking around I see water coming out from a pipe that is jutting out just over the edge of my river bank which is a fiftyish foot almost-sheer drop, and oh my, the pipe is coming from the direction of my trailer. I ran in the house and after filling up the washer and hitting the spin cycle, I then ran back outside to watch. Oh what a sight, and then WOW what a smell. At first my reaction is to do nothing, what is one person's raw sewerage, really? Then about an eighth of a second later, I realize that I cannot do that, so I call my friend Jay.
     Jay is a really nice fella and is good friends with my husband. When my husband became tied up out of town, Jay told him he would help me out if I needed it. Well, I was thinking that I needed it about then. So the next day that Jay has off, he comes over and takes a look at my pipes. "Geez, Leisa all your pipes are good, no leaks or anything. It is the pipes under the ground and those belong to the town. They are the town's sewer lines, they must have burst or broke or something. The town has to come out and look at them, this is on them."
     "Are you sure Jay," I ask, "because once I call the town I can't pretend I didn't." Jay nods and tells me he is sure. So I call the town. They came right out. I was really impressed with the speed of their response. Most ambulances don't even have that kind of response time.
     The town tells me they are only responsible for the pipes leading up to the first stub(the end of the pipe that hooks into the main line). "Ok," I ask, "where is the first stub?" The town guy looks at my lawn and rubs his chin for a minute, consults a paper and looks at my lawn again then points to a spot about 6 inches off the road onto my lawn. The rest of it is your pipes, he says and by the way the stub and accompanying pipes are listed as 5 1/2 feet down.
      At this point I call Greg, my plumber. Greg, comes right over. It is after all his name on the original permit that says he made sure everything was up to code, and the fact that I was maybe hyperventilating on the phone may have had something to do with it as well. I now have Jay, who is arguing with the Town Plumbing Inspector about who's pipes are where, and Greg who is trying to explain things to my son-in-law, who had come right over with my daughter and then tried to tell me what the plumbing inspector, Jay, and Greg the Plumber, have all told me, already. I am crying and my daughter is trying to tell me my son-in-law will take care of everything (Remember he is the one who tried to fix the pipes with duct tape). I may have cried harder at that one.
     The long and short of it is, that we have in the course of digging up my whole front and back yard looking for a pipe that is 5 and 1/2 feet under ground, found a septic tank. Which means that I am not hooked to the town sewer system. The tank is old and rotted, the tank lid having fallen apart and dirt is falling in to the tank. Did I mention the tank is under my trailer...literally? Now I have to hook up to the town sewer system and start paying a bill. Greg the plumber who felt bad, is only charging me 75.00 to turn all the sewer lines around from the back side of the trailer to the front. The town says I am not in any trouble. I am thinking at this point if I am, so is the plumbing inspector, and the town. My husband has told me to put a lid on the tank, have the lines hooked up and he will take care of everything when he comes home, maybe next February.
     The situation is still ongoing and each day seems to bring a new chapter to the saga. There are four trenches of varying lengths and depths in the front and back yards as well as a several holes, all of them at least four feet deep and some deeper. My father called a few days ago and I told him about what was happening. After I finished, there was a long pause, and all Dad said to me was, "You have what is known as 'a fluid situation' on your hands."  He could not even say it with a straight face...