Firsts

First Job: Other than "kid jobs" (babysitting, etc), my first "real" job was a summer job as a biller-clerk for a company (San Francisco Tool) that sold cheap tools. My high school "big sister" Joycie was working there and managed to get me the summer job. The best part of the job was meeting Joycie for breakfast each morning. We'd have hot chocolate and warm pastries.

First Favorite Politician: John Kennedy. I remember babysitting the night he was running for the vice presidential nomination and how disappointed I was that he lost.

First Car: Never had my own car, but the car my parents were driving when I was born was a Plymouth and the car Walt had when we married was a Nash Rambler.

First Record/CD: I'm not sure if it was the first record I bought, but my first long playing record (which was 10", not 12") was the sound track recording of the movie Calamity Jane. I had bought lots of 78 rpm singles before we got a record player that would play long-playing records. Those were the days when you could take a record from a clerk, go into a listening room, and play it before you made the decision to buy.

First Sport Played: We played baseball in my friend Stephen's concrete yard (where we had no bat, but used our arms instead, first base was a concrete lump on the right hand wall of the yard, 2nd base was the middle of the back wall, and 3rd base was the stairs). The "yard" was the space between the apartment building Stephen lived in and our flat complex. I don't think the whole thing was 6' wide. Our kitchen window loooked out on the yard, so my mother could keep track of us as we played. The only other sport I ever played was basketball in high school. We all did and you can tell how bad I was because I almost never played in a real game. I think we also played volleyball, but I don't ever remember playing it in competition.

First Concert: All the kids in our school went to San Francisco Symphony concerts yearly when I was in grammar school. The first adult concert I remember going to was a Judy Garland concert at the Opera House in San Francisco. She came through and did a week of shows. Alan King was the comedian who was on the bill with her. I was able to go three times.

First Foreign Country Visited: Canada. Walt and I went to Jasper and Banff on our honeymoon.

First Favorite TV Show: I don't know. We got our first TV in 1953, so it was a long time ago, but it was probably the Ed Sullivan show...or maybe Dr. Kildare (the start of my lifelong enjoyment of medical shows!).

First Favorite Actor: Believe it or not, Claude Rains. I don't remember what I saw him in that I liked (it wasn't Casablanca), but I had a huge crush.

First Favorite Actress: I can't remember the name of the actress. I don't remember really liking her, but my mother once told me, a long time ago that they took me to see her when she was filming a movie in our neighborhood. Naturally, the only one I remember as being my first favorite was Judy Garland.

First Girlfriend/Boyfriend: I had a big crush on a guy, who lived around the corner from us. We had known each other from birth and went to grammar school together. He was painfully shy, as was I. I ended up going to a dance with him in high school (we both went to Catholic schools, but they didn't have mixed gender schools) and I remember nothing about the dance, except that we went to the dance on the bus. He eventually married, had a couple of kids and then left his wife for his boyfriend.

First Encounter with a Famous Person: Well, I met Judy Garland in 1961, but my first actual encounter might have been when my mother, sister and I went to see a radio station and there were two guys there who wore huge Mexican sombreros and sang a song to us. (The song was the Mills Brothers' song, "Be my life's companion")

First Brush With Death: I don't know how young I was...but old enough to be playing in the water (a lake?) unsupervised. I can still feel how slippery the silty bottom was and I slipped and fell under the water. I can almost remember the feeling of my life passing before my life before the lifeguard carried me to shore.

First House/Condo Owned: Walt and I bought a house in Oakland in 1972. I drove by it recently and I still love (and miss) that house.

First Film Seen: I probably saw a movie before, but the first one I remember was being taken to see Show Boat by my grandmother. We stopped at Sees Candies next door to the Royal Theater first and bought a few bon bons to eat during the movie. And I remember that we arrived late and were looking for our seats during the honeymoon scene between Gaylord and Magnolia.

First Favorite Recording Artist: Judy Garland, of course.

First Favorite Radio Station: San Francisco's KSFO. It was on in our house all day long, starting with Don Sherwood every morning.

First Book I Remember Reading: "The Black Stallion" is the first one I remember, though, again, I'm sure I read books before that, since I was 10 when I read "The Black Stallion."

First Meme You Answered on Your Blog: Fortunately, for this entry, I keep a database of every entry I've ever written so I know that the first one I published was this Christmas Meme.