Saturday, September 06, 2025
ESSAY - HOW DID I SURVIVE TO BECOME AN ADULT?
BY DONOVAN BALDWIN
We protect our children. That's only natural.
When I look back on MY childhood, in a much different era, place, and with different dangers, I am sometimes surprised that I survived.
I spent days alone in the woods climbing trees, encountering snakes and strangers, finding all sorts of things which I inspected without fear of contamination, including discarded magazines which enhanced my knowledge of anatomy... somewhat, swam in the bay, shot guns, used knives, threw rocks and shot whittled arrows from a homemade bow, at people doing the same to me.
I rode my bicycle in traffic every day, in my early teens getting up at 3 A.M. to ride my bike to an isolated place to get my newspapers and deliver them in the dark by myself.
Had the usual boyhood fights and arguments, and no-holds-barred football games and wrestling matches. Climbed everything... trees, walls, and even a couple of buildings.
Still, somehow, I made it here.
As a grown up, in dangerous occupations, I survived, at least in part, because I knew what I was doing.
As a kid?
Not sure HOW I made it.
Just a spin of Lady Luck's wheel, I guess.
Anyway, that, and Sister Mary Fides, and that dear little storytelling Irish priest, Father Cunningham, set my imagination in gear, and on fire, so that the boy's body, and mind, took it from there, and always did something with the memories.
Just meandering thoughts arriving here this morning.
When I look back on MY childhood, in a much different era, place, and with different dangers, I am sometimes surprised that I survived.
I spent days alone in the woods climbing trees, encountering snakes and strangers, finding all sorts of things which I inspected without fear of contamination, including discarded magazines which enhanced my knowledge of anatomy... somewhat, swam in the bay, shot guns, used knives, threw rocks and shot whittled arrows from a homemade bow, at people doing the same to me.
I rode my bicycle in traffic every day, in my early teens getting up at 3 A.M. to ride my bike to an isolated place to get my newspapers and deliver them in the dark by myself.
Had the usual boyhood fights and arguments, and no-holds-barred football games and wrestling matches. Climbed everything... trees, walls, and even a couple of buildings.
Still, somehow, I made it here.
As a grown up, in dangerous occupations, I survived, at least in part, because I knew what I was doing.
As a kid?
Not sure HOW I made it.
Just a spin of Lady Luck's wheel, I guess.
Anyway, that, and Sister Mary Fides, and that dear little storytelling Irish priest, Father Cunningham, set my imagination in gear, and on fire, so that the boy's body, and mind, took it from there, and always did something with the memories.
Just meandering thoughts arriving here this morning.
------
Labels: boyhood, donovan baldwin, essay, growing up
Saturday, November 04, 2017
I Don't Mind Being Me
By: Donovan Baldwin
Unlike some, I don't mind limitations, at least not always or greatly.
I am older now (obviously), but, in my younger, wilder, days a belief in my physical and mental abilities, and infallibility, led me into some strange and dangerous places. Again, both physically and mentally.
Honestly, sometimes I think I'm lucky to be alive...and sane, assuming that I am sane.
Still, I don't mind being me, and I became "me" by living through those experiences...some of which were trials by fire.
Hmmm. Trial by fire. First wife comes to mind.
Anyway, limitations DO serve a purpose.
Knowing we cannot flap our arms and fly keeps us from jumping off of high places. On the other hand, while actual limitations, such as oxygen and altitude DO exist and should be heeded in our plans, many limitations are just in our heads.
We worry about what people will think if we do some odd thing we want to do, say something that's on our minds, or even encourage someone else to try a new path or adventure.
Not saying we should ignore that little voice whispering (or screaming) "Don't do it, you idiot!", but, it should be looked over carefully for the source.
Is it just fear of looking foolish or failing miserably, or a fear of taking a shot at the unknown?
Look out for steep cliffs, but, try to fly once in a while.
I am older now (obviously), but, in my younger, wilder, days a belief in my physical and mental abilities, and infallibility, led me into some strange and dangerous places. Again, both physically and mentally.
Honestly, sometimes I think I'm lucky to be alive...and sane, assuming that I am sane.
Still, I don't mind being me, and I became "me" by living through those experiences...some of which were trials by fire.
Hmmm. Trial by fire. First wife comes to mind.
Anyway, limitations DO serve a purpose.
Knowing we cannot flap our arms and fly keeps us from jumping off of high places. On the other hand, while actual limitations, such as oxygen and altitude DO exist and should be heeded in our plans, many limitations are just in our heads.
We worry about what people will think if we do some odd thing we want to do, say something that's on our minds, or even encourage someone else to try a new path or adventure.
Not saying we should ignore that little voice whispering (or screaming) "Don't do it, you idiot!", but, it should be looked over carefully for the source.
Is it just fear of looking foolish or failing miserably, or a fear of taking a shot at the unknown?
Look out for steep cliffs, but, try to fly once in a while.
Labels: donovan baldwin, growing up, limitations, taking chances
Monday, October 09, 2017
Growing Up As Part Of A Neighborhood...
By: Donovan Baldwin
In 1945, at the end of World War II, my dad started work at the Pensacola Naval Air Station, while I was busy being born in Atlanta, Georgia.
He found a home for us, Mom, my sister, and me, and brought us down to Florida six weeks later in a 1939 Ford, I believe.
We lived in an area called Warrington, which lay between Pensacola, and the Naval Air Station.
Warrington had a grocery, a drugstore, a hardware store, shoe repair, a barber, a gas station, and other amenities.
Dad drove to work through the shopping area daily for the next 30 years.
We moved three times over the next four years, but, in 1949, my parents bought the house I lived in for the next 20+ years. I went to school in Warrington. We shopped there. All my friends, until high school, lived there.
People in the drug store, the grocery, the gas station, knew me as "Mr. Baldwin's boy". I had identity and community.
I think that is one of the finest gifts I was given, with health, and a good education...that feeling of being known and identified as part of a neighborhood, a community, for all the years of my childhood and youth.
So many kids today don't get to know that.
Always sure of myself as "Mr. Baldwin's boy", I also got to be Tom Sawyer, running off with Huck Finn on the Mississippi, or sometimes Jim Hawkins, aboard the Hispañola, at sea in search of treasure, with adventurers and pirates.
I did try to build a raft. I climbed trees and sat in them staring out at the bay, dreaming of Treasure Island, and listening to the waves, and, for the voice of Long John Silver.
I got to be a boy, living among friends before "growing up"...or did I ever really grow up? Sometimes I wonder.
He found a home for us, Mom, my sister, and me, and brought us down to Florida six weeks later in a 1939 Ford, I believe.
We lived in an area called Warrington, which lay between Pensacola, and the Naval Air Station.
Warrington had a grocery, a drugstore, a hardware store, shoe repair, a barber, a gas station, and other amenities.
Dad drove to work through the shopping area daily for the next 30 years.
We moved three times over the next four years, but, in 1949, my parents bought the house I lived in for the next 20+ years. I went to school in Warrington. We shopped there. All my friends, until high school, lived there.
People in the drug store, the grocery, the gas station, knew me as "Mr. Baldwin's boy". I had identity and community.
I think that is one of the finest gifts I was given, with health, and a good education...that feeling of being known and identified as part of a neighborhood, a community, for all the years of my childhood and youth.
So many kids today don't get to know that.
Always sure of myself as "Mr. Baldwin's boy", I also got to be Tom Sawyer, running off with Huck Finn on the Mississippi, or sometimes Jim Hawkins, aboard the Hispañola, at sea in search of treasure, with adventurers and pirates.
I did try to build a raft. I climbed trees and sat in them staring out at the bay, dreaming of Treasure Island, and listening to the waves, and, for the voice of Long John Silver.
I got to be a boy, living among friends before "growing up"...or did I ever really grow up? Sometimes I wonder.
Labels: donovan baldwin, Florida, growing up, Long John Silver, Pensacola, Tom Sawyer, Treasure Island, Warrington
