• Being taught about Dinosaurs in School
We had this as a pretty big subject in year/form 1. And this was around the time Jurassic Park was out in the theater, so Dinosaurs were a massive craze.
As part of the subject we measured how big a Sauropod would have been out in the playing area, visited a Dinosaur edutainment park and erected a T-rex sculpture outside our School. For the latter I was actually asked to help by the teachers, as everyone knew how much I loved Dinosaurs.
That time of my life was by far the happiest, I even still have my work books from that class, and ever since then Dinosaurs have been one of my strongest loves and comfort items for me.
• Being given Zag, our cat
Zag originally belonged to my eldest sister as a brother cat to Zig - who unfortunately got run over.
Zag was a bit of a naughty Cat, although that could have been because he was still pretty young. Sometimes though he would sleep in my (at the time) baby niece's cot, so my sis was worried about smothering, so she gave him to us. I was unbelievably happy, as I loved Zag, and he seemed to equally love me.
We already had an older female cat called Truffles so it was awkward if they would get on or not. They definitely didn't love eachother, but they got on probably better than expected. Zag was an absolutely amazing cat though, truly a cat to win over cat haters, as he absolutely loved everyone and was super friendly.
I missed him dearly being in hospital, and I remember my mother asking me if I wanted anything bringing back from home, and I said Zag (she did say ANYTHING!). I never expected her actually do that, but sure enough she did. She kept him in our car for some of the time, and I would go see him during breaks, and at other times he stayed in our hospital accomodation (which we shouldn't have done), I was super happy though.
•Meeting Hannah in Hospital
During my time being treated in the environment hospital (Breakspear Hospital), I usually was the only kid there. Sometimes there would be a random kid, but they didn't speak the same language as me, and they weren't actually there for treatment (idk why they were there?), but even so I used to hang out with them, but usually the didn't stay long and I'd be by myself again.
But one time this girl called Hannah came for treatment. I don't remember her story exactly? (I used to have her newspaper cutting, but can't seem to find it) but she became the hospital's other poster child along with me, I remember the hospital hanging both our newspapers articles in the reception waiting area.
Anyway, she was English herself, slightly older than me (maybe about a year or 2), but I was overjoyed to have someone to play with. We used to swap game consoles and games, as we both had MegaDrives, and she had a GameGear (which I found to be amazing) and i had a Gameboy. We became pretty good friends, although sometimes I think I annoyed her, as I always wanted to play with her, whereas sometimes she wanted to talk to or help out the staff. One time she stayed the night with myself and my mother in our accommodation, whilst Hannah's mother went back home for something, which made me happy. I can remember also that she had a break from the Hospital and went to the Isle Of Wight, and rode the preserved Railway there, and she wrote me a postcard and gave me gifts & badges from the railway, which i still have some of, just thought that was very sweet of her :') but of course, even she went away eventually. I can remember us both being very sad. I still think of her sometimes, she was lovely, and very tolerant of me.
• Getting my Cat Minx
My eldest Sister's friend's Cat had a second little of all-girl Cats, and they needed homes. So my Sis asked if I wanted some. I wanted 2 mostly-white ones initially, but the one I liked the most was taken already, and the other one I liked at the time was thought to be taken. The other 2 were a tuxedo cat (boring, plus my nephew has one already) and the other was kind-of a grey & ginger tabby - which my Sis loved and wanted me to have 🤣 I liked Minx's coat, as she's basically a chimera of all four of them - not quite Calico and also not Quite Tortoiseshell ...just never so a cat quite like her, and i loved her, so i had her. I only decided on one kitten in the end, as I'd never had a kitten before. I had to wait until I moved into my house to have her, as previously I was renting and couldn't have pets. My Sis brought her round and actually paid for her to be spayed too. She's...not the absolute nicest Cat ever. She likes me a lot, but she's a little scared of everyone else, she always either sleeps by my feet on my bed, or on-top of me every night. Thought it was cute when I came back from vacation abroad, and I must of left the yard light on and I heard her come in mewing. I called out to her and she rushed upstairs mewing and ran into my bedroom where I was at the time :')