SHEENA, QUEEN OF THE JUNGLE

When I was eleven, we lived in the country in upstate New York. It was a very rocky area, what I later learned was called block and fault, being rocks that had shifted because of ancient earthquakes. A lot of trees grew up in the spaces between the rock ledges.

 I was a normal kid with five sisters, only four at the time. Nancy came along later. We played in the woods a lot. It was a fairy land to us. We didn't have television and we couldn't afford movies. Unless, we played softball, using cow pies and thorny bushes for bases, we had to make our own fun. 

We used play a game we called, "Hungarian Refugee". We plotted our course over the border, through the bramble bushes, over and under fences, stopping to eat wild raspberries when we found them, until we reached an old hay barn that only had it's roof and supports left. I would be horrified today, if my kid went anywhere near this very unstable structure. The barn was considered freedom. We even had a natural spring that we stopped at for water. 

My oldest sister, Anna had a crush on Perry Como. She used to make us play house where she pretended she was his wife and we were their kids. One of the rocky areas we cleaned of weeds and fixed up to be Papa Como's Italian Villa. We spent many hours here reading books and waiting on Anna, or Mama Como as she made us call her. 

Our cousins had more money than us. They actually got an allowance, something before unheard of in our lives. Most of their money they spent on comics. When they were finished with them, they gave them to us. Some of the science fiction ones gave us nightmares. Usually, Mother sorted out the scary ones first and burned them. Yes, my mother was a book burner! We got to keep Little Lulu and Casper and Tarzan and Sheena among others. 

Sheena was my idol. I broke my arm because of her. One morning, after a particularly heavy rain, I went out early and wandered down to Papa Como's to swing on the apple tree. I said, out loud, "I'm Sheena, queen of the jungle!", as I grabbed the limb and swung out. The limb was slimy wet and mossy and I went sailing out into space and landed in a crumpled heap on one of those rock ledges. 

It took them awhile to find me. They didn't even know I was up at first. This happened in the early morning. When I got to the hospital, I spent most of the day lying on a table in the hall. My parents couldn't afford insurance and we had no money. 

The hospital didn't even want to treat me. It was after dark before anyone even looked at me. My father finally convinced them, after the welfare department said they would pay for it. I spent all summer and part of the fall in a cast from my neck to my waist, with one arm free. I not only broke my arm in two places, but I broke my collar bone and a small neck bone also. 

After this, my mother tried to burn all the Sheena's and the Tarzan's as well as the science fiction. I usually got to them first and smuggle them under my mattress, where I figured no mother would look.