"A Problem Page For All!"

It sounds very cool! I love swapping childhood stories. We lived in a tiny, five-room apartment in a block of student-housing apartments in Iowa City. We wore hand-me-down clothes from a woman who had one daughter (a year or so older than Rachel) and shopped obsessively for her. Lots of the clothes that came to us were brand new. Often, also, she'd have bought two of the same outfit in two different colors, so Rachel and I often wore matched clothes. That was fun. I remember that I usually took the pink and she the blue, or I the pink and she the yellow, or I the pink and she the green.... Whenever we got another couple of garbage bags full of clothes, we'd dump it all out onto the living room floor and meticulously divide them up. Sometimes Mom had to interfere and help, but mostly Rachel and I got to choose who got what. We tried to be always scrupulously fair, but in retrospect it seems like Rachel always got what she wanted....

Heh.

Anyway. I can't imagine how we ate or stayed warm during the time that Dad was in grad school! Back then, if he earned an extra $20 or a relative sent a check, it was major cause for celebration. And even though we were just getting by, we were also sending money to my aunt, who was doing missionary work at the time. What an upbringing, anyway! Builds lot of character, eh?