Being able to hear and share memories with people during the "When I Was 7" project was a meaningful experience. When I would talk about this project with others, share interesting stories that people had shared with me, it would spark new conversations. That was why this book came together. I wanted other people to have this experience of discussing a time in life that isn't discussed often. Usually we look back at our childhood as a whole or look at a few powerful memories. The delight of picking a specific age is it forces you to look in more detail at the things that were happening in your life at that point.
I hope if having a spark for sharing stories interests you that you'll consider buying the book online at Barnes and Nobel, click here.
The stories you'll find span quite the range:
- when i was 7, i walked out to my swing set to find a snake curled up under my swing. i was scared and couldn't swing. i asked my uncle (who was watching me) to do something about it but he was scared too. so my uncle played barbies with me. it was a good day.
- when i was seven years old i calmed my hysterical aunt in a carl's jr parking lot while my sister was being born and my uncle was just arrested.
- my grandmother lived up the hill from a candy store. one day i came outside to find my older sister and my cousin sitting in grandma's gravel driveway, eating the biggest sweet tarts i had ever seen - they were palm sized. and they wouldn't share. i asked where they got them and they told me they had found them growing in the gravel. one by one i must've moved every rock in that driveway, ending up with bloody fingertips before they fessed up. i told my own kids that story nearly ten years ago, and they still hold it over my sister's head.
- i missed the olympics that year. the soviet union boycotted the games and there was no official coverage of the event.
I hope you enjoyed this project, I enjoyed making it. And I hope you will enjoy the book, we certainly enjoyed putting it together.
Note: The book does not contain the artwork titled "When I was 7" the book contains all of the stories.
The book cover and all internal illustrations were created by Katie Marek
The text layout for the book was created by Tyler Zwirtz
Phil Hansen (me) collected the stories and helped where ever he could with the book.