"How do you make those beautiful decorations on it later?"
"How do you weave a carpet on Grandma's loom?"
It seems I was always watching a lot of these goings-on while the other kids were somewhere else doing whatever they liked to do. And Mama and Papa were never too busy to answer my questions. I realize now how much more I could have learned if I had only known how and when to ask more questions.
It seems that my parents favored and petted me at times. I'm not sure they did. If they did, perhaps it was because they felt sorry for their little ugly duckling. And maybe I only imagined they were especially nice to me. Maybe they were that nice to everyone. Perhaps they were nice to me just to have me around handy when they needed me to help them just a little bit.
This latter seems to be the most reasonable argument, after considering some of my stupid exploits and my senseless reasoning throughout my life.
Yet, it just might be possible that they were partial to me on account of the wen, and later on, my paralysis—these factors coupled with the fact that within the last four years along about the time I was born, they had suffered the loss of a two-year-old son, a two-week-old daughter, Mama's favorite brother, Hugh, and Grandpa Johnson.
Who can measure the thoughts of loving parents as they view their newborn child for the first time, anxious to know whether he or she is beautiful and healthy and without blemish.
And who knows the anxiety of parents who, after seeing their child with blemish, must wonder how his condition will affect his relationship with others, how it will affect his outlook on life, and whether it might grow worse and shorten his days.