I was born Lena Marie Hodson on September 23, 1925 in the family home in Othello, Washington.? What I like to refer to as my original support group included, my parents, my two brothers, my maternal grandparents, aunts, uncles and two cousins.? Like stair steps in age, five more cousins arrived after me.? At twenty, I married and became Lena M. Clark, now known by many as Lee Clark.
The first seventeen years of my life were spent in Othello.? Its population at that time was approximately 300 people, give or take one or two on occasion.? All of these people knew my fanily and me.? I’m grateful for those years in Othello and for the loving care and support I received from my faily and relatives, plus that of the extended family of the community.? Many of them influenced me directly.? Being raised among honest, hardworking people gave me a solid foundation on which to build the rest of my life.? I learned to appreciate who I was, to trust daily living and to believe in my future.
The short writings included here are a few glimpses of those first seventeen years.? They are bits and pieces of a life and are not meant to be statistical, but rather an attempt be the adult to look again through the eyes of the child and register the emotions of growing, thinking and feeling, as she remembers certain times and situations in her life.