Our arrival:

My mom and Dennis lived in Running Springs, California, in the San Bernadino mountains. Unlike much of Southern California, this area is temperate, heavily forested with evergreen trees, and receives a heavy snowfall in winter.

We expected that our dingy life in the big city had ended and that now with our mom back at last, life would be a wonderful, fragrant bed of roses, like the potporri she used in the crafts she sold. Her entire home was redolent with the fragrance of it... I could have a cat, something my dad hadn't allowed even when it was the single item on my Christmas and birthday lists. I could get to know my brother and sister. Yeah. Life was going to be great! We gorged ourselves on candy (something our dad had strictly forbidden in almost any amount) and laughed and giggled giddily. We ran, laughed loudly, goofed, played pranks, hugged, and talked almost non-stop. Delighted with the pleasant area we were in, I ran the woods, climbed the trees, scaled the rocks, and waded in the streams and built forts with my brother. Girls (our sisters) were not allowed. And for a while, it was very good.

Our dad, who paradoxically was stick thin but afraid of growing obese, had been alarmed at my growing teenage appetite and tried to curtail what I ate. I felt like I was hungry all the time. Not at Mom's; there was plenty to eat and she was always urging me to eat it or allowing me to attempt to cook for myself (the attempts make me cringe to think of them, so I'll leave those out, if you don't mind). So it's a little ironic that the first real warning signs surfaced at a mealtime.