My Earliest Childhood Memory

 My Earliest Childhood Memory

My earliest childhood memory is of my dad teaching me the bedtime prayer "Now I lay me down to sleep, I pray the Lord my soul to keep, If I should die before I wake, I pray the Lord my soul to take." That part of the prayer is followed by, "God bless mommy, God bless daddy, God bless Ricky" ... and whoever else I could think of to name... "Amen" 

I don't know how old I was when he taught me that prayer, but he said it with me, or listened to me say it, every night when he put me to bed. I guess I was probably about 2 years old when he started doing that.

He also told me bedtime stories. One of the stories he liked to tell was about "Horse-and-a-Half". (Who rode down the road about a mile-and-a-half, and ate a steak-and-a-half for supper... etc.) Those were my favorite stories. 

Years later I found out that those stories grew out of an episode of the Andy Griffith Show on TV where Andy and Opie have a discussion about a "half a boy" named Horatio.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z6L70BwsjUk