Secret Wishes

I came from a hard working middle-classed family. My father worked in a factory, and my mother was a waitress. Together, they tried hard to keep ahead of the bills and payments, and raise three daughters. To say that we were strapped for cash was truly an understatement. As a child, I sensed our fragile financial situation even though my parents did a great job of keeping their burdens to themselves, and letting us kids be kids. I do not remember asking for things, but I do remember secretly wanting things. 
There were three must-have's on my "want" list, that my childhood was void of. The first being an Easy-Bake Oven. Ohhhh, how I longed for one of those. The commercials made me feel like I was missing out on all of the fun, and because we couldn't afford a lot of junk food, to be able to bake my own tasty treats, any time I wanted, would have been a dream come true. I can still see, in the commercial, of what had to be the face of the luckiest girl in the world, peering wide-eyed into the oven, watching the cake bake right before her eyes.
The second item was a bicycle and not just any bicycle, either. Nope, the only bicycle that would have made my heart burst with sheer and utter joy was the kind that had the banana seat. That's right, one seat in the shape of its name-sake. The cool part was, the long shaped seat would have allowed an extra passenger to sit right behind me. I would envision me, and my very best friend in all of the universe, peddling wildly, up and down the hills of the corn-field lined county roads, that made up my world.
The last item was a knitted, Winter stocking hat. Again, not just any stocking hat. I already had a few of the ordinary ones-- the kind that fit tightly over my head with the little pom-pon directly on top-- in our coat closet at home. No, this hat was the ultimate in stocking hats. It seemed to be 3 feet long, and when you wore it on your head, the pom-pon bounced enthusiastically all the way down by your tail bone. Why, you could just about nearly sit on it! The girls on the playground who were lucky enough to own one, would whirl it all around as they played. But the most shining moment for this wondrous hat would be when it was flying straight out as a classmate would be pumping back and forth on one of the high-flying swings (nothing like the sissy swings on playgrounds of today) that we had at our elementary school. Had life gone the way of my wishes, just think of what I would have looked like wearing my hat, while riding my awesome bike, hurrying home, to do a little baking...a jubilant day-dream to be sure.