Many of those photos were taken closer in time to when I was viewing them than the one at the right is to now.
Translation: Time moves on rapidly.
So, to anyone who reads this, specifically Jack and Ruby in the future, here is more information than anyone will probably ever need or want to know about one family's home.
61 Grace Ave, Shavertown, PA, circa 1960
- That's my brother's bike leaning against the house -- there was a lattice gate that lifted up where the push mower was kept under the screened-in porch.
- That's the small patio where my dad would sometimes grill hamburgers and hot dogs.
- That's our 1956 Ford (I think) at the far right.
- That's the clothesline where my mom (and sometimes my dad) hung out all of our laundry to dry -- we had no dryer.
- That's the back yard where I spent hours and hours hitting a baseball, kicking a football, playing catch with my dad, and having lunchtime picnics under whatever kind of tree that was with my mom.
- That's the window to our one and only bathroom upstairs to the left.
- That's my parent's bedroom window at the upper right
- That's where the living room housed our black-and-white Philco.
- That's the same living room that had a fireplace that was not often used for warmth, but more often for popping popcorn and Santa's visits. Except that night when I heard screaming downstairs after I had gone to bed; I ran down the stairs to see my mom standing on a chair and my dad chasing a bat with a broom -- said bat supposedly entered the room down the chimney.
- That's the same house I where I first heard rock and roll, and soul, and country, and gospel -- much of it through the sounds of brother's record collection.
- That's the house with the kitchen that always had a radio playing -- my mom listening to WILK and Rag Mop" by the Mills Brothers, and my brother's transistor forever turned to WARM, the Mighty 590.
- That's where I first saw the Beatles on Ed Sullivan.
- That's where I was shielded from the turbulence of the times -- Vietnam and the Civil Rights Era.
- That's where my parents sent my brother off to college -- the first member of my extended families to do so.
- That's where, starting in 5th grade, I walked to and from Shavertown Elementary, fitting my paper route in right after school.
- That's the house with very few books, save for a couple of Reader's Digest Condensed Books and a Funk &Wagnall's encyclopedia, which was bought in weekly installments from the local Acme Market.
- That's the house we moved from 3/4 of the way through 6th grade,
- That's the house that really felt like a home, and that sure is a hard feeling to replicate.
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