The quieter you become the more you can hear ~ Ram Dass



Wednesday, March 17, 2010

A tale of two cities

All my life, I've only lived in two cities.  Cleveland and where I live now.

I'm not sure when I was brought home from the hospital where we lived but I know it would have been somewhere in Cleveland.  I tried to get it out of mom but she was somewhat confused on that.

Eventually though when I was still small, we moved in with my father's mother I do know that in Cleveland.  It was a bungalow.  I started school there and we lived there until I was in about the 4th grade.With my poor memory, I hardly remember anything from that time.  One of the things I remember though and this was crazy, the house across a street burned down and no one in my whole family realized until the morning because we all slept through it LOL.

We then moved in with my mother's father.  I think I might have mentioned this before.  It was mostly a one story two family house that shared a bathroom.  However, there was one bedroom upstairs (which was mine)  and a big attic above the rest of the house. Grandpa lived in the front and we lived in the back.  When I was younger we didn't have a dryer and we either had to hang the clothes outside or in the attic.  I still remember getting the clothes down from the attic in winter time and they being stiff as a board.  One crazy thing I remember from this house was the neighbor two doors down.  He held his family hostage for some reason.  He may have been crazy who knows.  I can remember lying on the downstairs bed peeking outside the window watching the police.  I lived with my family  here until I got my first full time job.

When I started working one of the girls I worked with and me decided to get an apartment.  I think I was about 19 or 20 at the time.  I loved it.  After the first year though she decided to move out and I ended up moving as well.  Years and years later, I found out that our tax man owned this building although it wasn't at the time I lived there. He would have been too young.

I went back home but by that time my grandfather had died so I moved into the front part of the house.  It still gave me some freedom so I didn't actually feel like I was living back home even though I was.

I was living there when I met my husband to be.  After a couple of years, I got an apartment by myself this time.  I really wanted the freedom then.

When we decided to get married, I had to move home for a couple of months.  However, by this time my family had moved to my uncle's house which they had been renting out while they were buying it.

After marriage I moved to my husband's which is in the city we live in now.  It was like a condo/townhouse.  I don't know what you call it but they were connected together.  He had a corner one.  So one side was all grass and luckily on the other side was the garage, connected to another garage and then a home.  It was pretty private.  Good thing because at that time, he/we played music very loud LOL.  Coincidentally, I have a friend who lives down the street from there.

About a year later we bought our first home back in Cleveland.  It was a bungalow.  Again we were lucky.  Both of our neighbors on either side had an extra lot that was next to our home.  One had a bunch of fruit trees on theirs and the other one had a super huge raspberry patch.  We always felt ,while we lived in the city but we still weren't right on top of our neighbors.  Also, it was on a very small street.  We lived there until my son was going to start school.  Interesting fact here, this home was only a block and a half from my first apartment.

When we were looking for another home, I always wanted to go back to the city where my husband had lived when we were first married.  We found a home although its pretty much on top of the neighbors but I'm pretty sure its our forever home.  When we bought it we were already thinking that because we wanted a ranch style home for old age LOL.

 How many different places have you lived in your lifetime?

6 comments:

Vicki/Jake said...

Interesting post. I love hearing other people's tales..
Me? I've lived in so many places I'd have to take some time to remember them all. I envy people who have lived in the same small town they were born in...but then I like that I've seen so many places too.
You just seem to know where you belong eventually...

Mami said...

Japanese old saying:peple would change houses at 7 times a life.
I've lived 9 places since i was born
so far.

Julie Kwiatkowski Schuler said...

About 7 places, soon to be 8. I'm excited about moving back to my hometown in the Mon Valley!

Cathryn said...

Oh boy...Let's see--my father was military and so we moved around a LOT! I'll have to blog about this topic, I think. LOL

But I enjoyed reading your stories! Interesting!

lagata said...

As a child I lived in 6 places, 2 of which I was <3 yo. 3-12 in one spot, 12-13 in another, 13-adulthood in another, I have moved around my town, but only left it for ~1 year, then came back. I have pretty much been in the same place for 30+ years.

Anonymous said...

I've lived in CA (two rented homes,a double wide my parent's owned,and an apartment). I've also lived in FL (went to college out of state for 2 years and lived on campus in a dorm). I lived in IN (stayed with my in-laws and then our own apartment). I also lived in TN (stayed at Grandma's house, stayed with a cousin, rented a townhome, rented an apartment, now own a home).

Wow! I had no idea I lived in all those places until you asked your question and I started typing my answer. =) GREAT post!