I have really fond memories of the house I grew up in, which does not exist anymore. I mean, well, there’s a HOUSE there, where I grew up, but it’s morphed and changed so much (not in a good way) that it might as well not exist. I think it burned somewhat at one time and was um, “remodeled,” or else it was, er, “rebuilt,” but MY house is gone.
Still, when I was a kid, I’d go to my grandma’s house and it was in what I thought was a chichi neighborhood (I don’t know, maybe it was, but now it’s a tad rundown). I would go sell my school wares around HER neighborhood cuz none of my neighbors had any money.
Now, I love architecture anyway. If I’d been more focused in school (ha!) and a little more in touch with my creative/analytical abilities, I’d have known to go to school for that, but, well, hindsight is 20/20.
Anyway, I’d go around my g’ma’s neighborhood and see all these NEAT houses of mostly the same style: 1960s ranch, with a mid-century modern (which I did NOT like as a kid, but have come to appreciate more as an adult) mixed in here and there. I wanted to live in that neighborhood so badly. To me, living in a 1960s ranch represented having “made it,” but I was 12 and didn’t dare dream any higher (even though I knew there were far more grand neighborhoods in existence and had drooled).
So fast forward a couple of years and here I am with husband and tax deductions and 2 cats, in want of a house and we moved into…a 1960s housing development with…1960s ranch types (albeit no mid-century moderns). Some are more georgian (which here means, ranch with a second story) and a couple are split ranch (of both types) and ours is a raised ranch (finished, walk-out basement).
Friday I did some yard work, which involved going outdoors. (Shocker, I know.) Once I collapsed on my front porch to rest, I looked out over my neighborhood with the old, well-kept houses, the pristine lawns, and somewhat 1960s-ish landscaping (well, hell, I planted arborvitae, so who am I to talk, right?).
This morning, my door is wide open and I can see one old 1960s ranch with the brick veneer facade and the diamond-mullioned windows and the immaculate emerald lawn. The only sound in the neighborhood are the birds and the 3-year-old Tax Deduction.
My inner 12-year-old is very happy right now.
I had a real character of a supervisor once. The minute I clapped eyes on her, I felt real pity deep in my soul.
Anyhoo, over the next year, she taught me a lot about life. Well, no, not life. About money. About how to make money. Because, contrary to my first assumption, she was not eating cat food. She was richer than God. Older than Him, too, but that’s neither here nor there. She worked full time to pay her taxes because she didn’t want to dig into her principal.