“Where we love is home – home that our feet may leave, but not our hearts.”
It was a team effort. One of the cats dispatched the mouse, and Gracie went sniffing around this morning and found it. My guess is the event happened Thursday night because the house was cleaned that day, and yesterday morning I found the three large pillows (sit-on ones piled against the wall) askew. The deceased was lying beside them, but I obviously missed the body when I straightened the pillows. It was, after all, a small mouse. CSI was busy so I disposed of the remains. I thanked both cats and Miss Gracie for their assistance.
The day is again lovely. I woke earlier than usual and remembered I had forgotten to buy cream for my coffee so Gracie and I went to Dunkin’ Donuts. The roads were clear, and it was so early I was only the second car in line. When I came home, I went straight to the deck. The air still had a bit of chill left over from the cool night. None of the neighbors were stirring. It was just Gracie, me and a few hungry birds.
I lived in a project until I was sixteen. It was in my small town and back then the word project had no stigma attached. We never thought twice about calling it the project when we talked about where we lived. Even now, when my sisters and I remember growing up, we start our memories with, “In the project…” The houses were all duplexes made of wood. The front yards had bushes and flower gardens, and the backyards were interconnected but separated by plots of grass. In the middle, behind the clotheslines in the backyards, was a grass covered hill, perfect for little kids to sled on in winter and for a slip ‘n slide in summer. The project was loaded with kids of all ages. My best friend lived in the project and even lived in the duplex where we had first lived. Everyone in the project was a neighbor. One of our favorite neighbors lived in the house next door and another favorite lived right beside us in the same duplex. Their side was a mirror image of ours. A few neighbors were not so friendly, but only a few.
When I talk about my childhood with someone, I usually have to explain the project, defend it somehow, as most people tend to think of projects as block after block of brick high-risers in the poorest part of any city. They never think of them as I do: a wonderful place to grow up, a place with a field filled with grasshoppers, an old tree, blueberries, woods and a swamp perfect for catching pollywogs in spring and for ice skating on in winter.
Explore posts in the same categories: MusingsTags: growing up, projects
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keepthecoffeecoming.blog 
August 21, 2010 at 12:30 pm
I worked overtime today so I missed most of the heavy rains that fell during the early day. It´s still rather warm and that makes the bog to a mosquitoe paradise. It also seems as if most of them hase chosen to spend their free time outside my kitchen door 🙂 But I choose mosquitoes before flies any time 🙂
Like You I mostly feels like I have to defend where I grew up. It was the slum of Gothenburg but I don´t think I ever felt that it was a dangerous neighborhood to grow up in. On the contrary actually since all older people kept an eye on us and made sure we stayed where we belonged.
Have a great day now!
Christer.
August 21, 2010 at 11:20 pm
Christer,
I doubt I’d want either, but I guess I’ll have to go with mosquitoes too.
A strange day today-first sun, then clouds then back and forth. The morning was cooler than tonight. I didn’t even need my sweatshirt for movie night.
I never saw anything wrong with where I grew up. It was a great place.
August 21, 2010 at 4:16 pm
We lived on post more times than not and it wasn’t until I turned 12 that officer quarters were unavailable for Dad being assigned to Ft Belvoir, Virginia and later the Pentagon. So we lived mostly in townhome rentals near a school system known as Bucknell. It was a huge development all 3 bedrooms, 3 baths and my room on the top floor had a private bath with shower. I truly loved that room and it was the first feelings I got of privacy. Then when Dad came back from Vietnam we bought a house in Mt Vernon so he could build up some equity in an investment. He had decided to quit the military early and go back as a civilian which he did. He was one of those triple dippers, military retirement, government retirement and social security. They stopped that some years ago. But my childhood was all over the world; my teen years exceptionally good in the D.C. area; and my first jobs meeting my wife, all took place in D.C. Even though I was born in Florida my true feelings of home are up in D.C.
August 21, 2010 at 11:24 pm
Z&Me,
I think I would have liked moving all over and getting to know different countries and other parts of this one. I stayed in one place for sixteen years then came to the cape where I have been almost every year since, except for Ghana. I do love New England and am happy to call it home.
When I was in Africa, my family moved back to the town where I grew up, but the Cape had by then become my home so it is where I came back to live. I’ve never regretted my choice.