constant mayhem always brings a smile to the face
I recognized this wood paneling right away, though Mom’s handwritten note on the back help confirms the date. This would have been from the fall of 1981, at a house we had just started renting on Union Street in Galion, Ohio. That’s my cousin Tonya on the left and probably her younger sister Tabatha cutoff on the edge there, though we can’t really tell. Then me, holding the dog, and my little brother.
We had just arrived back in Ohio after a short stint living in Georgia. Therefore though only in the first grade, this was already my 4th school — same as the 1st, however, which certainly helped with the acclimation. It was great to see some “old” friends left behind when we moved south in the middle of my kindergarten year. Upon returning here, we lived with my Uncle Allie and his family for a short while — Tonya and I would walk out to Boston Street together to catch the bus. She was a year younger than me but we were both going to Wilma Crall (I always thought that would make an awesome band name, though possibly spelled Wilma Crawl) Elementary together. Then after maybe a couple weeks of this, my parents found this place on Union.
It was the one and only time of my scholastic career that I was able to walk to and from school. At some point I got these snazzy white sneakers with three green stripes down each side, which seemed really cool to me at the time, a totally mind-blowing development for the walking adventures. Most days I would walk to school with either my best friend Chase or this other kid that lived nearby, I think his name was Steve. But wouldn’t walk home with either, for whatever reason, though in the coming spring I would start walking with this redheaded girl I liked named Erin (some nifty foreshadowing there, maybe, as I would eventually wind up marrying a different girl named Erin). One of my other good friends during this school year was Greg Bates, who would be my cousin before the year was out — his grandma married my grandpa.
Anytime we were taking a bath, this puppy would run across the house and jump in with us. Therefore my mom named it Tubby. I have some good memories from this house, though we didn’t live here long. The first Super Bowl I distinctly remember watching, also the first birthday party I have concrete memories of — Chase couldn’t make it, for some reason, but Greg did, among others. That day, he wound up twisting his ankle very badly during a kickball game in the yard, by stepping in a hole.
On the downside, Grandma Gladys moved in with us while we were here, and ended up dying in this house. Looking this up online now, I can see that it was 510 S. Union Street, and it was located right next to the train tracks. Well, it still is, but this used to be a through-road — for whatever reason, it dead ends on both sides of the tracks now. That seems like a metaphor for something, though I’m not sure what. Down below are my Mom’s handwritten notes on the back of the photo, although as she’s mixed up on my brother’s age, I assume this must have been filled in at a much later date:
