This was the first house we lived at in Ohio, when we moved from Pikeville, Kentucky when I was just five. When we lived in it, the bottom half of the house was painted chocolate brown.
Since Mount Union bought the house, it has been used as some kind of campus office/s. There used to be a small garage behind the house, with a small workshop attached, where my da kept his metal working tools. Now it is small car lot. Shame.
My brother, sister and I played here just behind the house. There's always been this little path back behind the houses, it's how all the neighborhood children used to get around, on foot or bike.
Across the street is Mount Union College's campus. I used to see it every morning from these windows.
Just down the street on campus is the college's performing arts building, where we had piano lessons and recitals as kids.
Down the street the other way is Parkway Elementary, where I walked to and from school from kindergarten through second grade. It's hardly changed from the outside.
The town library has hardly changed at all in all the years I've known it. Several of the same librarians that checked out my books when I had no front teeth and a pixie cut are still there today.
We used to walk our dogs to this little grassy spot on the west side of the block, three doors down from the old house. They've put up landscaped flowers and a sentimentally overdone lawn chair. I stopped there for a few minutes to meditate. Then I drove home to Bowman Road.
