Memoirs of Childhood

When I was about eight years old my dad, who was in the navy at the time, got transferred out of South Carolina to a base in Washington (the state not D.C.). While I really liked Washington and am thinking about returning there for college at the time it was devastating. I’m sure I begged and pleaded not to go, I don’t think I realized that my dad and by extension the rest of us had no choice in the matter, he went where he was told to go by the United States Government. I remember crying looking back with my face pressed to the rear window of the car staring at my home. It was a home consisting of something greater than that gray-blue house with a big yard and a great old oak tree in the back. No, this was a home that held the whole cul-de-sac, and my best friend Rose standing in her driveway next to mine waving us off with her mother and little sister, and the neighbor boys across the street, and holiday parties that the whole street was invited too, like fireworks that went off in a spectacular display at the fourth of July or Easter egg hunts that had so many eggs we could invite every child from a mile around and couldn’t possibly find them all. As far as I was concerned I was leaving behind my life and my home and there would never be another to take its place. It was the first home I really remember well even though I lived other places. I’ve found another home and different things have filled those gaps but it was never like I remember it being there again. It forced me to grow up, move on, find new friends, and learn to adapt. Miss it though…