734 N Eleventh Street

 

And so in 1956, new baby in tow, my parents closed up shop on their first house and carried their furniture and belongings across the street. The house meant a gain of just 67 square feet but it was newer, built in 1952 rather than 1928.

I was on vacation with my grandparents in Bear Lake and arrived back after the move had substantially been made. I left one house and returned to another.

I remember distinctly my mother buying me a 45 record called “First Born” by Tennessee Ernie Ford. She meant to put to rest any fears I might have that all my parent’s attention would now be directed to my new brother. Frankly, I was never worried about that at all.

We graduated to two bedrooms but that was hardly an improvement. Both were small. There was still only one bathroom and a tiny galley-like kitchen with built-in seating pushed into a corner as almost an afterthought. We may have gained a bedroom – and who can discount the utility of that? - but we lost a dining room.

So it was a bigger and newer house but it seemed to me the net effect was a wash.

There were advantages to moving across the street, however. The previous neighborhood was still our neighborhood and the kids I played with were unchanged. I went to the same school.

I was given one bedroom (I had never had my own bedroom before) and Bob another. He went to sleep each night on his belly and his foot thumped up and down like a rabbit for what seemed like hours. I was having second thoughts about a brother.

As near as I can remember (I was just seven years old when we moved) Mom and Dad slept on a pull-out sofa in the living room. It wasn’t convenient and it certainly wasn’t private but it did present each of us with a modicum of space we might call our own, even if that space required double-duty.

We gained a knotty pine wall in the living room (just one) and a fireplace centered on it and Mom probably was convinced that they should buy the house with that one feature alone. We had many a wonderful fire in that hearth in the 24 years we lived there.

We also had an expansive and modern basement which stood in great contrast to the first. There was plenty of room for a washer, dryer and laundry tub and a gas-fired gravity furnace that could not be beat. It would light even when the power was out and I’ve never again had that luxury.

It also had its detriments. When we had a hard rain water would seep in one wall and run across the floor in multiple streams to a drain. At least we had a drain. But that eventually came back to haunt us when the city sewer system plugged up and sewage poured into our basement and lapped up several steps. I remember opening the basement door and seeing a polluted lake, brown sewage and toilet paper floating on the surface.

When the city was called and the stoppage under the street remedied, the water receded but not without leaving a high water mark around the walls, festooned with bit of paper and worse. We somehow cleaned it up – I suppose I have forgotten the details on purpose – and we had a plumber install a threaded stopper in the drain so that in an emergency of that sort we could, so to speak, stick a finger in the dike.

I once built a “flying saucer detector” and mounted it in the attic. It used magnets and I thought sure if one flew overhead it’d notify me. For a long time all was quiet and we forgot about it. Then, one night it fired. It’s rather startling to wake to a bell ringing over your head. I suppose it simply tilted on it’s own. We never saw a UFO.

That house encompassed all of my childhood, right through high school and college … and beyond. It seemed this was my permanent home and I did not consider ever leaving.

As Bob grew we shared a bedroom. I had a double bed which my grandparents had given me and he had a small one tucked beside it (there was simply no room to do otherwise). I should have shared my bed and Mom suggested it many times but I don’t think either my brother or I much liked the idea. We didn’t have much space but what we had was ours.

Eventually we graduated to a bunk bed, giving us back some floor space.

My grandfather built me a playhouse in the back yard, using an old pool table for the floor (it was left in the house when we bought it). Now, sixty years later, it’s still there (even if I’m not).

Dad would get up every morning in the dark, have breakfast and go back to bed. He so hated getting up and going to work that he did it twice. He said it was heaven when he got up the first time knowing he could go back to bed. I always questioned the logic of that but my arguments fell of deaf ears.

Mom had large flower beds at that house and developed her gardening skills there. We had a small garden at one corner of the back yard and we pulled the most wonderful vegetables out of that small space imaginable. The soil was dark brown, rich and friable and we’ve never had that quality of soil anywhere else.

One vivid memory is of Mom working one autumn to prepare the flower bed for winter. She would bank them deep with leaves she had spent hours collecting. She used natural techniques even then. Later the same day a neighbor was raking her yard and raked all of Mom’s leaves out of her flower bed. Mom didn’t say a word, appreciating the helpful gesture if not the effect.

Both grown, Bob moved out in 1976 and married. Four years later in a divorce, we “traded” homes. He wanted a smaller one; we wanted a larger one.

We might have saved money if we’d have known we were going to exchange houses. Instead we involved a real estate agent and paid a commission when no selling was involved. It was a waste of money, of course, but we knew, at least, that all the paperwork would be handled properly.

So, in 1980 Bob returned to Miamisburg and we headed north to Moraine.

© 2021 William G Schmidt