Childhood Doors (Thursday Doors)

My thoughts turned
to my first doors, where
I came from–
Ohio–
once gone, I doubted if I
should ever come back

to visit
those houses—if they
existed.
The trailer?–
a temporary measure,
now mere nostalgia.

The first house
I remember is
in fact there–
a bedroom
added, or one divided–
red now, with a tree.

The second
one, my real childhood
home, also
present, but
the trees are gone.  It looks sad,
naked, abandoned.

The vacant
lot where we played
kick the can
is also
gone—but the fields across the
railroad tracks remain.

I looked at the W3 prompt this week from Nolcha, to take a line or two from Robert Frost’s poem “The Road Not Taken” and incorporate them into a poem, and wondered how I could use them in a Thursday Doors post. I doubted if I should ever come back made me think about my early childhood homes, and if they still existed.

I was pretty sure the trailer where my parents lived when my older brother and I were born, was nowhere for me to find. But, luckily, the other two houses had been on the market recently enough to have real estate listings with photos. I remember the first house as two bedrooms–it’s less than 1000 square feet, although there are many NY apartments with 3 bedrooms that fit that description. But I know I shared a room with both of my brothers. The house had no basement. So my assumption is that either a room was added, and it was more like 800 square feet originally, or one of the bedrooms was divided into two. In any case it looks much more lived in now, with a nice big tree in the front yard.

I was unhappy to see that the owners of the second house had cut down all the oak trees in the front. They didn’t like acorns? or squirrels? or raking leaves? Or they wanted an easier ride for their power mower? My older brother made lots of money cutting front lawns (with a hand mower) for those people in the neighborhood who had no one willing or able to do it when we lived there…(I made a little helping him by doing the trimming along the sidewalks and driveways, my job with our own house)

The dead end street is gone–they’ve made a road now that goes parallel to the railroad tracks. But it appears that there are still fields and trees on the other side of the tracks. That made me smile, hoping the children living there now have as much fun playing there as we did when we were kids.

And do check out all the other doors that show up every week at Thursday Doors, hosted by Dan Antion.

I had to add this at D.’s suggestion.