Well, except maybe, reliving the past with some way funny memories.
I lived in the same house from age 2 till 25. A big part of my life. We had a lot of neighbors who we were close with who lived there a long time too. One family still does. We go to their house on Christmas Eve. We play "Dirty Santa" and catch up on all the happenings of the year.
To protect their identities, I will refer to the 2 guys as "Duck" & "Puppy". These are their actual nicknames I did not make this up. My sis & I went to the same grammar school as Duck & Puppy. Duck was 1 year older than me & Puppy was 1 year older than my sis. We all carpooled together. My mom was the driver of this ship of fools. We never let the boys sit in the front seat. That was an honor only given to us. My mom made my sis & I take turns as to who sat in the front. We did this on a week by week basis. We NEVER wanted to sit by the boys. Hello, they had cooties! Years later they revealed they used to fight over who had to sit next to us too!
On Christmas Eve, Duck & I were talking about the "old neighborhood". The one before Katrina, before my old house was torn down and the wonderful neighbors we had. We also laughed about the "things you don't realize when you are a kid".
One of these things were our neighbors, Ms. Cooke & Ms. Yvonne. Two women living together did not seem weird when we were kids. Duck asked me, "Did you know they were lesbians?". I said, "I didn't even know what a lesbian was!".
They were awesome neighbors. And like anyone in my life, certainly a little crazy!..
They had a blind dog and tons of cats. Ms. Yvonne smoked like a chimney & drank like a fish. I never knew what she was "drinking". Ms. Cooke just smoked like a chimney.
They gave each neighborhood kid their own little treat bag at Halloween that included wax lips. Score. At Christmas time, they threw a rockin' Christmas party. They got a flocked Christmas tree that they put the color wheel on. You know the one that has red, blue, yellow and green discs that spin around so the tree looks different colors. Like a bad acid trip, like I knew what that was like as a kid or like I still don't know what that's like but humor me. Each kid got a present. It was great.
Duck & I debated when Ms. Yvonne died. Our mothers weren't 100% sure either. Verdict: a while ago. Then we discussed "The Right Before Christmas Fire of......????". Duck said '89. I said that couldn't be right because I knew other half when it happened. We decided it was '90 or '91
The fire. Poor Ms. Cooke had been living alone for a while by then. There were no parties by then because she was too old & all us kids were getting old too. I remember thinking it was a miracle that those 2 old ladies had never burned the house down with an unattended cigarette before. This must be the cause.
Not even close. Ms. Cooke had run the extension cord for her Christmas tree under the sofa cushions. You know she didn't want to have a safety issue with the cord where someone could trip!
Don't worry, she wasn't home. I'm guessing she had made a cigarette, beer or cat food run. Maybe all three.
Sad part was that she never lived there again. Her daughter decided it was probably too dangerous. I wonder how she drew that conclusion?
So Ms. Yvonne & Ms. Cooke, the kids of the old neighborhood thank you for all the memories.
Duck & I are still laughing.
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