Side Trip

This morning I had to take my car to be emissioned because the tags are due. I happened to take my camera with me and on the way back home I went by a few old places I had not been to in a few years...This 1st picture is of Ann and Ladell's old house on Gable. They were our next door neighbors and Ladell built this house. He later built a house for us. After The Call's moved the house was bought by the Nassers. They were very good neighbors also but very different from the Calls.

This is a picture of out house on Gable. We bought this house in 86 and sold it in 90. In 89 we had a house fire and burned the top off the house. We still refer to it as the burned house. Dealing with the insurance company was an experience I will never forget. While the fire trucks were at our house an insurance adjuster showed up and talked to me standing in the street. He had a check in his hand for 15K and wanted me to sign off on the house. I did not like that at the time but when I look back on it it makes me so mad I could spit now. This apparently was a tactic commonly used by adjusters. I just wonder how many poor people take the check and sign off. I did not do that. It took us 9 months to settle with the insurance company and it was for more than 10 times their original offer.....Blood suckers, all of them!

Our neighbor about 3 houses down were the Clausers. They had a boy Missy's age. The Mom, Diane was a nice person. She used to be a hair stylists but went back to school to become a para legal for a Divorce Attorney. I remember her telling me she went back to school because she was tired of all of the sad tales her hair customers used to tell her...Then she would laugh because working for a divorce attorney she heard some really sad tales.... I also remember one day several of us women were sitting around talking about when our kids were young, they were all about teenagers at that time. The subject came up about how old each kid was before they slept through the night. Diane said she did not know how old her son was when he slept through the night but he was 6 weeks old when she slept through the night. I think she had the right idea about mothering...

This used to be a big open field where the kids would push their dirt bikes down to and ride for hours. Now it is just a hill trying to drown out the freeway noise...Once Kris took her dirt bike over a little mound in this field and spilled head over tea kettle....It is a wonder she did not break her neck. She would not ride again for quiet a while.