Our "roots"

As I sit on the couch here I can see out of our back slider window door down into the back yard and to John's shop. We have a back road that goes to his shop from the main road, and then a side driveway that goes through past the house to the street above, that takes you back out the main road.

This is looking down towards John's shop with is located in the right side.


So this past Saturday morning, I had an interesting experience. I was sitting here on the couch reading the paper, talking to Kevin (John had left earlier for the desert house that day) when Roxy and Dude aka Deet da dee starting barking at someone down on the back road. From time to time we will see folks down there, but mostly the neighbors walking their dog. This time is was a woman jogging (she was in her mid 30's) and I had never seen her before. She jogged down the back road and came up our driveway and stopped in front of John's shop. She starts walking around looking at the back yard.

Of course I get up and go out the deck and ask her if there was something I can help her with.

She responds, that her grandparents used to live here in the 70's and that she was in town for her High School Reunion from Arizona. Her parents lived over the hill and that she jogged over this way to check out the house.



Looking up at our house from John's shop

We talked for about 10 minutes. I think she felt a bit weird being approached...but of course I had to ask her the questions about what our house used to look like.

Back then, in place of John's shop, there were Avocado trees. There were also apricot, plum and fig trees. The deck was here, but the stairs went down on the other side. The back door to my office was there, but it was a dirt floor and just a storage area. She described to a 'T' the layout of the house upstairs. So nothing had changed inside.

Our house was built in 1968, we moved in during the late 90's. You always wonder about the history of your house, who lived here, what kind of people were they.

I'm sad she didn't stay long (she wasn't the talkative type of lady) Plus I wasn't prepared for all the questions I wanted to ask. Now of course, I can think of all sorts of questions.

I know a few years back when I went back to Canada to visit, I did the same thing. I stopped by a house I used to live in. It is an amazing experience.



One of the houses I grew up in, located in Canada. This house was built in the late 1800's. When I lived here the house was painted white and there were fields all around it. I almost didn't recognize the house because of all the trees that have grown around it

To see a house 20 years later and how much has changed. The ladies that lived there invited me to come in and see it. So I got to see my old bedroom, which seemed a lot smaller then I remember.



My old bedroom. My bed was in the exact same place

Our old Shed room was converted into a family room and in the living room they pulled up a big throw rug to show us the painted black wood floor. Which I was able to share that piece of history with them. My folks were hippies back then and they had some "interesting" parties. But I do remember them painting the wood floor back then. These women were able to strip the floor down on the outside but put a large throw rug down to cover the remainder of it.

It's interesting how we always will go back to our roots.

The boys and I with the family that lives at the house I grew up in now.