I have, but unfortunately the place is nothing like it was when I was a child. I grew up in a very small town on the coast of Maine, which was essentially Mayberry, but with Maine accents. We had a town cop, a town drunk, a town gossip, and a host of rather eccentric characters one usually finds only in a small town. The high school, which also served as the HS for the five surrounding towns, had an entire student population of 236, and everyone in town knew everyone else.
Main Street, like its name suggests, was the main route that ran through the center of town from it's south end to its northern border, along with a sidewalk which paralleled it the entire distance. The entirety of the Main Street of my childhood was lined with hundreds of stately, old Elm trees, which would form something of a comforting leafy tunnel over the street from one end of town to the other during the warm months of summer. The street, incidentally, that my beloved grandfather walked daily for thirty seven years, while faithfully delivering the town's mail,
Most of the townspeople earned their living from what the sea had to grudgingly offer - lobstermen, clam diggers, worm diggers, wooden ship builders, and fishermen.
The lovely Elms have been gone since the early 70s, thanks to the blight of Dutch Elm disease that struck the town, which killed them all. The cast of colorful characters is also long gone, thanks to the ravages of age, disease, and the influx of more "upscale" and far less interesting entrepreneurs, aspiring artists, and aging hippies with more money than sense. Also gone are the corner neighborhood independent grocery stores operated by lifelong members of our little community, having been supplanted by shops catering to the summer tourists' taste for the tacky and useless.
Such as it is with all it's faults my town remains, at least in those sheltering recesses embracing those memories, the only true home and sense of belonging I have ever known. It is to the place held dear by those memories I intend to be returned when the inexorable advance of time inevitably demands it.

 

The ex +1 moved to Argentina a year and half ago. He grew up there. I thought it would work out, but apparently it hasn't. Saw him at dinner last night and he's thinking of moving back. To be continued...

 

Another lovely epistle.

 

It's fun to hear people's "story" which sometimes gives a better understanding. The tale is often more bittersweet than totally sweet.

I drive through my old neighborhoods in Harrisburg PA...one in the depressed city and one in the nearby "white flight" suburbs. The one in the city had a "foreclosure" sign a couple months ago, and the little developer house (built 1955) in the 'burbs is looking pretty "run down". I still like to drive by b/c it brings back a lot of memories.

For an even better taste of the place, the next time that you visit: Park the car, get out and WALK around for a half hour. You'll likely see a number of things differently

 

Born into a military family so we moved every 13 months or so. I did go back through Miles City Montana a few years ago but it was on a cross county drive so I didn't stay to look places and people up.

 

Deb,

Last night I took a walk in the dark,
A swinging place called Palisades Park,
I went there just to see what I could see,
That's where the girls are.

I went to Palisades Park a lot, especially after I got my license. It was an adventure. Palisades Park was in Jersey just on the other side of the Hudson. In those days it was a long, long drive from Brooklyn.

By the time I started going there regularly, it was a bit old, dirty and run down. Sort of a pretty lady with a dirty face. I don't remember which one of the three, Alan Freed, Murray the K or Cousin Brucie used to broadcast from there on Saturday nights in the summer, but I think it was Murray the K and his Swinging Soriee.

I seem to remember that there also were Saturday evening broadcasts from Palisades Park on radio station WMGM which, after rock n roll was deemed to be of no social redeeming quality, was changed to another station, WHN. This was earlier than the big name DJ shows that I remember.

It was a fun place.

I'm not sure, but I think that Palisades Park is now a high rise luxury apartment complex. You can see it from Manhattan's West Side Highway.

 

Matt,

May family left Richmond Hill when I was 8 so I don't really remember very many of those places. I'm sure that they're all gone now. Neighborhoods change, and as a matter of fact, that's part of what makes New York and its boroughs so great. New York, and especially Brooklyn and Queens have always welcomed each and every immigrant group that came. I know that you've heard of the riots in Williamsburg and the racial hate beatings in Howard Beach, but for the most part New Yorkers have figured out that they have to live together. And somehow it works.

The best part of it is that each group brings with it it's culture, language and customs, and manages to share them with everyone else. Where there used to be Jewish communities and Little Italys, there are now Chinatowns and Koreatowns. Where there used to be Irish communities there are now Indian and Pakistani communities. And all of the groups that were there before have a presence too. Hindi and Parsi aren't the only language of New York, most every language spoken on the planet can be heard there, and especially in Brooklyn and Queens. The sign at the Brooklyn entrance to the Williamsburg Bridge now says, "Leaving Brooklyn, Oy Vey"

As I mentioned earlier, Brighton Beach, which was previously solidly Jewish is now Russian. On warm weekend days, the older people bring out beach chairs and sit along Brighton Beach Avenue, under the El, singing Russian songs. If you ever get a chance to visit, go there on a Saturday morning and listen to the singing. It's wonderful.

Brooklyn and Queens have changed, but when you get right down to it they're exactly the same as they were when we grew up there.

My Brooklyn is still a great place.

 

Gary,

No, the construction on the Belt Parkway will never be finished, and there will always be terrible potholes. That's part of it's charm, as is the traffic. I learned to drive on the Belt Parkway, and the big sweeping turn onto the VZ Bridge was an awful lot of fun for a kid on a motorcycle (later an MGB) going to South Jersey to visit his older sister who moved there when she got married. In those days, if you lived in Brooklyn New Jersey was The Promised Land.

Interesting that your mom lives in Monroe, my older sister recently moved there. My Aunt Rose lived on Elm Avenue right off of Kings Highway, not too far from where you're from. Small world.

 

Which development is your sister in? Mom is in the Ponds.

 

Gary,

I don't know. My older sister cut herself off from the rest of us 20 years ago and I haven't seen or talked to her since. I've heard from other family members that she sold her house in Morganville and moved to Monroe, but I don't know where in Monroe she is. I've heard it's an active adult community, but I'm not even sure of that.