Growing Up

By the time I was heading to kindergarten, we had already moved from our house on Hollen Rd. south to Silver Spring, MD.

It wasn't until my siblings and I drove by on Saturday that I realized how hard that move must have been for my dad. Silver Spring was not his wife's choice. She found him a job opening back in Baltimore a few years later, and we headed back to Baltimore. I can't imagine it was his choice either. He had grown up so close to our house on Hollen Rd., and by all accounts, his childhood was nothing short of magical. He was only ten when his dad died, but that became just about the only sad memory of his time on Govane Ave. 

Driving home after our drive through family history, I thought about what it would have been like if we had stayed. We would have been so close to my dad's family. His cousins actually lived up the street from us, and his mom and aunt lived in an apartment nearby. Silver Spring was 40 miles away from the magical land of Govans.

I have a feeling that when he bought that first house, his only hope was that his own children would be able to experience the same magical childhood that he did. If I could, I would tell him that my childhood was full of stories, just like his. Maybe I didn't have his childhood, but I had mine, and it was pretty darn good.