escape from the old neighborhood

Yesterday I drove back into a neighborhood where I used to live to look at a house I saw for sale and the neighborhood where it is located.  It was more of an experience than I planned on.

First, the house was pretty solid and well built, but it is 75 years old and shows some wear.  I liked the house because it was dirt cheap and the pictures of the house shows it has two marble bathrooms and the interior walls are all covered with hardwood planks and not drywall.  The exterior is stone and it was, at one time, probably something special.  I am guessing someone with money lived there.

The house was two blocks from where my maternal grandmother and step-grandfather lived when I was a teenager, so I had some familiarity with the area.  I am guessing, though, by the events that occurred, I will not be calling the realtor for a showing.

Just before I got there, I saw a half-dozen police cars with sirens blaring and at high speed pass by a block from the house.  I later learned that there had been a double homicide about six blocks away from the house five minutes before I got there.  I continued to hear sirens as I circumnavigated the neighborhood and got a look at the exterior of the house and yard.  When I left the neighborhood, I saw half a dozen more police cars-- sirens on and speeding toward north and east.

I was only a couple of miles from where the North Forty-Fourth Street Sidewalk Surfing Association used to ply their craft.  Since I was a former member and a resident of 44th Street, I figured I would drive by the old homestead.

Forty-forth street has fallen into disrepair, but the trees along the side of the street have matured creating a park-like atmosphere, but some of the houses show signs of being anything but park-like. Our old house is there but it is forty years distant from me.

When I left the area, I had to wait for a light at 47th and Parallel and a couple of gentlemen who were also waiting for the light decided to call each other out and got out of their cars and started fighting. Some young man, who apparently knew one of them jumped into the melee and started swinging and knocked one of the guys to the ground.  Then the kid jumped into his car and left.  It was other-worldly.

As I drove home, I saw a car beside the road that had obviously went off the road and been demolished with a fire truck attending to it.  Another mile down the road, two more cars had collided and there was a tow truck gathering them up.

Two deaths; one melee and two wrecks later I was heading west and back home, away from the old neighborhood and toward the current one.  I guess the current neighborhood is where I will choose to stay.

But tomorrow I will tell you more about 44th street and the "Pooch."