A Childhood of Nomadic Wandering

We didn’t live anywhere long. The first dozen years of my life are a flash of jumbled memories— a series of apartments in the city, usually an upper floor in some brick walk up in: Uptown, Ravenswood, Edgewater, Lincoln Square, Roscoe Village, Rogers Park, even Bridgeport. 

The furniture was always the same, it came with us: a brown plaid sofa, a wing chair, and vinyl dining chairs filled in the empty spaces. Large colored glass ashtrays overflowing with butts smoked down to the ends were the centerpiece of every table. The focal point of the living room was a boxy tv on a metal stand with wheels, and a rabbit ear antenna. On the wall, a starburst clock, it’s cord snaking down to outlet near the floor. My so called bedroom was a foldaway cot in a corner of the dining room. 

One of the last apartments we rented was over my dads diner. The smell of greasy food permeated the thin walls, but here at least my parents were easily accessible, because they were always right downstairs working. We lived there, like all the other places, for no longer than a year. After that we moved to a three flat building in a nicer neighborhood where we stayed for a bit longer, and then finally into a brick bungalow for all four of my high school years. 

I never thought to ask my parents why we moved so often. That was our normal, and my crying about how I hated to always be the new kid at school fell on deaf ears. I don’t look back on those years fondly. The chaos of constant upheaval was unsettling, and more important for me, none of my toys survived a move. It wasn’t an ideal childhood, but how many were?

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The Daily Post, October 6, 2915, Daily Prompt,: Our House~ What are the earliest memories of the place you lived in as a child? Describe your house. What did it look like? How did it smell? What did it sound like? Was it quiet like a library, or full of the noise of life? Tell us all about it, in as much detail as you can recall.<a href=”https://dailypost.wordpress.com/dp_prompt/our-house/”>Our House</a><a href=”https://dailypost.wordpress.com/dp_prompt/our-house/”>Our House</a>
 

2 thoughts on “A Childhood of Nomadic Wandering

  1. Hmm, our family of 7 was ,moved fairly often due to my shuband’s job. But they have insisted it was overall good, as they enjoyed different cities an parts of the country as well as meeting new people. I do wonder if they are telling the real truth! Interesting post.

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