Everything Changes

This is the house I basically grew up in. We moved in when I was about 11 or 12 (or was I 10?) and moved out when I was a senior in high school. The house caught fire in May of 95’which destroyed the living room, kitchen, attic, dining room and back porch.
Obviously, it has been re-built and it looks the same…from the outside anyway.

I took this picture during my recent Lubbock trip and was shocked by what I saw. I’ll get to that in a second.

There once was a large cotton field next to my house. As kids, we would play dirt clod ward in it, using the trenches for cover, until the sun set. A big tree stood alone in the middle of the field and we would often hang out under it’s branches until the farmer would run us off. One time, we found a playboy magazine out by that tree. It was very old and covered in dust and it was the first time I saw a naked lady.


I like Vargas’s drawings much better than the vacuous poses of the playboy models.

I remember thinking that it was odd that people would buy these magazines…much like I thought it was odd that women competed in the Miss America pageant.

I don’t think playboy subscribers are odd anymore.
I still think Miss America contestants are.

OMG! My doggie just jumped in my lap for some cuddle time. So cute!

That is a picture of Mr. Cooper taken when he was a wee pup, engaging in the game “Frog Rodeo.” Good times.

Anyway, the field is now gone. It has been replaced by houses….cookie cutter houses at that. It was such a shock that it was suddenly gone. As I stared at the new subdivision, It felt like part of my childhood had disappeared……poof, gone.

I wonder if the developers built around that old tree?
Probably not.
That sucks.