Homecoming
Mars Avenue will always have a special place in my heart. After graduating from college, I lived in apartments in Shaker Heights and Brooklyn before purchasing my very first home on Mars Avenue in Lakewood. It was the summer of 2000, and Amy and I were looking for a place to raise our expanding family. Little did I know we would still be living in Lakewood almost 25 years later.
As I walked past that starter home this morning the memories started to flood my mind. All of us sharing the tiny second floor bathroom, playing on the swing set and sandbox in the backyard, sleepless nights holding a crying baby, first steps in the living room with the aqua-blue carpeting. We have boxes of photographs from our years in that house, from a time before our phones all had cameras.
I probably walked from that house to Detroit several thousand times, either escorting kids to Grant Elementary School or heading up to Weekend Wonders story time at the library. Just as I was starting to well-up with tears, I passed the perfect lawn decoration to change up the mood.
A duck was staring back at me as if to say, “don’t take life too seriously”. Seeing him hiding in the bushes made me laugh out loud. This front yard also had a family of gnomes that had tied down a small alien. It was the perfect scene for a front yard on Mars.
