When my grandchildren were young I enjoyed having them at my house for sleepovers. I told them stories that I created just for them. They were silly little tales designed to make them laugh which they almost always did. We had lots of fun together and I always hated when it was time for them to return to their parents after a fun time together. 

Over time the storytelling changed. They wanted to know about me and the members of our extended family. They interrupted my dialogues to ask questions as they probed into the information about my own childhood and the people in our family tree who came before them. They liked hearing about their great great grandfather, William, who died long before they were born. They asked about their great grandfather, Jack, who was little more than a phantom in the past in their eyes. They wanted to hear more stories about my free range childhood spent in a neighborhood environment that sounded strange to them. 

When we had enough time Mike and I drove them to see the houses where we grew up. Somehow the run down neighborhoods of our youth and the tiny homes in which we resided did not jibe with the tales of joy and adventure that we had described in those places. I saw that it was difficult for them to connect the weathered neighborhoods with our fairytale stories. Times had changed. The areas had gone out of favor. Our former homes seemed to be too small for families. Their rundown appearance was difficult to reconcile with our newer and more modern abode. They had a problem imagining the innocence of our own youth when faced with the reality of how much had changed where life had once been idyllic.

Even I struggled to understand how it was possible for my childhood home to seem so small. Surely the tiny structure sitting on a small lot was not the place that I remembered. My recollection was of a yard so large that it rivaled a city park. We played our games like lords of the estate. The house itself and those around felt spacious and lovely in the recollections that I had conveyed. Instead I spoke as thought describing a fairy castle but what I saw a little wooden structure in need of repairs and several coats of paint. The place seemed so forlorn and not at all like the home that had been filled with the laughter of family and friends. My grandchildren quietly stared at the scene as though it had revealed the calumny of my accounts of my Tom Sawyer like childhood. It was difficult for them to believe that I had felt safe in the area that seemed to have become neglected and forgotten. 

I never again took my grandchildren back to the old family homestead. I wanted them to believe in my memories and it was too difficult to explain to them how the area had not weathered well in the decades since I walked out the front door of my childhood home to start my new life as an adult. Seeing the reality of time and change had even made me question the memories that seemed so crystal clear in my mind. It was as though the world had moved on from that house and the neighborhood in which it stood just as I once had. It was painful to view the reality of what had happened to the little place. 

A time came after I had retired from my decades as a teacher and school administrator when I volunteered to tutor students in mathematics at a high school that had been created in the building where I once learned my pre-college lessons. Once or twice each week I returned to the scene of my youth and now and again I drove slowly down the street where I once rode my bicycle and played ball with my friends. The home that I so loved seemed to get more and more dilapidated as time passed. It was painful to see, so I began to avoid my nostalgic journeys and instead went straight to the school to interact with the teens who needed an extra push to do well in their classes. 

During breaks I told them of my own adventures in the venerable building where they were learning about mathematics and science and history. Since the school had been gutted and remodeled in beautiful ways they had no problem imagining me enjoying my teen years in the same rooms where they now learned. It was only when I spoke of living on Belmark Street and walking to school that they seemed to be confused. One day they mentioned that they were not able to reconcile the disconnectedness of someone like me living in the neighborhood that now seemed to be so downtrodden. I laughed when I told them that they instead needed to imagine a time when the whole area was shiny and new and filled with young families with children playing in yards up and down every single street. Somehow I felt as I spun my magical memories that they were still in great doubt that such a place had ever existed but they humored me nonetheless. 

After I no longer tutored at the school in my old neighborhood I did not see my family home again for many years. Recently I took a deep breath and traveled through the familiar streets to see how the place was doing. I almost shouted for joy when I saw that someone had graced the house with a bit of love and care. It had a brand new roof and a beautiful coat of paint that made it almost seem to smile. The yard had grass again as well. It was a beautiful and welcome site that told me that somebody had decided to take care of the building and turn it back into a home. It warmed my heart and became the image that I choose to hold when I think of the place now and then. It was beautiful again just as I had described to my grandchildren. It had come back to life as vividly as I had remembered it. I seemed to be the mansion that I remembered in the way that only children see things. Maybe one day I’ll take my now grown grandchildren back to see it again. For now I’ll just tuck that image in my heart.