I joined a Facebook group called Southeast Houston in the 50s, 60s and 70s. It’s fun to be reminded of what life was like during my childhood, teen years and twenties. I was young then and a whole lifetime lay ahead of me. Houston was far from being the fourth largest city in the country, in fact I actually recall the moment when the population here hit a million people. I watched the city grow and change into a metropolitan area with more than four million people and growing. In fact, some believe that there are many folks who have never even been counted. As more and more folks moved here so much of what I enjoyed as a child is gone forever. On the other hand so much that I never dreamed of seeing has come to pass.

I have to admit to having a grand childhood with the exception of losing my father which made me much more serious at an early age than I might otherwise have been. Nonetheless I was mostly a free range kid who explored the world around me on my bicycle without a care in the world. I played in wooded areas that are long gone. I watched freeways sprout up making it easier to get from one place to another. I saw the flight to farther and farther away suburbs leaving my old neighborhood behind and dampening the economic growth that had always been so vibrant there.

I actually stayed in southeast Houston until 2005, albeit not in my childhood digs. I moved to a house in a neighborhood that stayed fairly stable until the turn of the century. I frequented all of the wonderful places that defined my little section of Houston. One day I looked around and realized that so much had changed. My neighbors were moving away or dying. The stores that I liked were closing. Nothing felt the same and so I pulled up stakes and moved even farther out into the suburbs leaving behind incredibly wonderful times that were no longer what they had once been. 

I love the memories that I made in my childhood and throughout my working years but I am not one who looks backward and dreams of a return to times past. I have learned that most progress takes place for many reasons, to fill gaps that made life unequal and unfair for others. Change is an inevitable part of life and we can’t go back and probably would not want to do so. I suppose that sometimes we recall our childhood with such fond memories because our parents were shouldering all of the responsibilities that left us free to play and explore. Like Tom Sawyer and Huckleberry Finn we romanticize our youth when there were actually terrible things happening to people not so far from us as well as in other parts of the world. 

I still wonder how I was able to endure Houston summers in a home without air conditioning. I can’t imagine not having a phone at my fingertips wherever I go and even remember when I once had to walk several miles to find a phone after my car broke down. My laptop has made writing so simple whereas having to type everything back in the day was an onerous task. I recall spending hours combing through a card catalog at the library only to find that the references I wanted were checked out to someone else. I could go on and on about things that now seem essential that I had not even dreamed of having in the long ago.

I would not trade the diversity of my city today for the segregated racism of the past. There were things that I was not allowed to do as a woman back then that we take for granted today like getting credit or working at certain jobs. I was not able to attend Texas A&M University when I graduated from high school because women were still not welcome there. I remember female friends being harassed in engineering classes at the University of Houston in the mid nineteen sixties. We ladies were often told that our choices for life lay between being a housewife and mother or working as nurses, teachers and secretaries. Now girls can dream of being whatever they wish to be with no holds barred. 

I would not give up my memories for anything. They speak of the simple times when I formed friendships and enjoyed roller skating on a Friday night. They tell the story of days spent at the local swimming pool and adventures riding under the shade of trees in Garden Villas. I remember nineteen cent tacos at Jack in the Box but also a salary of eighty dollars a month on a forty four hour a week summer job. Things surely changed just as they were meant to be. If they had not my granddaughter would not be as independent and self assured as she is. She knows that she is capable of doing whatever her heart leads her to do. 

There was indeed a time when things moved more slowly in Houston and the southeast section was as homey as a small town. I still have many lifelong friends from that era and all of us have answered the siren call of the world. We look back and smile as we push ever forward, happy to live in an era that is exciting and capable of shrinking the world down to a size that we can visit and explore. I’m betting that the future will be even better for me and for southeast Houston as well.