#14 Raleigh Street - Houses, Doors, & Yards

Movin' On Up - 1969

Estimated read time: 5 minutes

When my sister, Karla, was about a year old, my Grandmother moved down from Seattle to help out. She lived next to us in the last apartment on the left until a house three lots west of the Courts became available. Then she moved there. Mom had wanted the house, but Grama saw it first. And Grama thought it would be nice if we all lived there together. Mom didn’t agree.

The house had three or four bedrooms, depending on how you counted, and one bathroom, no matter how many times you counted. Erik got the small room off the kitchen, and I got the other small one between the laundry room/back porch and the bathroom. Each room was just big enough for a twin bed and a small dresser. Neither one had a closet.

Grama took the room that should have been the dining room and made it her bedroom. It was right off the living room and had a large opening instead of a door. She hung a curtain across the opening and called it good.

Mom kept Karla with her at the Courts. Grama set up a crib in her bedroom for when she babysat.

The fourth and biggest bedroom was turned into Grama’s sewing room. One of its doors led into the bathroom, a second door led into the living room, and on a third wall, there was another door that led out to the side yard.

The house was laid out in such a way that you could walk (or run) through it in a complete circle. The living room led into the kitchen, which led into the laundry room, which went into my room, then into the bathroom, next to the sewing room, and back to the living room; only Erik’s and Grama’s rooms missed being in the circle.

We had three yards now—one in the front, one in the back, and one on the side. Grama put up clotheslines in the back and side yards. On laundry day, this meant we’d better stay out of the yards or we’d be in big trouble. Grama didn’t appreciate it when we ran through the sheets to avoid being caught in a game of “You’re it.”

Since Grama’s house sat behind two smaller houses, our front yard was also someone else’s back yard. But we didn’t mind. Especially since, several months after Grama moved into the back house, Mom rented the front house that also belonged to the yard, and now it was our yard no matter which way we looked at it. And, since Mom’s house had a front yard too, the common yard became the middle yard, and we now had four yards.

The two front houses were separated by a narrow walkway that went from the middle yard to the sidewalk. The back doors of both houses led into the walkway and faced each other. If both doors swung open at the same time, they just missed hitting each other. And if a finger was anywhere near at the time, ouch.

When any of us kids failed to close Mom’s back door, which was frequently, the door banged loudly and repetitively against the side of the house. The noise annoyed Mom and our neighbors, Mr. and Mrs. Ridge, so we constantly got yelled at to “shut the damn door.” Mom also didn’t like it left open because it let the flies come in.

Mom’s front house had less rooms than Grama’s back house, but like Grama’s, it was laid out in a circle. Moving counterclockwise, you went from the living room to the bedroom to the bathroom to the laundry room to the kitchen and back to the living room. The rooms were a lot bigger than those at the courts, so Mom and Karla had a lot more space now.

The bedroom’s south window faced both the middle yard and Grama’s front door. It, therefore, became a communication channel and a regular thoroughfare. When dinner was ready at Grama’s house, she’d send one of us kids to tell Mom it was ready. Sometimes we’d just hang out on the sill and holler in at her. Other times, we’d climb all the way in. Mom didn’t care much for our using the window as a means of getting from one house to the other, but we thought it was a lot more fun than the door.

Having two houses and four yards was great. And, since both our houses were on the driveway side of the property, we got the driveway—all the way from the street to Grama’s back yard.