Some ex-residences
Forgive me for raking up old history, some of which I’ve surely blogged about before, but I have little else to discuss tonight. I must be getting on in years because I’m keen to list buildings I’ve lived in that have been torn down.
(1, 2) Mission houses, Las Palmas, Esmeraldas, Ecuador.
My boyhood home was the eastern house. As a baby, I briefly lived in the western house.
(3) Cottage on the property of Lakeview Church, Zion, Illinois.
My family lived in Zion from 1990 to 1991 (my third-grade year).
(4) Missionary Church Dorm, Quito, Ecuador.
My home during boarding-school years.
If I were asked to choose one former residence to live in forever, this would be it. My own Hogwarts.
It was torn down a few weeks ago.
(5) The Music Machine, River Park, South Bend, Indiana.
I lived in the tiny apartment above the office of the Music Machine, a DJ-ing business. I moved in when I married Karin. Less than a year later, the city forced us out and built a fire station on the land.
♦ ♦ ♦ ♦ ♦
I used Google Maps to try to find the house in Seattle’s U-District in which I rented a room for four months, in 2004 and 2005.
Ultimately, I can’t be sure of the address. It was a grungy building surrounded by gaudy fraternity houses. I leeched wireless Internet from one of those fraternities; the network was called “Sex Gods.” So, if I’m ever back in that neighborhood, I’ll know how to pinpoint my old location.
I did find this lovely 2013 article in the University of Washington’s student newspaper about my landlady, who rented to ex-cons, sex offenders, and others who needed a break. I was in neither of the first two categories, but she rented to me after she called my friends and they confirmed that I didn’t drink alcohol. (And it was good that she rented to me, because it was about the only room in Seattle I could have afforded.)
I lent her my mom’s parents’ missionary memoirs, and she read them.
That year and the next, when I moved back and forth across the continent, alone, to pursue fruitless but necessary studies, the Lord put me in touch with some remarkable people.
(1, 2) Mission houses, Las Palmas, Esmeraldas, Ecuador.
My boyhood home was the eastern house. As a baby, I briefly lived in the western house.
(3) Cottage on the property of Lakeview Church, Zion, Illinois.
My family lived in Zion from 1990 to 1991 (my third-grade year).
(4) Missionary Church Dorm, Quito, Ecuador.
My home during boarding-school years.
If I were asked to choose one former residence to live in forever, this would be it. My own Hogwarts.
It was torn down a few weeks ago.
(5) The Music Machine, River Park, South Bend, Indiana.
I lived in the tiny apartment above the office of the Music Machine, a DJ-ing business. I moved in when I married Karin. Less than a year later, the city forced us out and built a fire station on the land.
♦ ♦ ♦ ♦ ♦
I used Google Maps to try to find the house in Seattle’s U-District in which I rented a room for four months, in 2004 and 2005.
Ultimately, I can’t be sure of the address. It was a grungy building surrounded by gaudy fraternity houses. I leeched wireless Internet from one of those fraternities; the network was called “Sex Gods.” So, if I’m ever back in that neighborhood, I’ll know how to pinpoint my old location.
I did find this lovely 2013 article in the University of Washington’s student newspaper about my landlady, who rented to ex-cons, sex offenders, and others who needed a break. I was in neither of the first two categories, but she rented to me after she called my friends and they confirmed that I didn’t drink alcohol. (And it was good that she rented to me, because it was about the only room in Seattle I could have afforded.)
I lent her my mom’s parents’ missionary memoirs, and she read them.
That year and the next, when I moved back and forth across the continent, alone, to pursue fruitless but necessary studies, the Lord put me in touch with some remarkable people.
