North Rural Street Memories

Dad and I were on the front porch of our duplex on North Rural Street in Indy. (Seems like no one else was home but us.) Dad didn't have kids merely to carry on his family name and DNA. He had kids to fetch his beer and cigarettes. That day, Dad told me to go down to the gas station and buy him some cigarettes. I was only five at the time, but back then a kid could walk around the block and not be worried about a drive-by or some pervert picking them up. And a kid could run down to the gas station and buy a package of cigarettes for her dad.

I got up from the porch steps, and Dad told me there was money on the kitchen table. As I walked into the house to pick up the money, he added, "...and get me a beer too". I picked up the money, stuck it in my pocket, and headed out the front door to go to the gas station. At the end of the block, I crossed 19th Street, making sure I looked both ways. Then I was in the gas station's parking lot.

I entered the station. Two attendants were at the counter. One of them leaned over to see what I wanted. I placed my money on the counter and said, "I want a beer and a package of Chesterfields!". The two attendants looked at each other and chuckled. One of them leaned over and said to me, "Honey, we don't sell beer here!". But he handed me the cigarettes and the change.

I walked back to the house and gave Dad his cigarettes. Then I told him that they didn't sell beer at the gas station. He gave me "the look" and said, "I didn't mean for you to BUY a beer. I wanted you to get me one out of the refrigerator!". Man, what a dopey kid I was. That was almost as embarrassing as the time I walked into the tavern where my grandpa bartended and sat down at the bar.

As you may have guessed, the top photo is the duplex we lived in on North Rural as it appears today. The next one is the gas station. I retrieved the photos from Google Maps, and am amazed that I was able to "virtually" walk up and down North Rural again. I was even more surprised to find that the old gas station is still there, and going a little farther north and across the street from the gas station, the old Garnett's market building still stands. It's evidently now a day care center.

The photo to the left is my mom walking home from Garnett's carrying her groceries. You can even see Garnett's in the photo. How cool is that? The cars give away how old this photo is.

Using Google Maps, I even traced my steps back to the school where I attended kindergarten. That was Public School 81. I think my teacher's name was Charity Showalter. We always walked 18th Street to the school. I remember not being able to tie my shoes for the longest time, and Miss Showalter said something about it one day. That made me determined to learn. In our classroom, we had a Fisher-Price "Old Woman that Lived in a Shoe" toy, complete with laces. I took that toy every day and played with it until I learned how to tie my shoes.

PS81 is also where I had my first crush. I was in love with David Qualkenbush, who had strawberry-blonde hair and freckles. I can still recall what he looked like--he was the cutest boy in the class. One day our teacher announced that we were going to have a field trip that day and we would choose partners. We all had to sit in a big circle on the floor to "choose up". Here's my chance, I thought. As soon as my name was called, I was going to pick David as my partner for the field trip. Little did I know until that day that EVERY girl in kindergarten had a crush on David Qualkenbush.
I didn't realize that, alphabetically, my name was way at the end of the pack--and that's how the names were being called. Sure enough, the first girl called ran over and picked David. My heart was broken. I remember hanging my head and tears going down my cheeks. Then at my deepest minute of despair, I saw a pair of shoes stop in front of me. I looked up and saw another little boy in my class. He asked ME to be his partner! Hey, maybe I was the cutest girl in the glass and every boy had a crush on ME.

I wiped my tears, stood up and took his hand. Who needed dumb ol' David Qualkenbush, anyway.