The Everlasting Gobstopper

The title means nothing. It just popped into my head and I thought hey, thats a good title. For what? Doesn't matter.

*****

One year ago we were celebrating Josh's graduation and preparing for his open house. His commencements may have actually been a year ago today. My how times flies.

Five years ago, the kids were: Josh 13, Matt 10, Rachel 8 and Alec 6. I had just finished working my first tax season at my previous job. I worked about two days a week. I was evangelizing at every opportunity. The seeds that I had planted in one person did eventually grow though -- my cousin Stacy has been a born again believer for a couple of years now. Hooray! We didn't have our pool yet. Oliver was a little bitty puppy. None of my kids were driving. I had three in elementary school. I was probably 20 pounds lighter than I am now. I was only 35. I had never heard of Tim Horton's.

Ten years ago, the kids were: Josh 8, Matt 5, Rachel 2 1/2 and Alec 1. This would've been our first summer in our new home.
No dogs. I didn't work outside the home. We had our yard to put in (grass, sprinklers, landscaping...) I think we were actually putting in all of the brick pavers at this time. Kristie had her first child, my nephew Daniel Todd. My Mom and Mike lived in West Bloomfield. The woods behind our house were right off the back patio. Josh and Matt were the only ones going to school. They were in third grade and kindergarten. Nick Jr. was on the television all day. I would get together with friends for lunch all of the time, with the kids of course. Alec took naps in his crib. Keeping the house clean and decorating were huge priorities. No one was on the internet. We didn't even have a computer! Gas was probably $1.30 a gallon and I could feed my family for about $130 a week. John was always doing 'side jobs', which were very lucrative.

Fifteen years ago, the kids were: Josh 3 1/2 and Matt would've just been turning a year old. We had just moved into the house on Fish Lake Road. It was our first brand new home and it was on four and a half acres. We were so excited about that. I drove a white Chevy Corsica. Me and the boys were always doing something fun. John had just started working at the job he is at now, switching from the other heating and cooling company he had worked for. None of my family lived anywhere close to us. They were all at least 45 minutes to an hour away and thought we lived in the boondocks. John's parents lived in Metamora and we had dinner over there just about every Sunday. We didn't have central air and I remember it being very hot that summer. We had a window a/c and I would close up the house, all the blinds and try and keep the house cooled off. I loved my white kitchen with the cute farmhouse style kitchen table. I was 25 years old. John and I had been married for five years.

Twenty years ago we didn't have any kids yet. John and I were newlyweds. We would've been married for two months! We were living in our loveshack, also known as the trailer, in the trailer park that was located in Clarkston. Our whole lives were ahead of us. Just a few months later, we would start discussing having our first child. I could not wait. I was working at the tax and accounting office that I had started working at as a co-op student in high school. We had a dog, a cocker spaniel named Max that we had adopted from a shelter. My Mom and Dad were still married and living in the house that I grew up in. Kristie was graduating from high school and dating her long time boyfriend Jeff. I loved General Foods International coffee. Suisse Mocha and Cafe Vienna were regularly stocked in my cupboard. John and I would go to Meijer and spend about $80 and it would feed us for a few weeks. I weighed about 125 pounds. The tv shows that we watched were: Roseanne, The Wonder Years, Bosom Buddies, Family Ties and Growing Pains. I also loved watching Knots Landing. My Mom wasn't even 40 years old yet.

Twenty five years ago. Now I have to do some thinking here. I would've been fifteen, which puts me in the 9th grade and madly in love with a boy named John Walls. I talked on the corded telephone constantly with him. We would have two to three hour conversations. We found out that our Moms and Dads went to high school together. My best friend Laurie and I spent the night at each other's house often. She lived two houses down. I had babysitting jobs in my neighborhood. One was my favorite, babysitting Joey and Karen. Karen was only a year old when I first started. Anyone who knows me knows that I love little ones. I would dress her up and fix her hair. Okay, so this makes her at least twenty five now? Ugh. I remember a boy named Paul, who I knew since grade school, had started liking me and was dropping by the house. He didn't live too far away. I didn't give him the time of day though, I was way to lovestruck with John. I worked as an assistant in the front office at my junior high school. My friend Deena and I were both in there at the same time and she knew that I liked John. I would make up excuses as to why I needed to go out of the office and she would cover for me. I would then go and find John's class and stare at him through the window in the door.

Thirty years ago. I'm ten years old. Life is good. My biggest chore is maybe washing a dish or two. I spent a lot of time playing with my cousins Traci, Debby and Todd, who lived next door. Jumping on the trampoline, playing in the playhouse that Uncle John had built in their back yard and riding bikes. I remember riding my bike up and down the street with my portable radio slung on the handlebars. "Hot child in the city" is playing on that radio. I was way cool. This was also the time when Kristie and I spent a lot of weekends with our Grandma Cooley. We would go to my Uncle Butch and Aunt Sue's. The adults would play cards all night and we would play with our cousins Mike, Allen and Shannon. I remember the boys having this cool stereo that had lights all over it. The lights would light up to the tune that was playing. KISS was really big. I had a huge crush on my cousin Allen's friend Mike H. I was invited to go with Allen, Mike H. and Mike H.'s family to celebrate his birthday. We went to Farrell's and then went to the movies to see "Moonraker". I was in love. All of us kids spent many summer days swimming in Dixie Lake, playing hide and seek outside and listening to our older cousin Gary's super cool band play their super cool Bob Seger like music. On tv was Laverne & Shirley, Happy Days, Little House on the Prairie, The Love Boat, The Incredible Hulk, Fantasy Island, Wonder Woman and Welcome Back Kotter. I had a great childhood.

As always, I so enjoy going back in time.