The Brick House

Reminiscence...That last post made me think of that odd house that we lived in for a just a few years. It was, as I say, a brick house and the only one in the whole city. It was located on Center Street, now Manhattan Beach Blvd. It was close to the school and there was a huge vacant lot on the west side of the house, with plenty of room to play. This house also featured a basement and that is where the washing machine was located. In the kitchen, one cabinet was designated as the vegetable cabinet and the bottom of that cabinet was screened and open to the basement below. This allowed cool air to circulate around the vegetables. It also allowed us to communicate with mom when she was doing the laundry; we would open the cabinet door and yell out our requests to her. Out in back, and attached to the garage, was a covered patio/room, complete with a brick barbecue. Beyond that was a small fruit orchard and the pen that held a neighbors pig. Oddly enough, I can't remember much about the inside of the house, as I was usually ill with asthma and spent a lot of days sleeping on the couch in the front room. I do remember that room quite well.

I remember that the vacant lot, owned by Gianini Construction, was used for making great fortresses, complete with secret passages. We would dig trenches in the sandy soil and cover them with cardboard and sand. The weapon of choice for defending a fortress was a dirt clod or dirt bomb. You would grab a choice weed, with plenty of soil attached to the roots, pull it up and fling it high into the air, hoping it would land on your adversary. Those "enemies" were the kids from 12th Street, just above us. It's amazing that none of those trenches ever killed or injured any of us, as they were always collapsing and had to be rebuilt often.