The Ward!

Today I was looking through Facebook during my lunch break when I came across a group entitled "Raised in the Ward-Guelph and PROUD OF IT". The "ward" was the oldest part and in many ways the poorest part of the city I grew up in. The elementary school I attended was in the heart of the Ward and we lived on the outskirts of the Ward. There was a public school down the road that in some ways became our rivals. Because of the high population of Italians in my city, many of the people who lived in the ward were related and parts of large Italian families. I would often go to my best friend's grandma's house when they did the canning of their pasta sauce and processed their meat.

Although the "ward" didn't always have a great reputation, I absolutely loved living there because I loved my family and the memories I made. The street I lived on had about 30 houses on it and you better believe that I knew the names of almost every person! There was a guy down the street who taught me how to make origami stuff, my best friends who were twins lived two houses down, the woman across the street would make me cookies when I'd come visit, another lady let me play with her babies anytime I wanted and the list of other memories is endless. One of my very favorite neighborhood memories is playing Kick the Can with all the kids on my street. We'd get into camo gear and play it into the night while the parents hung out on their front porches and watched us (sometimes revealing the hidding place of one of the kids). There was a candy store at the top of my street so anytime I found .05 cents in my parent's pants, it meant I could get a candy. We had a river at the bottom of the street and a forest area that we built tree forts in and would catch frogs/tadpoles to keep hidden in our rooms until they all ended up dying.



To this day, my parents still live in that house that I grew up in and since they love it so much, they bought the house next to them as well! Most of the houses in the area have since been renovated and are selling for 3x what they were when my parents bought their house but my parents house looks almost the same!



In just a few weeks I'm heading home for a month and I couldn't be more excited! Of course I'm sad to leave Texas and all my friends here but there's something about being home that I just love. It's the familiar place where most of my memories were made and I could know where I'm at even if I was wearing a blindfold. I've convinced my parents to go "old people camping" (originally I asked if we could do real camping, like in a tent, but they said they're too old so they'd prefer to do old people camping...basically, sleeping a motel near a campground). This is better than just staying at home so I agreed! It'll be the first time since I left that I'll be at home for that long and I'm looking forward to the time with my family (especially my lovely niece!).



So although the "ward" didn't always have the best reputation, I too am proud to say I grew up there and it's still what I consider "home"!



Here's a picture of the street I grew up in (the snow is the reason I still don't live there