Trimble House
Colleen grew up here when I knew her in grade school. The house is still there. It is across from our grade school Elkins First Ward. It’s pretty nice to cross the street to school. I remember visiting her once. I received an invitation to play with her. And what I can recall is that I was impressed by her older brother’s three speed English racer. I ride a 24 speed Specialized tricross bike now. But the three speed bike was so exotic when I saw it back then. As for the invitation, that part is murky. We did not get together again. Girls and boys kind of stayed apart. I regret that it was the bike I remember most.
photobackstory 
…yet how nice it is still there, looking (at least to me) as though it were plucked from ‘back then’. And do I ever know your envy over a 3-speed bike, which, in upstate N.Y. in those days, we called an English Racer, made, if I recall, by a company called Raleigh. Their frames and wheels were so thin! I was taken to a department store basement one Christmas and invited to choose a bike. OMG, how exciting–and as torn as I was over choosing an English Racer’s elegance and speed, I ended up going for this chromed-up Roadmaster, all glitzy-glamour and white-walled tires and ‘show-off’ attitude.
You’ve gone from W. Virginia to NYC, and there can’t perhaps be more of a cultural contrast in all of the 50 states. Another memorable post, Victor.
July 5, 2015 at 6:59 am