Frear Ave

   This is 1 Frear Ave many years after we left

The house was huge.  I was 8 years old which made it more huge.  The first thing I saw were flowers--beautiful purple flowers all along the ground in front and bushes full of white flowers on either side all the way into the back yard.  Flowers were always one of my favorite things in life--already I knew this would be a good place.  Things would be happy now.  That's what my 8 year old mind told me.

I made my way up the old wooden steps--I liked the way they creaked and moved when I stepped on them--onto the biggest porch I'd ever seen.  I thought it must wrap around the whole house (it actually only went halfway).

Finally into the enormous front doors.  The first of the two sets of doors into the house was thin and light.  The kind, if you weren't careful would slam and break the glass panes at the top.  But no one ever slammed doors in our family.  Everyone was very controlled.  No one yelled, ran, laughed too loud, cried, anything that would show lack of control.  Beatings were even controlled.  Dad was always sadistically calm while the cane, belt, fist or broom handle made its mighty way  (with the help of his great strength) onto our small, lithe bodies.  We, in turn, always remained in total control.  Never a tear or even a sound, except the numbers of the count we were to keep, escaped us (we had to count each strike out loud as it hit our body).

So in the five years we spent living at 1 Frear Avenue, that door never had to fear for its safety.  In fact, we learned to love the forewarning it gave whenever Dad had been out and was returning home.

About a four foot space, then the inside door.  A large, heavy, wooden door that worked well to keep out the cold and wind of upstate New York, and keep in the sounds of a tortured childhood.

The interior of the house was just as magnificent to me as the exterior.  Having been built around the turn of the century, it was complete with stained glass windows, secret passageways, an attic full of treasures left behind by previous families, and an enormous fireplace for keeping warm on cold winter nights.  I loved that house from the moment our car first pulled up in front of it.  The things that happened within the walls of it are quite a different story.

Jen ;-)