Remembering Colorado Springs

On my last trip to Denver, I took a chance to drive down to Colorado Springs to visit the old haunts. It was quite odd, curious and reminiscent. Oddly, the street corner right down to the right of this picture is where I had the most memories. I remember standing under the street light and watching bats for the first time. It's where we always hung out on balmy summer evenings. It's where I first played tackle foodball and got hooked. We played in the middle of the winter with nothing but t-shirts, bare hands and hard ground. The house, of course, seems smaller than I remember it. I didn't recognize it at first. But then, the address confirmed it:4150 Thoreau Drive. That's the house. Didn't remember the tree in the front yard being that big either. :)

I took a panoramic shot of the park close by. When we lived here, it was an open lot full of weeds and holes. This is where I rode my first bike and where I tried to jump a wooden ramp and chipped my two front teeth. The handle bar grip slipped off and my hand with it. My mouth hit the handle bar and chipped off the middel of my two top front teeth.

It's bizarre to go back to these childhood places. Most of my memories from here were good even though we only lived here two years. Moving away from Colorado Springs was the hardest move of my childhood. I was old enough to realize what was happening but not old enough to understand why. I'm still scarred from leaving my BB gun at that house when we moved. :)