 This
picture was taken in the living room of the house in Baltimore. The house
was in Yale Heights, in the southwest corner of Baltimore City, near Irvington
and Catonsville, and a mile from I-695, the Baltimore Beltway, with easy
access to I-95 and the Baltimore Washington Parkway.
This
is Matthew. He was five at the time. The grandfather clock was a present
from me to Barbara on the occasion of our fifth wedding anniversary on
March 5, 1989, a few months before we moved from Washington to Baltimore.
It’s a Howard Miller clock, stands 7½ feet tall, and despite its
considerable weight, has followed us from place to place as we’ve moved
from the District of Columbia to Baltimore and then to South Venice and
Kissimmee in Florida. |
 The
house in Baltimore had two stories and a basement. This picture was taken
in the living room at the bottom of the stairs leading to the second floor.
From left to right are Matthew, about 5 years old, Angela, about 10, and
Jeannine, about 11. Those look like Easter outfits and so the picture was
probably taken on the way to church. The tapestry hanging on the wall commemorates
the Apollo 11 moon landing. I bought it in 1970 in West Germany. |
 Matthew
was four when we moved to Baltimore. The same week we moved into our house
on Melbourne Road, Jay and his family moved in right next door. Their youngest
child when they moved in was Jay. He was four, just like Matthew. They
started playing together and soon became inseparable. Where one was, there
was the other. |
 They
both played baseball with the Yale Heights Boys Club, although on separate
teams. They were always in one or the other’s yard or inside each other’s
house. Here, Jay’s sister Nicole and Matthew’s sister Jeannine are pictured.
Matthew and Jay maintained correspondence and telephone contact for about
a year after we moved to Florida but as long-distance childhood friendships
tend to go, that contact became less and less frequent and eventually just
faded away. |