Walking Home on the Last Day of School

Last day of the school year with summer vacation ahead.

Who doesn’t remember the joy of that?

Every year, as schools let out for the summer, I relive my last walk home from Auburn Heights Elementary, summer delights ahead, school work finished for the year.

The first house I’d pass would be the Potbury’s, built in 1862 as the tenant home for the Adams’ farm, property that included the four dead-end streets of my neighborhood. We kids knew Mrs. Potbury as the kind Bible storyteller, with a front porch lined in potted plants. She sold them for pittance to be gifts for mothers, from seedlings to African violets.

Across the road, the Silkwoods lived next to the School Hills, which my family considered a “lucky bum” house, since they had access to the bike and sled hills anytime, as well as front row seats to the annual fireworks.

McDonald’s lived on the corner of Squirrel and Margaret, another lucky bum family, since they were next door to Shovel’s Market, the local go-to corner store. My best friend’s mother sent us for bread and milk. For me, it was a candy store, from candy bars to endless penny candy choices behind a glass display.

On the other side of Squirrel Road, houses boasted long front yards of satiny grass, shaded by enormous oaks filled with squirrels. (Which I believed gave the road its name.)

Jimmy Dennison was usually outside the garage in his wheelchair surrounded by faithful friends. Rose lived next door, on the corner of Nichols, with its own neighborhood of elegant houses and green yards, where my friend Jeanette lived.

After admiring the shaded lawns and oak trees, I imagined the inside of each house I passed on my side of the road. Large picture windows, flowers along fences, neat and inviting. Uhan’s had a double lot, fenced, with a lovely house, and next door, on the corner, Gibbs’ house was as neat and welcoming outside as inside. (Later I babysat occasionally, taking my guitar for entertainment.)

Caroline Street. The First Woods began at the end of our street, and there was a slope halfway down that made riding bicycles no-handed a death-defying feat. Some of the houses had ditches or culverts between the sidewalk and street, where we played in the clear, rushing water early in the spring.

Vicki’s house was a beauty on its double lot, and across the street, Marilyn’s had a long sunny front yard, lined by maples, with a round brick front porch. Linnea and Larry lived two doors up from us, the Turners were next door, and I was home. Home for the summer.

I always paused to admire the Hall’s house across from ours. Stately sugar oak in the front, dignified frame house with front porch, and on the adjoining lot, a garage apartment over the garage. I dreamed of renting it when I was grown and working. Mrs. Hall’s garden could be glimpsed behind the house with a white arbor and flowers. Always a lovely sight, in any season.

But home. Busy family with six children, Mom who could do anything, and Dad who knew everything. We’d buzz around Mom, telling her about our teacher and school day, beg to go swimming as soon as possible, listen for the ice cream truck, and relax into the joy of eternal summer, Kool-Aid, and neighborhood friends.

Funny. I only attended Auburn Heights Elementary one year, fourth grade. We came from Pontiac where I was at LeBaron Elementary from kindergarten to third. In fifth grade, I took a bus to Stone School, and afterward, the Junior High.

I could walk there, too, since we’d go down the street, through the woods, and across the football field. High school was on Auburn Road between Crooks and Livernois in those days, where my last day of school didn’t include walking home, but planning jobs.

Yet every year when schools remind parents of the last official day, I’m back in the Heights, humming to myself as I head home for summer vacation from Auburn Heights Elementary.

Yes, the school remained part of my life for years—the annual fall festival with its White Elephant room, cake walk, and duck pond; the close of Halloween, when we headed there, after the seven o’clock fire station whistle, for cider and doughnuts.

But I still see it as I left on that early June afternoon with all summer ahead for riding bikes to the Heights downtown, swimming in local lakes, family camping trips, and playing until dark in our neighborhood.

Doesn’t matter that the building is officially, sadly gone.

It lives on in my memories.

Happy summer vacation to all.