Me and my Brothers and sister in the 1960's

In the beginning, before God invented dirt, I was born. And before that by three and change years, Karl was born.
     When my Mom asked my Dad what to name the baby  the story goes that my Dad said, William, Kenneth or Joseph. My Mom picked Karl William, I don't know where Karl came from except, maybe it was a German name.
     I was named after both Grandfathers, Joseph Milton, Joseph having recently died and both were alcoholics. What a way to start.

     My Sister Ruth Theresa after both Grandmothers and Eric Kenneth, filled up my Dad's request for William, Joseph and Kenneth. Eric, I think Eric was just a name they liked.
    Being the second born and three plus years younger then my brother I was the typical kid brother who wanted to hang out with his older brother and  friends. I never really fit.
     I remember watching from the door, now the door into the front bedroom, former northern half off the sun porch, as my brother dressed up for Church was picked up by the Fishers,Trudy Fisher and her father and taken over to the Dutch Reformed Church on Strawtown Road.
     Life was different then, I bet you were taking bets on how long it would be before I used that expression. Well anyway it was. After School kids went out side. And families had more than one or two kids. We were a group of four, our cousins were three, there were five Marsicos. There were only two Lafacianos until Lou got remarried then there were four more.
     We played baseball and football across the street from our house in the open lot, there's a house there now. We rode our bikes. And We went fishing. I remember walking down Klein Ave, past Theresa Dr. and all there was was turned mud and dirt. The land had been cleared to make way for the development. I guess no one calls it that anymore. I was told by my mom that there was a farm over near the Firehouse. I don't know if the farm extended as far as Klein Ave.
     The early 60's were not much more than ten years after the Tappan Zee bridge opened and changed the county for better or worse.
     My Dad had purchased our house from the Demarest family who'd gotten it some time after my grandfather Joseph lost it in the depression. It was a small house even then. To enter the house, the front door opened onto the sun porch. There was an archway to the right and the wall extended left. You would walk to the right into the living room. Then You could got to the left through a door to the bedroom, now it's a closet. Or You could go straight into the dinning room. In the Dining Room, on the right was a window looking north. The only way to go from there was about five steps forward and left into a small kitchen. It extended only to the archway. The Cellar door on the right opened and going down the stairs on the left was a door to go outside.
     I only remember some of those features of the house. As a young Kid, I remember a big grate in the living room floor that was part of the forced air heating system the house had at one point, it was about two foot square. I remember sitting on it looking down into the basement when my father was down there, I think closing up the hole in the floor.
     Additions to the house; the addition of the two back bedrooms in the 50's. My Dad, Uncle Ken and my Grandfather putting it on. In the sixties moving the door of the bathroom out of the main bedroom and reworking the bathroom, which started the reworking of the bathroom every couple of years until it was done correctly by someone, I forget who, but it took several attempts by several less then qualified people to finally get it correct. That was in the 80's, I guess. It stayed that way until the early 2000's when it was expanded and improved.
     The Living Room and the moving of the front door happened in the 70's by a man named D.T. Albino. He first worked on Uncle Ken's and Aunt Elsie's house doing a wonderful job. He then did work on our house.Doing an awful job. Electrical outlets would fall out of the wall. He put trim up before putting up the paneling. He cut wood on our dining room table and put an inch cut in the table. He was a disaster. Back then We were not in your face people and no one felt able to confront him about it, so it was let go. Over the years his work would be corrected and improved,  still all these years later it is hard to forget. Maybe that contributed to the four kids being more outspoken and less willing to take crap from people. I would hope some good came from it.
     Another good story about the living room on the north side of the house, it was kept narrow to keep it from going over  the property line to the lot we owned next to the house. Years later it was found that the room went over the line by a few feet. Later after my Dad died and Eric and Lynn had their car accident, the boundary lines were changed to what they are today. One lot in the back, one lot in front.

     In the 60's the lot to the north had its share of pools and the northern boundary of the lot was lined by a fence. Outside the fence were a line of roses that my Dad bought home for my Mom from Jerry's Nursery, up near where his Uncle's house was. After that there were Crabapple trees and some pine trees going east to west. One Pine Tree that was inside the fence I dug up from the Farm in Nanuet just before they bulldozed it. I planted a pine that was just a few feet tall. When Eric had the house put  thirty odd years later the Pine towered above everything except the huge Maples. The One in the backyard and the two near the road. The Pine was cut down when a worker cut the roots on the driveway side putting in underground lines then cut the roots on the opposite side putting in something else. Fearing it would now fall, it was taken down.

     We had a septic tank until the late 60's. If You don't know what one is feel lucky. When We had one, every few years it seemed, probably less my Dad would go out and have to dig it up. It was directly behind the house,west, toward what was the swamp then and a little to the south of the Maple tree. Grass never grew between the maple tree and the house even with the sewer under it. Maybe that is why the Maple grew so big.

     There was a driveway on the southern side of the house that was edged with cinder blocks when I was a kid. It went back along the property line between the houses and when my Uncle Joe died in the mid 60's from cancer, that was where his car was parked. There were other cars and some trucks that got the privilege of being parked there over the years. My father would bring home a car for us and it would be a stick shift and he'd swear it wasn't. My Mom didn't drive  a stick, never could. Over the years several Divco trucks would get parked there. Some like the 64, in perfect shape, but lacking in refrigeration and insulation would get parked there in the 70's. Later then that trucks that my Dad drove would get parked further back, back as far as they could go. Or Sons would add their share of different cars. A Mustang fastback, a Triumph or two or three, just to name a few.

      This was supposed to be a post about my brothers and sister. I got off topic a little. Karl was the oldest by three and change years. Between Karls birth and mind, our mother had several miscarriages. After my birth, Ruth came along about two years later. I remember waking up one morning and Mrs. Hart was in our hose. My Parents were nowhere to be found. I remember not liking it. I don't remember Ruth being bought home. It must have not made an impression on me the way waking up to Mrs. Hart being in our house did. I can remember helping my mom give Ruth a bath in the small sink in the bathroom.
        One Morning, a few years later again Mrs. Hart was in our house one morning. Again I didn't like it. Eric had been born.
       Karl and I were close, mostly when we were young. That was until we got new neighbors. The two lots to the north of our house were empty in the early 60's. I've talked about the lots and how the builder who owned the lots was getting a lot of community push back and offered one of the lots to my dad. On the other lot a house was moved from Nyack or something like that and the Cockcrofts moved in. Karl and Brian became friends. Then suddenly Karl was friends with another neighbor, Louie and finally in the late 60's a house was built on a lot across the street and a little north and the Peronies from Queens moved in. Karl became friends with their son, Joe. He was in his teens by then. He'd started smoking, he joined the fire house and his life went onward.
       After Karl started experiencing the world, Ruth, Eric and I would hang around together. We'd do things together for several years.