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Just to the right of center, on the corner - that's the house I grew up in.View Larger Map

July 2005. That was the last time I saw my parents. That was the last time I was in the house in which I grew up, my hometown, walked the places I could walk blindfolded. Had anyone told me I would be homesick for all that, I think I would have laughed myself to a stroke. Yet, I do miss it.


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Of all the old stomping grounds, the one place I miss more than any other is a village park called The Glen. It isn't really a glen in the technical sense. What it is, rather, is the last remnant of the small glacier that retreated from that area. Most of the geography is dominated by rolling hills, with valleys cut by the meandering Susquehanna and Chemung Rivers. Here, though, the hills are steeper, sheer, and at the top of the Glen is a small (about 25 feet or so) waterfall that either pours violently or is bone dry. I once climbed it during a dry spell - it is shale, with many steps and handholds along the way - and reached the top to hear the rush of water from the sluice gates at the Village reservoir open. I dashed out of the way as a small wall of water rushed down, turning the once dry fall into a torrent of falling water.

Next to the Glen is a village cemetery. At the top of the cemetery is an access road for vehicles to go to the water supply, and just off the road is a small path. You cut up that path, always keeping the top of hill in view as different paths branch off the main one. After about ten minutes, you come out in to a meadow that stretches out over the top of the hill north of town. If you walk out from the cpose of pine and maple trees about 100 yards and look south you can see the entire Valley from there - Waverly, South Waverly, Sayre, and Athens. I used to go and sit there - just sit.

I blame ER for this bout of nostalgia and homesickness. I hope he doesn't mind.

Anyway, the wife and I will be going out to dinner at Yanuzzi's, maybe, or Tomasso's. We might even venture over the tracks to the east side of Sayre and eat at Mangialardo's. When you order spaghetti at Yanuzzi's, they ask if you want one or two meatballs. If you order two, prepare yourself for a doggy bag for your entree (spaghetti is a side order there) because the meatballs are about the size of a baseball.

Ah, well - in three weeks we shall be there. I am planning on taking the laptop, in the hope that the area has reached the 21st century and has wi-fi somewhere. If not, when you don't hear from me, you know now why. I will be taking pictures and sharing them, although I know my family is, um , reticent to have their picture taken. So, it will be places, rather than people.