The Woods I Played In As A Kid Are Mostly Gone
And you know the sun’s settin’ fast,
And just like they say, nothing good ever lasts.
Well, go on now and kiss it goodbye,
But hold on to your lover,
‘Cause your heart’s bound to die.
Go on now and say goodbye to our town, to our town.
Can’t you see the sun’s settin’ down on our town, on our town,
Goodnight. ~~~ Our Town, Iris Dement
I just Google mapped the place I grew up in. I was stunned.
I started inserting red arrows for all the corporate office parks and luxury housing that was built since I was a kid.
I had to stop before the image became all red arrows.
When I was a kid, you could walk from Hackley School lower fields for miles northeast to the Saw Mill River Parkway and north to Tarrytown Lakes through unbroken forest. Today, it’s all fragmented by corporate office parks and luxury housing and Hackley School athletic facilities.
The land between my house on Maple Avenue and Axe Castle was all woods and streams. The Castle was surrounded by hundreds of acres of woods. It’s now apartment buildings, luxury housing, roads, and things like spas.
The land between Benedict Avenue and the NY Thruway and along White Plains Road (Rt. 119) was all woods and wetlands and streams. It’s all developed now.
The corporate office parks to the east of the Saw Mill River Parkway were not there either.
And the housing costs are obscene – the tiny dilapidated 2 bedroom house on a tiny lot I grew up in sells for half a million dollars now. Absurd.
Just take a look at all those red arrows.
Say goodbye…