See that white car? See the window right past it? See that window right around the corner, on the right? Those were ours. Mum is going to look in the windows now.
It was nice! There was a little hallway when you came in the door. It opened up into a reasonably sized living room, right in front and to the right. To the left was a kind of narrow kitchen area. Past that, and connected again with the living room, was a dining nook.
To the right was another little hallway. Immediately to the right was the bathroom. Next was a spare bedroom, for heaven's sake. To the left, us. Happy times, mostly!
Immediately to the right of this view, across the street to the south, is where Mum worked as a day care lady for a few months. Here's there:
Across the street from this first apartment of ours, to the east, is this little social hall where Nana caught Grandpa's eye, at a dance, in 1956!
The camera is looking south south-west. Keep pointing in that same direction, move to the right just a little bit and you'll come to this:
Our beloved Old Strathcona library! Built in 1913, and the scene of lots of lovely leisurely afternoon and evening visits back then, when there were not kids complicating everything.
Let's turn back. Two more shots of our apartment building, now from the east:
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| Near ... |
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| ... Far |
We're looking west now, as you'll probably remember. Keep going for a block-and-a-half, and you'll see the Old Strathcona High School.
That's it. Only girls have best friends, but at the end of grade nine my best junior high friend announced that he was coming here. Far from Riverbend! An academic high school, too? Come, he said. Do you want to, asked the folks. Thought hard. Didn't, as I liked the name of a nearer high school so much better. Evolved away from that very dear friend, which happens. What if I'd decided differently?
Imagine yourselves back at that apartment building of ours. Go south one block, then left/east a few feet. This building:
Just like the poster in my office, at school. This is the Princess Theatre, built in 1915, renovated and turned into a tremendously superb repertory theatre in 1978. Perfect timing! The first few times (like that Rebecca/Notorious double feature, which might have been on the very first night that the theatre was re/opened!) Grandpa drove me down. After that, or eventually, I had a license. So many movies! Here is half of why I'm a film professor, I'd say ...
Final thing, which precedes most of the above, at least in terms of my own experience. Here's the LDS Whyte Avenue chapel, which is about 5 blocks to the west of the Princess, on the same side of the street.
This is Edmonton's first Mormon chapel. Nana Duncan attended here, when a lass. We went too, after our move to Riverbend, and a subsequent, major boundary re-alignment. At first we wondered about that. Then, soon, forever, it became clear that it was the best thing ever. The great things that happened here! Like that much, much later, Miss Caitlin Rory Duncan made her official debut ...
