West Town Family Portrait - Home is Where Your Heart Is

Home is where your heart is, or so they say, but if it’s true - my heart is in a lot of places. Today is my last day in this house as a nanny on Huron Street. I’ll continue on with my sweet kiddos in another location but Huron Street will always have my heart.

We shared a lot of laughs in this backyard. Many summer mornings spent half awake - finishing one cup of coffee before the day really got going. Mornings when the kids slept in and I helped out watering the plants - coffee in hand - my Easy Morning Spotify playlist playing through my phone in my back pocket. Summers romping around in the kiddie pool. Friyays on the back porch.

There were tears, there were joys, this was an exceptional place to be for any number of reasons. I was a part of this house for seven years - and two of which I had the joy of living next door.

You’d think that wanting to live next door to your nanny family might make you a special kind of crazy - but it was one of the best decisions I’ve ever made. You see, I had left a sad life situation and moved into the apartment as a fresh start. Huron Street will always be the place where my heart healed, I grew some wings and started to fly - creating my own, new beautiful life.

There are a lot of things I’ll miss about this street. The kind next door neighbors. Lalo - who loved to see the kids and we could always talk motorcycles - the next door neighbor who lived in a multi-generational house. Janet - who had the cutest little Tater Tot puppy and always had a big smile for you. Their dad Manuel - who didn’t speak much english but always tried his hardest to have small conversations whenever I saw him, he also loved saying hello to the kids. Matt and Rizzo - the coolest guy in the world who taught cheerobix classes and rode a rad bicycle. The other neighbor whose name I never knew but always wore a big ten gallon hat and cowboy boots while riding his bicycle - I’ll miss that hat tip and seeing him walk the TINIEST puppy I’ve ever seen, “ok lady have a good day” was how he always said goodbye.

There was the older gent who would walk his pug (I found out later TWO pugs but he would walk them separately) and would sing to them. The old retriever whom would always nap in the window across the street. The best damn block party you’ve EVER been to. It’s the first place I ever lived that truly felt like a community.

I miss my old front porch. I miss the ambiance of the street lights. I miss the random cat I’d see walk the same pattern across the street every night whom I coined as “Babushka Cat.” She would toil all day to bring home mice for her babies in some unknown alley - whatever they didn’t eat they would make into mouse jerky. I miss hearing the live mariachi bands playing in the distance at the house a few doors down.

I’ve moved on to a new home which is equally lovely, next week I’ll move on to working in their new home. New sets of adventures await - but I’ll never forget the wonderful time spent on Huron Street.