Basketball.
I live here because of basketball. And cigarettes.
This is the second post in the Where Bloggers Live series. And while I’m simultaneously finishing my post about a very fun home dec/DIY project that I’ve just checked off my list…today I am off topic to join a group of six ladies as part of the Where Bloggers Live series.
For my entire life I’ve always lived in Western New York State, and always within a 20 minute drive of Buffalo. You’ve heard of Buffalo, right?
I grew up twenty minutes north of “downtown” at the gateway to the Erie Canal: the city of Tonawanda. Say it slow with me, TAHN a WAN da.
This is the house my parents built in the 50’s, and where they still live today:
For some of their 60+ years in this house, my low-key parents were cursed to live next door to some pretty unpleasant characters (and I am going overboard on understatement). I don’t know how they lasted. Or why.
I tell you this for contrast. Whether our differences are the result of impatience, being spoiled boomers, or just knowing when to cut your losses, Mr and I would have been long gone.
Looooong. Gone.
However, my folks just looked the other way and went about their business. The tables eventually turned and today, they are blessed with wonderful neighbors all around. My mom became volunteer caregiver for the elderly couple across the street until they passed. And now that my parents have become the elderly couple, their lovely neighbors likewise help them in so many kind and thoughtful ways.
I lived at home until Mr and I were married thirty-three years ago. We had an apartment for two years. Then we mortgaged our young and foolish souls to live here:
It was a brand new neighborhood filled with kids, sidewalks, a bustling but convenient location. We had a very small back yard and not much space between the houses. We were super close with a few of the families…and our kids were born within days/weeks/months of each other.
Ten or so years later, the basketball started. As the little girls next door grew into their late teens, they started having lots of friends over for fun nights outside. If you’re their parents, that’s a great thing. If you live next door and there’s basketball games outside your bedroom window until 11:00…then the parents come to pick up the kids and honk the horns when it’s time to leave. Well…
Please note: nice kids, just having fun…and well within the protection of local ordinances.
But when you’re sitting on the front porch with your seven year old at 10:30 on a school night hoping someone will take the hint that the party is keeping your kids awake, well…
First-world problems.
And let’s be fair, they had to deal with our quirks, too. It’s life…
As some of our friends moved on, there was talk in our house of moving, but we continued to plod along. Mr. expanded our deck and we had a summer screen room installed. Then we discovered, via olfactory sense, that the new neighbors downwind were smokers.
We started to discover it every time we sat on our newly expanded and screen-roomed deck.
If I’m being honest, we’re NOT get off my lawn kind of people. We like people… in small doses… and love quiet, privacy, working in the yard and hanging with our family and friends. I fully acknowledge your right to enjoy your tobacco products, though I’m not a big fan of that kind of smoke smell when it makes it’s way next door. Is that smellfish? Probably.
But it’s not the kind of selfish that seeks to make you stop playing basketball or smoking…it just means that if we’re unable to enjoy it, then WE go, you get to stay.
So, we went. About seven minutes further east to Clarence, NY.
We live in a small neighborhood around the corner from this charming farm:
…which by great fortune, is just down the street from a Tim Horton’s.
If you don’t have a Tim Horton’s, you might not understand that people will eagerly wait in line behind 10 cars for a $2.00 cup of coffee at nearly any hour of the day. A cuppa Tims is a treat, a fashion accessory, and what you bring on the way to anywhere. If you have Tims in your area, you “get me.“
Clarence also has a lovely park which we often visited long before we ever imagined living here.
It’s next door to an historical society that once upon a time was a lovely and charming restaurant.
And fun fact: it was the lovely and charming restaurant Mr and I went to the night he proposed…so yeah, it definitely has historical value to us.
In any direction, I am 5 to 10 minutes away from either full-bore, all-needs-met retail;
farm stands with fresh eggs and produce;
small rural boutiques and shops;
fine and/or fun dining options,
and several other suburban communities around the eastern hub of Buffalo.
I profess great Buffalove, but best serve my fair metropolitan area by bringing my business as a commuter.
We’re about 25 minutes east of the city, and the perfect Sunday-drive distance from so many amazing and wonderful destinations (like Aurora, NY), some of which I hope tp tell you about in the future.
We really love living in a rural suburb. If I’m being honest: in do-over world we’d have moved another seven minutes further east and gone for a smaller house and more acreage. But at the time, we thought it was too far out for our kiddos and their friends, so we settled here.
The biggest and unexpected thrill, by far, has been the joy we get from our yard, whether swearing our way though a big landscaping project,
hanging out with a cold Shock Top at the chess pit,
watching and listening to the birds,
or sharing the grass with some of our quieter neighbors.
We often head to urban areas for entertainment and are sometimes wistful about the beautiful homes and architecture, bustling activity, fun and convenience of city living…but at the end of the day, we just love quiet. This is where we should be.
Plus, it’s so much handier to get Lyme disease directly from your own back yard, rather than traveling to a forest. Nothing more charming than finding a tick attached to your neck after harvesting wild grape vines. So there’s that…but we’ve learned to be pretty careful.
So how about YOU. City? Suburb? Rural? or Other?
Be sure to visit our host, Bettye, and the other ladies…and a heads-up that next months theme is Holiday Tours!
Daenel at Living Outside the Stacks
Bettye at Fashion Schlub
Iris at Iris’ Original Ramblings
Em at Dust and Doghair
Julia at When the Girls Rule
Jodie at Jodie’s Touch of Style
Tim’s left our area and Starbucks moved back in! But I don’t drink coffee, so it didn’t matter much to me! Enjoyed this read and learning a bit more about your life!
Ticks? You want ticks, come to Alabama! Seriously though, love your ‘tour’. I’m totally unfamiliar with your part of the world, but I can surely relate to wanting the peace and quiet. Never heard of Tim’s coffee – but now I want some 🙂
Grace & Peace,Iris
http://www.IrisOriginalsRamblings.com
Best invitation I’ve had this week, Iris 🤣
Thanks for visiting. Email me your address and I’ll send you some Tim’s for home brew. It lacks the paper cup goodness, but it’ll be like we shared a coffee together!
How sweet of you to send me coffee (my family thinks I’m a coffee addict). I failed to mention in my earlier comment that I have visited your neck of the woods previously (feels like another life though). Hubby and I visited Niagara Falls many, many years ago. Thoroughly enjoyed it.
Iris
I’m so enjoying seeing everyone’s homes and towns! Buffalo looks about like I’d expect. I’ve never been, but…
Long Island is tick crazy, too! They’re EVERYWHERE. I get them on me all the time cuz I go walking where I oughtn’t and poor Caleb had Lyme disease three times!
That giant chess set is in your yard? How fun!
Bettye
Ha ha, tbh, I didn’t use any pictures of “actual” Buffalo. Saving all of those for a winter post. But yeah, there are days that do look like that pretty much across the area. But I looooove the fluffy flake manna snow. Those days are priceless.
I love your quiet deer neighbors! We get them too especially now when they are hiding from the hunters who are all around us! And the cigarette smell is way off-putting. I can tell when I have to wait on a customer at the winery who has been smoking by the smell of their breath and clothes. I don’t want to hang out and chit-chat with them b/c of the smell! And they’re not even smoking at the time!
Yeah… the smoking thing is tricky. My brother smoked for YEARS. Nothing like a stroke and circulatory problems to help you quit. But I know what you mean, the scent liiiingers… We weren’t sure if we were imagining the smell was clinging to the awning and screens, or if it was. But either way, time to move on. It was a really great neighborhood though.
Even though they seem to eat the buds of my deer-resistant perennials, I do love those graceful deer. I don’t feed them as it is illegal here in New York, but they seem to be enjoying the halloween pumpkins and apples we leave out back to biodegrade.
I love your quiet deer neighbors! We get them too especially now when they are hiding from the hunters who are all around us! And the cigarette smell is way off-putting. I can tell when I have to wait on a customer at the winery who has been smoking by the smell of their breath and clothes. I don’t want to hang out and chit-chat with them b/c of the smell! And they’re not even smoking at the time!
You are definitely a different breed than us Em! So far away from the hustle and bustle and ticks?? Eek! You know how I feel about bugs. But I love your attitude and perspective on it …you always crack me up.
And yes, I do think of Buffalo as full of snow. Cold, wet, snow that I will not miss in the least!
And how charming your parents are still in their original house. I bet they have a bunch of treasures in there too!!
Loved seeing this and especially the chest set. I think somehow that’s when we first “met” you….somehow.
XOXO
Jodie
PS. I didn’t get an email today? Am I somehow off the list?
Good Heavens! I HOPE you’re not off the list!
I am trying a new comment thinger….I suspect that may have somehow disabled my original subscribers (versus the MailChimp ones). Now that you mention it, I didn’t get one from WordPress either. Hmmm… Something new to try to fix.
We had our first dusting of snow yesterday. And I picked up my first packable puffer of the season. You would be proud! It’s not black!
My mom will always be a collector! Haha…she’s always “cleaning out!”
There was not a single snow picture!! Well, except the first one. I want to visit. Again. We lived on Idlewild or Idlewood, in Tonawanda, when I was born. Thinking it was the latter because I found images of houses on Google (so handy, huh?), that look much like my first home. This one is almost exact except the driveway should be on the right for it to be our house. https://www.estately.com/listings/info/165-idlewood-drive
I admire your parents perseverance. Life is short or long, though. Short when things are wonderful and long when they aren’t. Can’t imagine putting up with what must have been pretty horrible issues for so long.
When I saw the photo of the house where the kids played basketball next door, I was puzzled. I thought you were sharing it as your current house. When I read about the small yard, I knew better as we ‘met’ when you were mid-foot injury, mid-way through the construction of your beautiful walk. And I should have realized the window treatments in that house were not the ones you made so lovingly and beautifully.
Thank you for this tour of your area. Thank you for excluding snowstorm photos and showing us how much more there is to Buffalove.
WHAT?!! YOU LIVED IN TONAWANDA?!!!!
No way!!!
Idlewood is in the neighborhood where Mr. lived!! I had a classmate who lived on your street. It’s a lovely neighborhood. That is so crazy. And the perfect example of “the Buffalo thing.” It seems when you talk with strangers, nearly everyone has some kind of connection somehow..like the six degrees of Kevin Bacon. Happens all the time.
How fun for me to know—after all our exchanges on line–that you lived here! You must’ve left when you were little.
I had included a neat picture of our current house…but it kept bouncing for some reason and being replaced with the little blue box of doom, so I took it out this morning. And to be fair to the nice ppl who bought the old place, they probably had very nice window treatments… When we first moved there I was obsessive that all the windows HAD to have tiebacks. I’m plenty over that now, haha. I’m just grateful if there’s a shade to pull down.
So grateful for your visit, my friend!
I’ve only ever been to Manhattan in New York, but I will admit, your picture of Buffalo pretty much nailed what I envisioned about that area! 😂 Anyway, enjoyed reading your post.
Lisa
Mwahaha…that’s what we want you to think.
It’s really a wonderful place to live, though. Especially now with so many exciting changes happening all over. But I’ll save that for another day.
Thanks, Lisa!
Hi Em!
I recently discovered your blog and I love it! We live in Rochester so I can relate to your pics of snow!!
My friend and I are heading that way next week – we will be on Sheridan Drive. Transit is a long road. My husband and I should explore it more. Usually when we go we just hit a few places. But, I am definitely going to check out that gift shop. Any other places you can suggest? We just had our first “lawn covering snow”! Take care and have a great weekend.
Peggy
Hello, Peggy! Welcome! We’re in Rochester all the time…just enjoyed our first visit to your incredible farmers’ market.
The Perfect Gift and the coffee shop are at the same intersection, FYI.
There’s also a neat collection of shops and cafes along Route 5/Main on the way to Sheridan if you get off at the Pembroke exit (if you feel like exploring).
Also further south, you could spend a day in East Aurora. If you haven’t been there, it needs to be on your list of day trips!
Thanks for the visit!🥰
Should have mentioned….one of those neat shops is a Paula Dean store. As a mediocre cook, I’ve never been there, but it might be a fun stop if you like to cook.