Second Street, Norco, California

This morning I left the house just after 8:00 to head for the Riverside campus. A "welcome" meeting of all faculty and administrators was scheduled to begin at 9:00 in Landis Auditorium. A continental breakfast was planned from 8:30-9:00, but since we're still dieting, I wasn't much interested in arriving early.

As I left our neighborhood and drove onto Second Street in Norco and looked out the mile or so stretch toward the 15 Freeway, I thought to myself, "I've been driving this pavement for the whole of my working life."

At that moment, I reached into my purse, pulled out the cheapie camera, and started clicking. Even though the windshield wipers show in this photo, it is the one I like best.

When my two children were still tiny tots, I left home (another house just a mile east of here) each morning, to drive out Second Street to "Town and Country Day School" in the heart of old Norco, where my children would be taken care of while I was at my first job.

Back in those days, a million years ago, I wanted so desperately to go to work. Women's Lib was telling me that if I didn't work I was not liberated. I wish I knew then what I know now. I traded a lot of precious days with my children to be "liberated." So I'd drop-off my children, and then come back across Second Street out to Pomona Road that faced the 91 Freeway to work as a front office receptionist. I loved getting dressed-up, I loved going to work, and I loved managing the front office. I was so deluded.

So now the last 18+ years I have driven Second Street east to Hamner Avenue, turned left (north) and driven to Third Street where I turn left (west) and Third then takes me to the heart of the campus. I am a stone's thrown from home.

This morning as I drove that stretch, it was as though all of that history came rushing over me like a wave. While I was so sorry that I was so mis-lead as a young adult, a very young mom, I was also so glad to still be alive still living in this same geography, and to still be traveling this pavement -- now to a place where hopefully I can help young people and also re-entry students to understand how gifted they are and how helpful the world of academics can be to them if they choose to embrace the world of school.

Second Street still looks like a country road and I so appreciate that my life is lived near a community that has NOT embraced the macho, condo, disco, fast-paced life that makes so many people stressed, insane, or both.

I'm sure none of this makes sense to others. But for me, this morning Second Street was like turning pages of my adult yearbook as the sound track of my life played in the background. So the photo above is a little view from my life, my whole adult life.

Mr. Fun is waiting for me in the heated spa just outside. He's my best friend. I'm going to put on my swimsuit and join him. All errors here will be edited later.

I love Blipfoto. Thank you for reading my page
and letting me be part of this fabulous community.
Rosie (& Mr. Fun), aka Carol


P.S. It is still EXTREMELY hot here in Southern California and a half-dozen wild-fires are now raging here.