My Real Memoir
“We’ve sold our home!” Mommandad announced after sitting me down and numbing me with a hamburger and a chocolate shake. We’d walked—for the last time—to our favorite cozy little bistro just blocks away called, let me think… Oh, yeah “McDonald’s.” Seriously, the McDonald’s in Downey, California was only the second one ever built, and is now the oldest surviving site; it even has a modest little McDonald’s Museum (if anything McDonald’s can be called “modest”).
Dad was finally moving up from the loading docks. The moment he’d gotten his driver’s license back, he’d put in his bid for a Herald-Express newspaper dealership. It was a semi-self-employed position, where he would not only start out with a big income bump, but would be encouraged to built-up his territory (enroll new subscribers) and reap the ever-increasing benefits. His eyes had a light in them I’d never seen before!
The location? A wet-paint-new outer-outer suburb of L.A. called La Mirada, which its developers thought meant “The View.” It actually translates to “The Look” (a pretty groovy name in the 60s, actually).
“This is big, honey!” Mommandad shouted. “Our lives are going to change forever!” How right they were. Few things change a kid as much as moving (I remember vividly how our kids changed when my wife and I moved them—twice).
Of course, I’d miss my friends. But we’d just come back after the holiday break, so I was still getting a handle on 2nd grade. Stevie was the only kid my age I’d really bonded with. So my classroom send-off (cupcakes and a “Goodbye, Mitch!” sign) wasn’t exactly a tear-jerker. But, oh, how I would miss my wonderfully odd assortment of non-school friends: Weird Eddie, Crazy Old Alice, my babysitter Frieda and her magical garden filled with all of my non-human friends!
I didn’t know what to expect. I only knew that Mommandad were right. It was big.
Sometimes everyone’s world changes, like ours did in 2020. And other times only our personal world changes, or even our inner world. The latter is happening to me even as I type this (for good, not bad); I’ll tell you more about that later. But one thing is certain…
When our world changes, it changes us.
My Real Memoir is a series. To read the next one, click here.
Mitch Teemley 
Thanks for the memories, Mitch. Did you, in fact, sit in the shade of your own olive tree in La Mirada? This reminds me of the move my parents subjected me to in the summer between my juniuor and senior years of high school… from Hilliard, Ohio to Seattle, Washington. It changed EVERYTHING!
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Yep, it does that, especially when you’re a teenager!
Re. that Olive Tree: Yes, we sometimes sat in the shade, but mostly we threw olives at passing cars (until one driver got out and yelled un-repeatable things at us).
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I can see you doing that. 😉
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lump in throat
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Great story, Mitch. When our kids were young, we lived a couple of blocks from the McDonald’s museum in Des Plaines, IL. It was store #1 (by Ray Kroc) after they franchised. Although we would’ve had to go to a newer one to numb our kids with a burger and shake. We actually numbed them to Medieval Times before we left town. 🙂
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Knights on horses? Oh, yeah, that’ll do it!
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And eat with your hands, no forks! Yeah, we had a blast. 😊
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As a military spouse I can certainly relate to those moves and what they do to everyone involved. Some of the changes are for the good, others not so much and when the goodbyes come about every year or two, they just get too sad. As my husband always used to say to the families in his commands, the military member enlists but the family is drafted. Hug a military kid today if you find one nearby!
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Will do!
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It’s funny that La Mirada is the “Courtesy Capital of the World,” considering it was set up as a restricted community (no blacks)Hopefully they’ve come around!J
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True. I had a lot of Hispanic and Asian friends, but no Blacks until I went to college. The city has diversified a great deal since then. Hispanics are now the largest segment at about 40% (much like Buena Park), followed by non-Hispanic whites at about 33%, and Asians at about 20%. Though still not many Blacks, apparently.
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I so enjoy your stories. My husband was born in Downey! Moved to Oklahoma when he was young. I always worried about how our moves would affect our children. But change means growth.
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Oh, it definitely can, Kelley. I loved growing up in La Mirada once I got my bearings.
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Courtesy Capital of the World! 😀
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same thing happened to me at the age of twelve when we moved away from London. I got over it (eventually) but the strange thing was that much later with the advent of social media I could look at the lives of the kids I had grown up with. It made me think about the parallel life I could have had if we hadn’t moved, which when seen in pictures is rather weird!
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It is, isn’t it.
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So I always wondered why the name Biola. Your sweet walk down memory lane answered that. Thanks Mitch and have a nice day and by the way I still love their cheeseburger and a coffee when I’m on the road!
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And we can change the world.
Even if it is only our own.
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That’s so true, we do change when our world changes, hopefully for the better. And this post reminds me of how I felt before our family made a big move…always hopeful, even though I was sad to leave my friends behind.
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“When our world changes, it changes us.” I hadn’t really considered that truth before. Might be worth analyzing further, for the lessons learned through the process, the upheaval. During my childhood, my family only moved once, but in adulthood my husband and I (and one, two, or three children depending on the year!) moved to eight communities and lived in twelve homes. There were definitely some lessons along the way!
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Wow, Nancy, hadn’t realized that. Instead of “military brats,” you raised “ministry brats,” I mean, um, “blessings.” ;>)
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I’ve realized my comment wasn’t worded clearly and leaves the wrong impression. S. and I moved twelve times but each of the kids were only involved in four or five each. Some were in the same community, just a different house as three of the churches where S. served bought new parsonages. That’s still above average, I suppose, but not as often as military families! P.S. Thanks for the blessings–which reminds me, we enjoyed countless blessings throughout all those years of ministry–in spite of the challenges of moving.
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You are such a glass-is-half-full people-encourager, Nancy. I truly appreciate that.
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You too were naughty in childhood days. Nice 👍🏻 to hear Mitcheemley 😀
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