Alice and Chris’s Old Place

This photograph shows our long time friends Alice and Chris. Also-known-as ‘Doctor Bozo Bean Breath and the Master Bladder’. At least that is how they self-addressed the return envelope, on their wedding invitation to us, lo these many years ago. That is all ancient Ann Arbor history now. We moved to Saint Louis and managed to entice them to move to Saint Louis too. Alice and Chris bought the picture house. It is a grand ole dwelling, with architectural details to die for. Alice and Chris worked hard on it and made it quite the home.

We were in Borders one year and spied a book that featured historic Saint Louis homes. Thumbing through it we found their house. Like all of the buildings in the book it detailed the architect, date of construction, original owners and other pertinent details. We bought it and showed it to them and they had the exact same book on their coffee table when we visited them next.

Alice and Chris were lured away to Rochester, where we still see them. Maybe for our fortieth high school reunion? I’m sure that they’ve seen the old homestead since they left. This last weekend on our way over to Tower Grove Park, we wandered through the Shaw neighborhood.  It looks better now than in all of the thirty years that I have lived in Saint Louis. All the old once abandoned store fronts in the neighborhood are now populated with nice little shops. Even Flad looks presentable, I work with a guy that owns a house on Flad these days. I was impressed with the neighborhood.