About 15 months ago, I wrote about my childhood neighborhoods in Boothbay Harbor, reminiscing about our neighbors on our street, Gilead Street, and friends on Union Street and Atlantic Avenue. It was a column prompted by my sleepless night due to the thunder and lightning and my frightened dog shaking beside me. 

I recently was reminded by a friend that she enjoyed that column (and others about growing up in the 60s and 70s) so I thought I would rekindle those memories while taking another “sleepless bike ride” through other nearby streets. 

The next street over from Gilead – to the east – is School Street, named for the former school, since torn down and now apartments take up the spot. Too many fond memories about the days in the school and on the school grounds to write here (a column for another day), so I will just write about who I usually ran into on my “bike ride,” starting with the entrance to the street from Union Street. 

Curt West was usually in his yard doing something while daughter Debbie and son John were somewhere about. 

After passing the West household on the right, young Steve McCusker and his younger sister, Colleen, lived on the left. Also on the left, and across from the school and our closest neighbors, were the school-age Whitcombs, Lisa and Lyra. Later, Kevin and Jan Barter and their sons, David and Mark, and daughter, Amanda, moved into that house. 

More neighbors without kids just past the school until you reached the Fogg house on the left, where my sister Sheryl hung out with classmate Linda. 

Then it was pay dirt – The Winslow house – on the right. Lynn, Alan, Kim and Lee Ann. We hung out at their house, and they hung out at our house, Lynn and my sister, Alan and I. Kim was in my class, but it was just not a cool thing to hang out with her at age 12, and Lee Ann was brother Glenn’s age. 

It was at the Winslows’ neighbors, the Arsenaults at the end of the street, where I, and my brothers, spent a lot of childhood days. Bill is the oldest, Gary is a couple of years ahead of me, and Ronnie is just a month older than me – but he was a grade ahead because of the school cutoff date. Ball games on their lawn, listening to music in their house, talking with their wonderful parents Jolly and Laura, getting friends to come to the school field or playground for basketball or baseball, in the woods for hide and seek, at Pat’s Pond to ice skate and bonfires – such great memories. Jolly even filmed some of our games and a fun day when we helped tear down part of his shop so he could build a new one. 

Next bike trip will be up Park Street and Kenney Field Drive – a bunch of kids up there, too!