Photographs Of Places I've Lived # 4: Villa Cordoba

(Image from Google Maps.)

When we lived here, it was called Villa Cordoba (never pronounced in the Spanish way), & there was a wall in-between the door & the front lawn of the complex.  Actually, we lived in three apartments in this small square apartment world.  The one above - the one that's green with the awning - was apartment 48 I believe.  I lived there from perhaps seventh to eighth grade.  We left in the summer before my ninth grade year.

They were by all accounts some terrible apartments.  They were cater-corner from the middle school I attended, & a teacher there, upon being told by me that was where I lived, had a look of utter horror.  In fact, we were never without roaches, & at least one time the management dealt with a plumbing problem by simply opening up some valves & letting the tenants' shit run down into the street.  But it was home to me!

It seems like we lived there forever, but it was really just four years, from when I was in fourth to when I was in eighth grade.  I have fond memories of the place, but I was equally unhappy there - I went through puberty there & began to become a person while living there.  My little brother & I were inseparable when we first moved there, & barely spoke or talked to each other at the end.  I made my first real friend while I lived there - it was at school, but every day before class in eighth grade, he'd come over, we'd watch cartoons together, & then run to school.  

Because I write about my life on this blog around the time of my birthday, I've written a lot about this place.  I first spoke about it in this post.  I continued here (with a picture of apartment 18, one of the three units in which we lived).  There is a lot more here (with a similar picture as the one above).  Gosh I've written a lot about this place, here's yet another post.  & there's one last post about the heat wave of 1980.  I guess we moved away in 1983, so I've written about other places we've lived since then.

Here's a bonus photo of me & my little brother in front of Apartment 45, which is where my mother's boyfriend lived.  I'm not sure how old we are - possibly I'm in fifth grade, Chris is in fourth.  I do know I am rocking that Star Trek shirt.

It's dated 1977 (by me, I don't know why).  I would be nine years old, & therefore in fourth grade or so. Crazy.