A Gardeners Forum Forums Members History Forum Life 2006 My Playground

For the past 30 years I have told my family about the ravine back behind my house in Bloomington. I lived there for 8 years during the late 1960's to the early 1970's. My happiest times were spent out back in the woods.

My husband never believed me when I told him that a really tall, maybe 10 feet tall waterfall was at the end of the ravine. He always laughed and said "it is probably 2 feet tall because you always remember things from your childhood as being huge when the are really very small."

In January of 2006 my husband and I went to visit my old neighborhood. It has changed alot since I lived there. Someone put in a long driveway around the end of the ravine and built a house on the opposite side from our old house.

Picture 1: Stairs leading down to the creek were built by the owners. That is my husband down at the bottom of the hill. Behind him is the hill going up to my yard.

Picture 2: Taken from the stairs towards the end of the ravine.

Picture 3: My tall tale waterfall!!! In real life. The angle the picture was taken makes it look shorter then the actual at least 15 foot height.

my playground

I used to live by a ravine when I was young too..
The best place to play. gosh the games and characters that we used to dream up.Princesses and witches and Robin Hood..
I want to go back

Is it as you remembered?

Wow, that looks just like Kentucky!

When I was little we played in a creek in front of my grandparents house. It was a big deal to jump across this little waterfall, from one rock to the one on the other side. It seemed like such a far jump to make.

I went there a few years ago to take pictures of that creek for a painting, and the rocks were still in the same place.....about a foot apart!

Yes, amazingly enough the ravine was as I remembered.

EXCEPT that it was alot steeper!!

I showed the pictures to Mom and she couldn't believe that was behind our house. She had heard me talk about it but had no idea how tall it was. Dad had no idea there was a waterfall back there!!

I told the kids all this and my youngest asked "Where was the parental supervision?!?!"

I watched my kids like a hawk, but probably because later I saw how dangerous all the things were that I thought nothing of as a kid. Like riding a bike from Marlin Hills to Dolan and then on to Lake Lemon or over to New Unionville by myself and no one knowing where I was or that I was even out of the neighborhood!!

map
Zoom out a bit and you will see the places I am talking about. Lake Lemon is past the far upper right hand corner.

It is so different now.
I used to walk about a mile to Ocean View Amusement Park by myself when I was 9 years old. No way a parent would let a kid do that now. They'd probably never see them again if they did.

And the dangerous stuff I did scares me to even think about it.