Sageville

Sageville is only one Sage-street, out of so many. It also happens to be one of the very first Sage-streets in Sagemont. If you look at the Google view now,  it sits tucked away in the corner of the shadow of the Beltway and Interstate 45. First came Sagewood (far right), and then Sageville. Sages and Kirks everywhere you look now.

But this story starts way back when a fly over in 1964 showed the brand new subdivision going in, without trees and very few paved roads. The little red X is on the lawn of 11222.

There aren't any houses on the I-45 side of Sagewood yet. 

Sageville was the first street to have houses on both sides. 

A few years later, the trees were just starting to come in. Most of them still look pretty scrawny, though. 

It's 1967 and there are families full of kids up and down the block. 

courtesy of Ruth Estes

 courtesy of Ruth Estes

courtesy of Ruth Estes

1967

 courtesy of Ruth Estes

1969

 courtesy of Ruth Estes

1974

courtesy of Ruth Estes

By 1974, after a decade, the trees were starting to fill in and some families were moving out, further back into the newer sections of the subdivision with newer amenities built in. 

The house I would call home for the majority of my childhood, from age 6 until I left home for college, was at the other end of the street than the houses pictured above. 

From what I'm told, it was the Baker's house during those kids' day. Mr. Baker was a home remodeler and turned the garage of 11222 Sageville into a kitchen, enormous in size for its day. 

the kitchen came with green carpet, no less

He also added on another master bedroom/bathroom area at the back of the house and put in the pool.  Mainly, all the kids from the street remember the pool.

By the time that first batch of kids were graduating from Dobie, I was six and moving in. I got caught in between the first and second wave, without many kids my age on my street. Most of them were older, and they were the youngest of their siblings. For a few years there was Kimberly in the house next door but she moved when I was 8. There was Alyssa who moved in down three houses from me in 1979, but she was gone two years after that. And there was Susan towards the other end of the street. We met walking home from Thompson Intermediate together some afternoons, all the way down Sagedowne, appropriately.

This was home. 

Inside its '60s panelled walls it hosted birthday parties, Thanksgivings, Christmases, and all the other days in between you share with family and friends. And even all the days you feel completely alone in the world. 

It is, in my memory, a precious, sacred space.

But what I dream for this blog is that it becomes home to the memories of childhoods and places that may not exist any longer except in its residents' memories and photographs, not just mine, but others like me who remember the South Belt area in its prime.  Certainly not perfect or upscale. 

But home.