Memories of Leaving Home

When I think back on all the times we’ve relocated, I often return to Flemington, New Jersey.

After we married, my wife and I lived in our first apartment on the second floor of an old house on Broad Street. It was a fun place to live as we were started our lives together.

I still worked with my dad, even though “Bayliss Industries, Inc.” was now a wholly owned subsidiary of another engineering company. I reported to management located in Georgia of all places. Times were good.

We later bought a house on Allen Street in Flemington, behind the same school I attended in seventh and eighth grade! It was surreal.

My friend from college gave me her as a puppy on the last of school after graduation. Jenny stayed with my parents when I moved out.

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Michelle worked part-time, in the evenings, as a waitress at the Union Hotel in downtown Flemington. She preferred the dining room that other servers avoided because it required more work, but the tips were better, and she didn’t mind the extra effort. She made good money there.

The Union Hotel itself was one of Flemington’s historic landmarks. Located across from the courthouse made famous by the Lindbergh kidnapping trial, it had long been part of the town’s identity but was sadly left abandoned.

Today, decades later, on the cusp of my 50th high school reunion, I learned that the hotel had been restored and reopened. We may have to stop by for a visit. 

Looking back, it is easy to say that we should never have left Flemington. At the time, however, things felt different. Hunterdon County was changing rapidly. More and more people were moving out of New York City, attracted by the countryside and small-town atmosphere.

Traffic increased dramatically. One Saturday afternoon, after waiting through several red traffic lights, I weaved past a car, zoomed through the intersection on a “yellow,” but was stopped by police.

That particular light was where we used to drag race when no one was around (those days were gone). I explained to the officer that I learned to drive on these streets, and the waiting became intolerable.

He was sympathetic and let me off with a warning.

In hindsight, I wonder if those frustrations influenced me too much. As my dad would say, you can justify anything, even a wrong decision.

We surely would have built a very different life had we stayed. Would it have been better? Nobody can know. 

The life we eventually had turned out fine in many respects; we’re now in a beautiful spot nestled in the Appalachians, but the first few years after leaving New Jersey were extremely difficult.

Family primarily motivated the move. My parents had relocated to Maryland after my father accepted a position with a prominent engineering company, headquartered in Baltimore.

Michelle and I were the recent proud parents of a bouncing baby girl. My parents missed seeing their newborn granddaughter, and eventually, despite having good jobs, a home, and established roots in New Jersey, Michelle and I resigned and moved to Maryland.

We lived with my parents in a beautiful, history-rich stone house in Carroll County, Maryland. My father, as usual, was renovating portions of the property. It was an impressive place, but it was not our home, and living there came with its own challenges.

One of the saddest memories from that period involves our dog, Saturn.

Saturn was energetic, excitable, and more than a little wild. In Flemington, he would “enthusiastically” greet (terrorize) the postal worker every day!

We brought him to Maryland with us, but in my mother’s view, he was simply too much to handle. So, even though we were in the wide-open spaces of Carroll County, we tried to find him another home.

One woman answered our newspaper advertisement and adopted him, but after only two days she returned him, saying that he was too wild for her as well. I didn’t know what else to do, so I took Saturn to the local animal shelter. 

The shelter was closed when I arrived. I left him in a metal cage at the door with a note explaining the situation and asking them to take care of him.

I cried as I walked away. I couldn’t, and didn’t, look back.