Ghosts of Christmas Past, 1981, Downward Mobility
In the summer of 1981 we moved into a smaller house in Searcy, Arkansas. MUCH smaller. It was a "fixer upper" and it was supposed to be a rent-to-own situation. But we didn't "fixer up"... and, as it turned out, we never "owned" either. Only after we had lived there 4 years did we find out that the house had been reported as burned down and the owner had not been paying taxes on it. The reason he did that? The house had actually been condemned, due to a sewage problem. So... yeah. The house was not really for sale, and we were apparently as dumb as a bag of rocks.
Oh, and the man who did all that -- was an elder of the church. Our church.
Our first Christmas in this house was not even in this house. The first time the temperature dropped below freezing our water pipes burst under the house. So we evacuated to my Burford grandparents’ house in Bald Knob (just a few miles from our house), and that's where we spent the holidays. Here are some pictures from that Christmas.
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