A Return to Plano

On our way to see "Dear Evan Hanson," Nina and I stopped in Plano to check out this house at 2000 Williamsburg, where I lived between 1973 and 1975 when Dad worked at the Richardson YMCA. I don't believe the sun and the star were on the wall then. That was my bedroom on the far left of the picture. I had a bunk bed. I learned how to ride a bike here. I kept the training wheels on my "Red Baron" for a long time. I played outside and in the street with several kids on the block, and one of my front teeth was shattered by a soccer ball kicked by the son of a German immigrant. Dad and I were in Indian Guides (I was "Blue Hawk"). "We" watched Nixon's impeachment hearings in the living room (I did not last very long, but I knew it was a big deal). We lived here when I came home from the hospital after having seven teeth pulled. When Mom went out to do some grocery shopping (probably for some soft foods I could eat), I looked for, found, and ate some fried pork chops in the fridge, which is not the kind of thing you're supposed to do after getting seven teeth pulled, but I was pleased. I loved prok chops. Going to bed when there was still light outside in the summer was a bummer. Some nights, I could hear Plano High School's Wildcat band playing. We lived here when Brian came home from the hospital. I remember having to tiptoe past his bedroom when he was asleep.

I went to first and second grade here (the building has been extensively renovated since then). When school started, I was staying with Grandmom in Fort Worth while Mom and Dad finished packing up our house in LaMarque. We would get up when it was still dark outside, and she would drive me to Plano for the start of the school day. She'd stay at the house during the day and then drive me back to Fort Worth. That went on for a week or so. I signed up to sing "The Ballad of the Alamo" in the school talent show in first grade without consulting Mom and Dad. I wore my coonskin cap and took "Old Besty" with me. If you asked me back then, I probably would have said I wanted to be a singer or a painter when I grew up. I liked to draw drag racers and mazes, and I made paper airplanes.

Mrs. Hunter was my homeroom teacher. Mrs. Henderson was my reading teacher. I got in a lot of trouble in first grade for talking too much (I remember spankings). I suspect that Mom drove me to school in the morning, but I walked home in the afternoon. Once, a boy who was running by me knocked me down, and I got a bloody cut on my hip that required three stitches. I remember that it was a great thrill to turn the corner and see Grandmother and PawPaw's pickup parked in the driveway. One time, when they were visiting, I put a piece of costume jewelry in my ear--a faux pearl--and it got lodged in my ear canal. PawPaw got it out with a straight pin, which was a great relief.

I would ride the Red Baron to Willow Creek park. There was a dirt track beside the creek bed. Nina and I stopped at an outlet mall on the way down and bought her some Converse tennis shoes that she could wear when we walked around the park.
Once, when my cousins Greg and Gary came to visit, we took bacon from the fridge and used it as bait to lure crawdads out of their holes by the creek. I don't know if bacon has ever stooped so low.

Nina is the only one of the Ruiz Bentons who has visited this place with me.

Mari and I are much more protective with our kids than Mom and Dad were with me when we lived here.