It amazes me that I can't remember the name of a person I just met, but I can recall the names of neighbors I haven't seen in forty years. You may have a thousand reasons for loving your old neighborhood. it may be the favorite path you took through the corner lot, or the streetlight in front of your house, where the neighborhood clan would play hide and seek or sit on the fence to play the guitar and sing. One of the reasons why I love our house on Avenida Pasco was because I remember the excitement when my new baby sister Elizabeth was brought home from the hospital.
Across from our home lived an Arabic woman by the name of Zara who own a store. She was a cranky old lady who spent the better part of her days yelling at kids for throwing fire crackers at her roof on Christmas and New Years celebrations. The whole street was full of people lighting up fireworks and she hated them. It was a time in El Salvador where children could go out and play soccer on the streets too and those balls sometimes ended on her front porch.
Even as children we were fascinated by the differences between the families in our neighborhood. All the people around us were professionals or had their own business. Our next door neighbor to the south for some time was a wealthy family who owned a lot of land, the Rengifos. When they moved my parents purchased their home from them. The other neighbor to the north was a doctor who once helped me get a perfume cork out of my nose. The Morales family were also our good friends. The dad was our Dentist, he helped my grandmother alleviate her pain when she was dying of cancer. The Velasquez also were our good friends. Their dad was in the military and loved guns. My father was known to trade in his cars every year for a the newest models. He loved cars! My mom had among many other businesses a beauty shop and spa. Veroliz. This was named after my sister Liz and me, Veronica. Clever!
On the back side of our street lived the Contreras family. The mom, Gladys, had a fashion design business. I would get my prom dresses from her. Around the corner was the Martellis family who owned a Pharmacy. The Herreras from Mexico was another family on the street above us who the mother was sickly dying of cancer. This woman was my mom's good friend from Mexico. She was very beautiful. Another Herrera family lived across from us. The husband was known to bring trios and mariachis to his wife to ask for forgiveness of some mischief he had done. Eventually they separated and divorced. This woman is an angel though and she truly deserved better. And of course there was the woman married to the Russian man who sold my mother a patent to make everything from toothpaste to perfumes to face creams. I wish I had a hold of those recipes. they were hand written. All organic and my mother even had a business that sold that product "Lufrangmi" I think was the name.
All the homes were kept nicely but in my eyes our homes, because we ended up with three, were perfect in every way. But wether our neighbors were cranky or friendly, or rich or poor, they were the people we saw almost daily, and even if we didn't realize it at the time, they helped to form many of our lasting attitudes toward grownups.
Old neighborhood like old loves, can become rundown, dull and even getto. Maybe its best that we remember old neighborhoods the way they once were, a perfect memory in an imperfect world, a dream to comfort us and a place of refuge from lives storms. That is how I want to remember my home, sweet home.
Con amor,
Vero
Then, Liz sitting on the table
and Now, second from the left. 
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