Day's End Drive

Years ago my parents moved our small family to this little citrus community just to the east of Orange Country. We had been living in the OC (as it is now called) in the community of Cypress near Disneyland and Anaheim. I guess I was 12 going on 25 and my folks were trying desperately to move me to some place back in time--back to a time when kids grew like crops, slowly but steady, and were allowed to stay wrapped in innocence and nurtured by family. The world was quickly growing large and my mom and stepdad were panicked. I was already on the bridge to the new world and they were looking for a way to pull me back. In the next couple of years life went terribly out of focus for our little family.

There were less than 20,000 people then living in this community surrounded by orange and lemon groves. These days the city dads keep a worker with a brush and can of paint at the city limit sign because the population increases everyday. Currently we're at 141,000.

This evening after dinner we went for a short but interesting drive through a couple of the newer sections of our city. Amazing growth -- urban sprawl -- has mowed down citrus groves and wilderness. Actually the recession has caused some people to move away. We saw quite a few vacant houses, bank repossessed, as we drove through neighborhoods.

This photo was taken in the southeast corner of the Norco foothills approximately at the junction of Norco and Corona. Norco was originally the short name for North Corona. Then it became a city in its own right. Most folks nowadays don't even know what the name represents. Norco is nicknamed "Horse Capital of the World." The neigbhorhoods have no sidewalks, but instead horse trails (see the photo).

In this photo the camera is aimed south toward the foothills that keep Corona from spilling over into south Orange County and you can see zillions of homes (well if I had a good camera you could) where the citrus groves use to grow and produce their fruit.

Two years after moving here, I married Mr. Fun. I'm sure part of my mom died as she watched her 15 year-old-daughter walk the aisle. I find the thought utterly terrifiying!

So this evening I look across this city that has grown immensely and am reminded of how the two of us began on a thin winding strip of payment that eventually widened and today is an amazing highway of opportunity in a community filled with potential. Thankfully no one told us of the terrain we would travel; otherwise, we would never have signed-on for this trip.

Well, a little after-dinner drive conjured all that history. Good night from the former "Lemon Capital of the World." But today, we're the "tract home capital."

Till tomorrow,
Rosie (& Mr. Fun), aka Carol