Saying Goodbye

If you are from the general Chadds Ford/West Chester area, I'm sure you've heard about Jimmy John's burning down yesterday on their 70th anniversary. Having lived through my mother's house burning down in 1995, I can relate to how devastating it is to watch your whole world burn down right before your eyes. But in the case of a place like Jimmy Johns, while only a handful of people have spent the last day bawling their eyes out, picking through charred remains to salvage, there are hundreds, maybe thousands more that are having to say goodbye to a little piece of their past.

I have memories of sitting in Jimmy Johns as a little kid with my mom and dad and siblings, staring at the walls of pictures, watching the model trains and eating strange tasting hot dogs. I never really did like the hot dogs. Probably because they were what hot dogs were supposed to taste like. I was a store bought, boil on the stove type of hot dog eater. Now I only eat the beef franks and they have to be grilled. But Jimmy Johns dogs were different and they definitely drew a crowd.

The last time I was in Jimmy John's it was about 4 years ago. I was with Max, my sister and her kids and my brother Ralph. For him, taking the kids to Jimmy John's was like going on a field trip. It was his civic duty to introduce a part of our childhood to them. He has so excited and I still didn't like the hot dogs. But the second we walked in, I was flooded with memories of my father, who passed away when I was 11. I was still drawn to the walls and the trains.

It's interesting to think about that whole stretch of Rt. 202 and how much of it is gone now. The drive in movie theatre where I saw Bambi. Betty's Ice Cream Parlor was a few doors down from Jimmy Johns and I worked there as a hostess when I was about 15. I'll never forget how proud I was when I got my very first 25 cent raise. The corner of Rt. 1 and Rt. 202 use to house the BYC baseball and football fields and a Wawa. It's all gone now. And when I put it in the context of Jimmy John's burning down, it makes me sad. Or I could just have PMS.

But it still makes me sad.
http://www.facebook.com/home.php?#!/photo.php?pid=31034212&id=1564284344&subject=51742898843&ref=mf