So, here we go....
All right, pulling up over the hill...
Pretty good wide shot of everything...Getting out the pen...
....red arrow, a real estate place I think...used to be a video store ages ago, more on that later.Blue arrow, Gorham House Of Pizza.
Green arrow, Amatos, a sandwich/pizza shop.
Yeah, I know, right across the street from GHOP, but...they both do a good business, so...*shrug*
Okay, right up on this building now.The outer facade has been radically remodeled, but like I said, way back in the 80's, it was the first video rental store around these parts.
They rented Atari games as well as video tapes.
They were way ahead of the curve on game rentals.
It's where I rented Captain Beeble!
Eventually, they went out of business, and sold everything, and I nabbed Captain Beeble.
Sometime in the early 90's, the connector to the Atari 400 broke, and I was never able to replace/fix it, so, it's packed away somewhere.
All that's left is the linked Youtube clip, and memories.
*Sigh*
Oh, okay, here the hill is crested, and here's a nice crisp wide shot of both sides of the street.
Better view of GHOP and Amatos, first clear shot of the other 2 buildings, more on those as I get up on them.
Okay, here we go.White building has always looked like that, but back in the late 70's, early 80's, it used to be a sort of indoor flea market.
Lotta junk, my folks liked rifling through it, but I never found anything good.
Dunno what the fuck it is now exactly, never go in there, and not worth pulling over in steady traffic to find out.
Brick building is Sierra's.
Used to be a Mexican restaurant, but they turned it into a Sports Bar.
Hate Sports Bars, they fill right up with assholes.
Anyway, the food was awesome.
Best dish was "macho nacho"s.
Big heap of nachos with everything on 'em.
Fresh salsa, cheese, black olives, corn, sour cream, guacamole, and shredded marinated chicken.
The chips were all soggy in the middle, and you had to eat the whole mess with a fork.
*Drool, gurgle, gurgle*
Oh well, goodbye, Sierra's.
Okay, closer up view of Gorham House Of Pizza.
Used to go there way more often with the folks as a kid.
Haven't been there in ages.
The pizza there is fucking awesome.
Recipe hasn't changed since the 80's so, it's a time capsule right back to then.
Crispy crust, chewey everything else, glistening with heart-burney greese, oohhh....
Think I was there for my 12th birthday, yeah, had to be, and the TV was on MTV, and they played"the touch", and it was the first time I'd seen the video.
Gorham pizza, Transformers music, I was in heaven.
Heh, heh.
*Sigh*
Anyway, I had that blaring on the MP3 player as I went down this hill.
Made everything feel complete, y'know?
Yeah, I'm a sappy nostalgic bastid, whaddya gonna do?
So yeah, it wasn't for nothing I put those clips up over the weekend, it was to help set up this little reverie.
Okay, so the light finally lets me through, and we're past that damned intersection...
..not much to say about these 3 buildings, they were never businesses of interest to me no matter what they changed to.The white and black one used to be an automotive store my dad used to check out when I was a kid. But, they're gone, and he's more obsessed with NAPA nowadays.
Anyway, they're only there for transition, really, get past those 3 fuckin' boring places, and we creep up on....
...a 7 Eleven!I never go in there anymore.
They used to have Mad and Cracked magazines back in the day.
Ah, misty water-colored memories....
Okay, up the road a piece, and on my side of the street is this place...
Building is more or less intact in it's original form as I remember it.Used to be a sort of half hardware, half department store.
They had some toys and coloring books and stuff when I was really little.
Okay, up the road a little bit more, is this complex.
I took this pic from the parking lot of Hannaford grocery store.
It looked way better in person.
I could read the signs and everything.
Dunno why it looks further away here.
Pissed me off.
Anyhoo, still looks okay, so I'm using it.
Okay, take it all in....Now to get out the pen....
Right there, used to be Laverdiere's Superdrug.It was a drug store, and department store rolled into one.
Kind of a baby Wal-Mart almost, long before there ever was a Wal-Mart.
Oh, I loved it as a kid, I loved it so damned much.
Candy, toys, and comic books all in one handy place.
And when I got a little older, I graduated up to Mad Magazines.
Would've been great to see it all the way up to Playboys, but fate didn't have that in mind, alas.
So many issues of Hulk, Swamp Thing, Mad, I think they even made it all the way up to the early days of Freddy-mania.
It was the core of Gorham for me.
The whole point of goddamned Gorham.
Only real use I ever had for it.
There's a specific tale revolved around a comic book from there, but I'll get into that a little later....
All right, that bit at the end?Fuck it.
It was never anything good.
Never.
It was a crummy laundromat for ages, then it was some dumb yarn store or something, it's always been boring.
Always.
Moving along...
Oh, this place was cool...
They built the whole building next to Laverdiere's for this place, it was called Ben Franklin, and it was just fuckin' great.It was another department store, but it had more toys, more candy, and way more trading cards.
With the Ben Franklin and Laverdiere's combo, I had everything my little kid heart desired.
Paradise.
True paradise.
Never been as happy since.
It's gone now.
Now it's a fuckin' Salvation Army.
Laverdiere's is gone too.
Been gone a long time.
*Sigh*
But my memory still goes there, like it should be there, like I could pull into it, and walk right in.
I even dreamt about it knowing I'd be coming here.
Heh, heh, sick and sad, huh?
Okay, this bit here is all one big Burger King.Laverdiere's, Ben Franklin, Burger King, I had the fuckin' trifecta.
Fast food tastes better when you're a kid.
Nowadays,...meh...fills the hole.
And you're never like "gee, I'm glad I ate that", as Jim Gaffigan would say.
Geez, they make a big fucking deal about 99¢ Whopper Juniors.
I can remember 99¢ Whoppers!!
...well, they ain't ever gonna come back...
Gettin' old, Mike....
This bit here?This just makes me sick.
It used to just be a big open hallway in between Ben Franklin and Burger King, but they recently wedged this fucking little insurance company in there, and now it fucks up the flow, and fucks up how you have to get into Burger King, and it's just a nasty little parasite of a business.
Vulgar.
Just fucking vulgar.
Hmm, what've we got left?
Ah, yeah, the big CVS drugstore.
They're pretty cool.
Almost compensates for the loss of Laverdiere's.
They've got just about everything Laverdiere's and Ben Franklin had combined, really.
But...no comic books...
Meh.
Too grown for most of 'em anyway.
Everywhere used to have a comic rack.
Now, only in comic shops, or on Amazon, or TFAW.
*Sigh* gettin' old, Mike....
Alright, now to turn the camera back around to Hannaford.
Okay, doing the pan from left to right.....
Aaaand, that's Hannaford.Used to be "Shop N' Save".
First, it was just renamed, but then it was radically remodeled.
That's almost 3 times the size it used to be.
Anyhoo, here's where I get back to that comic book story I promised.
Indeed, it was the point of the trip.
A pilgrimage if you will.
Come with me around this corner....
...and it was right here where my life changed forever.
Okay, after the remodel, this has all been opened up, but it used to be more scrunched in.But, right about here...
...is where my folks parked to go shopping.No, it's not a crime story, it was something wonderful, simmer down.
It was 1984, we had just come from Laverdiere's and I had just picked up Swamp Thing issue 21.
The Anatomy Lesson.
My world was flipped upside down, and things were never the same again.
In a good way, of course.
Here at last, was real writing in a comic.Gone after this were "Hulk smash!", and "holy ____ Batman!!", from my literary diet.
It was if I was blind, and could now see.
It was dark, there was a bluish fluorescent street lamp up above me, and I reread that issue almost 10 times as my folks farted around in the store like sloths.
In doing searches for the images, I joyfully discovered that The Anatomy Lesson is available legally for free from DC.
Read with me now....
Click.
*Sighs with joy*
Gold, all of it gold.
Imagine being hit with that at 9 going on 10, huh?
Holy shit, huh?
Well, if you're impressed, it's available for purchase bound up with the "Saga Of The Swamp Thing", collection.
Amazon linky.And if that book pleases you, you'll want to get all of the Swamp Thing volumes, and then everything Alan Moore, and then when that's not enough, Neil Gaiman, etc, etc.
It'll joyfully lead you down the road to ruin, and I'm more than happy to pass that along. :)
So, that was Gorham.
Let's get the hell out of here now....
Okay, so heading back through Westbrook, and we're back at this intersection, but coming at it the other way.
Pen time.....
Red arrow is where I was coming from last time.Blue arrow is where I'm going, and the lane you're supposed to be in.
Green arrow is where the little yuppie teenagers try to pass you on the outside, but aren't supposed to.
Little black SUV with a teenage bitch in it did it to me today.
Grr...
Anyhoo..
...here's a better shot of King's.Hmm, just from 3 days ago, they've painted red from yellow....
Here's a better shot of Hansons...
Oh yeah, here's "the pumpkin tree".Every Halloween going on a few years now, the owners of this farm hang all kinds of lit Jack-o-Lanterns from that tree.
It's a big spectacle, and they've been on the local news a bunch of times.
Okay, then we crest the hill, and here's a much better shot of the field from last time.
Ahah, and THIS time, the camera was charged properly, and stayed on as long as I needed, so this time, I got the Smiling Church.
Okay, just coming up on it...There's the dead guy cross.
A better view...
Better still....
...and here's just past that damned shrubbery so you can see the door.
And that's it.Thanks for taking this trip with me. :)
Hope you enjoyed it.
I sure did.
Been a great day.
:D
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