A Long Ago Winter Vacation Spot

I ran across the photograph on the left of my Grandmother and Grandfather Hoyt the other day, which I believe was taken many years ago on the deck of their winter vacation rental in Newport Beach, California. They used to drive out there every winter and stay until spring. My Uncle Jack - their younger son - and his family lived in Pasadena, and so they had family both out there and back home in the Brainerd neighborhood of Chicago, where my father Nelson, mother Mary, sister Susan, and I lived. They stayed in Newport Beach at a time when it was actually affordable, as opposed to now, a waterfront community for the super wealthy.

Eventually, Newport Beach became too expensive for them, and they bought a trailer in a very nice park for seniors in nearby Costa Mesa. After that, they moved to California permanently, and from then on we rarely saw them. However, both Susan and I fondly remember them when they lived in their house in Brainerd. I took the photograph on the right of the house, looking pretty much the worse for wear, when I visited Chicago back in 2010, and superimposed on it a photo of my grandparents at an anniversary party. My grandfather was a great gardener, and both the front and back of the house were filled with flowers. My father had his dental office in a front room off the porch for many years. The porch itself was his waiting room, and each night after work he would visit with his parents before coming home. My grandparents spent most of their time in a large enclosed back porch, often listening to White Sox games on the radio. Those were such happy times, and a completely different world from today. I know I am looking at the past through rose colored glasses, but some things you instinctively know are true.