I had to drive on Route 22 today, back towards Roselle Park, for the first time in quite a while. I used to drive on 22 between Somerville and Roselle Park on a fairly regular basis, after I’d moved to Somerville, but my parents hadn’t yet moved to Whiting. (Looking back at some paperwork, this would have been 1994 – 1997.) The one thing that stirred the most emotion, unexpectedly, was passing Gertrude Hawk. I used to stop in there and buy sugar-free chocolates for Mom occasionally.
I was actually taking a trip into Westfield, for my first meeting with the law firm that will be handling Mom’s estate. We used to go into Westfield occasionally when I was a kid, usually to see a movie. I passed the Rialto theater, which is amazingly still there. And I passed by the Town Book Store, which is apparently (and depressingly) the last independent book store in Union County. Yikes. (I guess that means that the old Cranford Book Store is gone.)