Last Friday, I walked through 1712 Salter Road for the final time. It was a piece of property in a house that my father, Mike Strong, moved into when he was three years old and had been in my family for 75 years.
My grandparents raised four children there and resided in the home for the rest of their lives. Then, I moved in as a go-between resident in between flipping real estate projects in my early 20s just so someone would live in the house and not let it sit idle. I ended up really enjoying it over a couple of months, the summer after my grandmother passed away, and I bought it from her estate when I was 25 years old. I’ve lived there for the last 18 years. It’s the home that I welcomed my new wife to come live in. And together we welcomed all four of our children to live in over the last 11 years. Like so many things in life, it was very hard to come to the realization that we had simply outgrown the house. That we simply needed more than two shared bathrooms and three bedrooms for six people to live in. While it did create space and a tremendous family environment, we had simply come to a point where it just wasn’t going to last us anymore.
So I decided to turn the page. It was a very hard and emotional decision. A lot of feelings, a lot of thoughts about ‘Do I keep it?’ ‘Do I sell it?’ ‘Do I preserve it for my children?’. But at the end of the day, nothing lasts forever. And while everything somehow has to come to an end, the Strong Family legacy at 1712 Salter Road has finally come to an end. A place where hundreds and hundreds of visitors and guests have flocked over the years. Parties, holidays, get-togethers, and simply just hanging out with neighbors have been a mainstay of our lives.
As it officially comes to a close with the money hitting my bank account today, it is with a peaceful heart that I say goodbye to 1712 Salter Road and all the many memories it created.