It’s weird thinking that we’ve been in Ward Manor for five years. It’s not that I have that dichotomy of feeling like we just moved in and feeling like we’ve lived here for twenty at the same time. It’s more of “it’s only been five years?”

Part of that is because the area around Ward Manor has been sprouting up like unattended weeds. When we moved in, there were just a few places to eat out within a reasonable distance. Now there’s a bunch. All sorts of commerce that we used to need to go into Bradenton for is now within a “close” car ride. I use the quotes because with all of the aforementioned growth, the infrastructure hasn’t kept up. Some of that is just normal growing pains. Some of that is county mismanagement.

I’m not going to talk about all the changes within Ward Manor, as most of them have been chronicled in previous posts. I find it somewhat interesting that the only two major appliances that we’ve had the entire time are the fridge and the outside freezer. Heck, even the cars have changed. The Wife and I are looking at some additional upgrades over the next few years, but we’ll see how all of that shakes out.

What amuses me the most is that for us, this is our “new” house that we bought after we got married. For the grandniece, this is the “old” house that Derek and The Wife have always lived in.