My Home in Rupert

I was born in Rupert. No. That's a lie. I was born in Burley. At the hospital there. But, when my parents brought me home from the hospital, it was to a house in Rupert.

The name of the street I grew up on was 100 West. When I was older and some of my school friends and I shared the names of streets we lived on, I learned that most streets had real names. Like Linden. Or Maple. I felt cheated.

Our house began it's long life as a one room claim shanty. But I can't remember what year it was built. Over the years, more rooms were added.

Our house consisted of two bedrooms, a small bathroom, a living room, a pantry, or as we called it the 'fruit closet' (due to all the canned fruits and veggies we stored there), a kitchen, and a carport. A carport differs from a garage by the fact that a garage is enclosed. A carport is not.

By the time I was five I had three sisters and a brother. My parents shared one of our two bedrooms and the other tiny bedroom -- it was shared by myself and my four siblings.

Now, my dad's a genius when it came to situating all of us kids in the same room. He built two sets of bunkbeds. My older sister and I each got a top bunk. My younger brother slept on one of the lower bunks and my two youngest sisters shared the other lower bunk. Occasionally Dad would pull in an old army cot and one of the younger kids would sleep on that.