Laura was Grandma DeGriere's next to the youngest sister and was her daughter Irene's favorite aunt. Aunt Laura and her husband Vincent were married in St. Thomas Aquinas Church, and after their honeymoon at the Hotel Northampton, moved into a small house on Russell Street in West Springfield. In her youth, Irene used to visit at least once a month, with the ritual always pretty much the same. Sunday morning she would rise at seven o'clock, pack a small bag with whatever she was bringing with her, and then take the trolley downtown.
Irene would then walk across the the Old Toll Bridge between Springfield and West Springfield, the current Memorial Bridge being at that time not yet constructed. Crossing the old bridge was always a challenge. Irene cringed at the sounds of the creaking boards and the clopping hooves of the big, dray horses as they hauled the rumbling delivery carts across the wooden bridge. Through the small open spaces between the boards of the floor of the bridge, Irene could see the rushing water of the mighty Connecticut below. It didn't seem so bad in winter, when ice covered the water, but in the spring especially it was slightly unnerving to see the current passing beneath so intensely.
Irene always recalled these visits to West Springfield as great fun. After Uncle Vincent went to work at eight o'clock, she and her aunt had the whole day to themselves. First the breakfast dishes were washed and put away. Then it was time for girl things like sewing, and best of all, crocheting. They often sang as they worked, usually melodramatic old tunes like "Please, Mr. Conductor," which was about the plight of a child trying to get home to his mother, "before God takes her away" and attempting to prevail on the goodness of the train conductor.
One day, when Mother was visiting, Uncle Vincent came home with a tiny Catalpa tree which a friend at work had given him. It was barely a stick, so small that if it didn't have a tag on it, it would have been impossible to tell what kind of plant it was. "Oh, I just love Catalpa trees!" Aunt Laura had exclaimed excitedly. "They're so beautiful in the spring, all those wonderful blossoms and broad, green leaves." She didn't mention the mess the long green seed pods the tree would make in the autumn. However, there was really no place for them to plant the tree, as the couple would soon be moving across the river to an apartment on Greenwood Street in Springfield's North End.
"Why don't you take it and plant it on your property on Hood Street?" Uncle Vincent suggested to Irene. When she left that day she brought the tree to Pine Point on the trolley, where Grandpa DeGreire planted it in the front yard that very afternoon. Over time, it grew to be a well known landmark on Hood Street.
Planting the tree that day reminded Grandpa DeGriere of how during the time when 124 Hood Street was being built, while he was working on the sub-flooring for the first floor, he ran out of the rough timber he was using. He didn't need much more, just a couple feet. It was then that he noticed the discarded FOR SALE sign the realtor had left from when they had purchased the lot.
"Rose, hand me that sign," he asked his wife, who was helping him that day. She reached for the sign and handed it to him. Sure enough, it fit perfectly and he quickly nailed it into place. They both laughed to see how the sign had become permanently embedded in their house, where it would be visible to them every time they went down the cellar stairs. Perhaps the laughter stood out in his memory because Grandfather and Grandmother DeGriere didn't always laugh in the years that followed. A lot would happen in the neighborhood surrounding that Catalpa tree.
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