On my block, there’s a storm drain that always clogs when it rains hard. It clogs with broken twigs, dead leaves, plastic bags, and other debris.

The rainwater backs up and floods one side of the street. When cars drive through it, they have to slow way down. Sometimes, they can’t drive through at all.

Someone always has to stand out in the rain with a rake and unclog the drain over and over again. As soon as they stop, the drain clogs back up. If nobody does it, the drivers detour or risk stalling. Sometimes, I do it.

On my block, there are mailboxes and stop signs and chain-link fences. There are solar-panelled roofs and screened-in porches.

There are sports flags and American flags. There are yard signs that say things like “Another Great Job By Double-A Construction.”

Some people purchase big yard signs printed with their most deeply-held personal opinions. These signs sit in front yards like giant greeting cards for everyone to see.

This choice never made much sense to me: putting your beliefs on a big sign in your yard. It’s like putting them on a billboard by the highway. As if all the strangers passing by care. But that’s how some people are, I guess.

On my block, there’s an old man who fought in World War II. He sits on his porch in the summertime blasting Motown oldies for people in the city park across the street.

I think they like it. Or at least they don’t mind. I like it.

On my block, there are manhole covers and telephone boxes. There are rose bushes and sidewalks and trashcans. There are dead squirrels in the street sometimes.

On my block, there’s a family that voted for Trump in the last two elections. At least I assume they did because they posted Trump signs in their yard during both elections.

They had signs for some of the other candidates too. But the Trump signs were the biggest.

I met them one Halloween when they were giving out candy. They were some of the nicest people I’d ever met.

On my block, there are black oaks, red oaks, bur oaks, and pin oaks. There are sugar maples, Norway maples, red maples, and silver maples. There are bitternut hickories and shagbark hickories. There are Dutch elms and American elms.

There are sweetgums, black cherries, cottonwoods, and ashes. There are magnolias, basswoods, London planes, and mulberries.

There are blue spruce and Norway spruce. There are junipers, Leyland cypress, and hornbeams. There are Fraser fir and Canadian hemlock. There are white pines and bull pines.

On my block, there’s a lot of shade.

On my block, there’s a family with an adult son who still lives with them. He’s in his twenties and can't talk. I sometimes hear him in the house screaming and banging.

Once, the police came to their house. I don’t know what happened. I don’t think they arrested anyone. The son might have autism or bipolar.

On my block, there’s an old lady who rides a big cruiser bicycle up and down the street. There's a radio strapped to the handlebars.

She plays classic rock music at full volume as she rides. It's only in the summer and only for a half hour or so in the afternoons. Nobody seems to mind too much. I like her music. It’s okay with me.

On my block, there’s a retired firefighter with an eyepatch. He told me he lost the eye in a house fire. I thought he meant a fire he was fighting. But it was his own house that caught fire while he and his wife were asleep.

He lost the eye when he tried to carry his senseless wife through a broken window. A glass shard somehow broke off and landed in his eye.

It happened a really long time ago. He didn’t seem upset talking about it, even though his wife didn’t survive. He lives alone because he never remarried.

On my block, there’s a yellow fire hydrant. Aren’t fire hydrants supposed to be red? This one is yellow, though.

The paint is chipped and scratched. The bare metal underneath is rusted.

I don’t know if that hydrant would work if there was a fire and the firefighters hooked their hose up to it.

They might be left with an empty hose and a fire that couldn’t be put out.