The Homes that House us.

Some houses are just that, a roof, four walls, a place to sleep, a money pit, or a handyman nightmare. Other houses become old friends. You learn to appreciate the attributes, and overlook the shortcomings. Today I said goodbye to an old friend of 18 years. We moved in six days after our daughters 3rd birthday. It was our first two story with a curved staircase and a light green carpet from top to bottom. The entire home had been wallpaper and I spent much of the first year painstakingly stripping it off. It wasn't my dream home by any stretch of the imagination but it was an ideal location to raise a child.  We left the syringes in the city parks behind and moved to the suburbs where some of my city friends never even ventured to visit. It was a house we spent many weekends in, to broke to go out, to nervous to trust a new babysitter. It slowly turned from just a house to our home.

As I walk through the empty house one last time the memories  come fast and I can hear our voices calling one another from different rooms. " Hailey we have to go soon" "Turn on the oven please", "Is the kettle boiling?"  I remember painting in preparation for my parents visits. I recall hanging balloons and streamers from the family room ceiling to celebrate birthdays and digging little graves in the backyard for family pets who went. I know every curve of the staircase in the dark of night and every creak of the stairs. Noises that use to wake me, became familiar and comforting even . I know every view, esp from the hallway window as I wait for someone whose delayed. Each spring the tulips closest to the sunny back fence bloom first. At Christmas the tree lights shone from the living room in just a special way you can see them from the street.

My fingers touch the inside of the closet door in our daughters bedroom , her  height milestones pencilled for historical record as she sprouted taller and taller.. Out her window the same crows and hummingbird that lived with us sit watching. I'll miss them all esp the woodpecker that greeted us with his ra-ta-ta-tta each spring looking for a mate. 

The early forsythia in bright yellow and the late summer hydrangea in deep blue. I'll remember how the  sunshine  dappled the wall where I painstakingly typed out my first book and the way the washing machine always bumped on the spin cycle and rattled the floorboards.

My husband will remember the ocean that peaked out on the deck each morning.  He would rise and stand and stare out as if expecting it to have disappeared over night,  and the upstairs wave my vacationing Dad would give me enjoying a summertime beer as I pulled into the driveway after a long commute. 

It was a house that kept us safe and dry and happy. A living room big enough in the early years to have those dance performances by our budding ballerina and hold the tallest Christmas tree we could cut down because of the lovely sloped ceiling. A front and back to kick footballs and throw frisbees, lots of room to spread a blanket and watch the meteors in late summer.

This house was a good house and I say thank you for keeping us safe each night. 

I loved the way you made us a family home.

I loved how you made us money in the early days, on that old four burner stove. Thousands of batches, tens of thousands of bottles all delivered off a gas range that shows its scars like a proud veteran.

A house that needed only a new roof , 13 years ago, everything else just keep ticking along,  out of fashion but reliable. 

Like me now I think. 

Only very special houses can do that.

Protect you, nurture you,  allowing the space and money, for your dreams to grow alongside. 

It's hard saying goodbye to an old friend, and that you truly were. 

I hope the new people grow to love you as I have. As we lock the front door one last time, my husband quizzically looks at me "are you crying?" he asks.

Surprisingly I am. The Mom who taught my daughter to view real estate as an investment. I became attached to this house, and I know why. Women make homes that mirror their hearts. This house, generously stored our family history and if these walls could talk, they would be telling the most wonderful stories.

Thank you.