"You Can't Go Home Again"

I was on my way over to my daughter's house a couple of weeks ago for an outing at the Botanical Garden when I saw it. "IT." The For Sale sign prominently displayed in the front yard of our old house. When we downsized six years ago we moved only one street south, even the same block, so it wasn't really a surprise to come across the notice that morning.

I don't really know why, but it hit me harder than I would have expected... seeing that For Sale sign again. We had lived there for twenty-seven years with our family. For me it was even longer, as it was the house I grew up in from the age of twelve until I graduated college, got my first teaching job, first car, and first apartment.

I'm thankful there were no cars behind me at the stop sign that morning, because I just sat there idling for a minute or two wondering how the new owner could just give up on her (yes, my old house was a "she" to me) so soon after moving in... and yes, I also know that six years isn't really all that soon. Humor me.

I wanted to look at the website, look at the pictures. I had heard from old neighbors there had been lots of renovations. At the same time though, I didn't want to view all that had changed. That old house, built in 1923 was almost a time capsule. We loved it and lived in it just as it was, valuing her for the grand old gal she had always been.

When we were stretched a bit thin on space after adding our daughter Sarah to the family, we simply put in bunk beds. Other than painting, and restoring and installing an old claw foot tub to its original spot of glory in the hall bath, there was no remodeling until we added the screened room off the back that eventually became our son's bedroom.

Curiosity got the better of me, and I did, indeed, take a look at all the photos. I had to say the new owner did a lovely job with what was done. It was new, modern, updated. I'm sure all the remodeling will keep the house standing for many years to come. In this neighborhood so many of these old cottages are simply being torn down, and that would truly break my heart.

The whole thing got me revisiting the reason we sold that house in the first place.

Tom and I are not spring chicks any more. Living in a hundred year-old house meant lots of upkeep, more upkeep than we would physically be able to do ourselves as we got older. We had seen our kids go off to college, get married, and several of them move away from San Antonio. When it was just Tom and me left, we decided to come full circle to the newlywed days. We would make this little Casita our second honeymoon home.

Doing so was painful, both physically and emotionally. We had to tackle projects that had been waiting in the wings for years. Cleaning out the garage and the attic were mammoth tasks in and of themselves. There were boxes and boxes of old documents and photos from both sets of my parents' parents. Pictures of people I didn't know, nor had a clue of why they were important to someone at one time.

It all had to be gone through... sorted, saved, or trashed.

This lifetime's worth of long-forgotten treasures and memories would have been left for our children to muddle through and sort out after we were gone, if we hadn't tackled it ourselves when we did. Our kids all have sweet memories of that place. We wanted to preserve that for them. Nothing spoils a lovely memory faster than having to deal with all the cleaning, clearing, donating, and prepping to sell that must be done after the fact.

So, all in all, I'm still glad we did what we did. We secured a sweet, little home for our old-age, and we left our darling old gal in good hands for the future. Some things are blessings for a lifetime. Others are meant as blessings for a season.

Life is nothing if not forward motion. Houses are but tools used in the process of building the thing that has real significance. Within its walls you live and love, and laugh, and experience loss together, but it's the home you have built with those nearest and dearest to you that lingers in our hearts and in our memories long after we've closed the door for the last time and walked away.

We may not be able to go home again... at least not in the physical sense, but we can certainly carry its impact with us wherever we go. And... if we close our eyes and remember...

we can walk the halls again any time we'd like.