My parents recently sold my childhood home. I grew up in the same house nearly all my life, only having moved for the first time for college. This is an ode to my childhood house, a place to remain in our hearts for a lifetime.
It’s crazy how much of your identity can be held in a place made of four walls and a roof. Without those five things, my house wouldn’t exist. My identity wouldn’t exist.
The house I grew up in was small and had four consistent residents. It was a split-level home, meaning it had two floors and an open concept. Little to no privacy meant learning to be comfortable in the constant presence of others.
There were a lot of good memories and a handful of bad made in this home. Hundreds of life lessons were learned, and countless hours were spent studying, reading, dancing, laughing, cooking, and more.
Almost every night, my family would eat a meal around the dinner table. This deeply shaped me as a person and became a time for us to discuss family matters, ask life’s biggest questions, and jest with one another.
The dining table was a place where homework was completed, arts and crafts were painted and glued, and board games were played.
My bedroom took many forms as my personality and interests evolved with time. From pink flowers to purple overload and a blue antique Paris theme. My bedroom, like my life, was constantly evolving.
Accommodations were made for my passion for dance when eight mirrors were hung in a row, and a ballet bar was nailed to the wall. Metals hung lazily while my dresser trembled with each dance routine I practiced.
My lofted bed became a place of lethargic dreams. Dreaming about what high school would be like or if the cute football quarterback even noticed me. Wondering if I passed the AP Government exam or if tonight’s shift at work would go smoothly.
The perimeter of our house held as many memories as the confines of the walls. The smooth, flat driveway was a canvas for my imagination. Scooter races and carnivals, lemonade stands and movie sets, the driveway brimmed with possibilities.
Our backyard was home to our garden, which produced the best pickles and zucchini bread to ever exist. It’s where my mother's flowers flourished and where we watched the Fourth of July fireworks.
The playhouse nestled between two Evergreen pines is where my first business was born. It was my own little Amazon warehouse that stored extra products and merchandise. It was a place for me to unwind in the quiet and privacy of nature.
Our backyard was where we found two abandoned duck eggs and decided to become their adoptive parents. Days of rotating the eggs in an incubator and holding our breaths, wondering if any ducks would actually emerge.
From walking down the hallway with a baby duck running to keep up, to decorating the stairwell for someone's birthday. From sitting on the steps in ‘time out’ as children to having family movie nights in the basement. From my brother and I fighting over the tiny bathroom, we shared to making hundreds of sugar cookies in the kitchen every Christmas.
This house, though no longer ours, outlives its physical presence in our lives.
Part of life is letting go of things once held near and dear. Finding peace at the end of one season and knowing that when one door closes, another opens.
The memories belong to my family and me, but now the home belongs to another. A family who will get to laugh, cry, fight, and make peace. The home will serve as a space to learn, grow, and love.
As my family changes their licenses and edits the primary shipping address in Amazon, the home still lives on without us. The home now gets to grow and experience something new. Adding to its list of achievements, the house now gets to raise up another family.
Different places and our experiences in them shape who we are. They lend a hand in the molding of our memories, our hearts.
But just because you leave a place, doesn’t mean it’s gone. A place, though rooted geographically, can live beyond the constraints of location through the memories we share and the lessons we’ve learned.
So we say goodbye to our lives as we once knew them and embrace our new realities while knowing that the best is yet to come.