Margie and Louise Boss’s house…that is where it all started. In thinking about moving and all the preparations I have yet before me to relocate us to another house I ponder with bittersweet affections about “home”. Are we moving from a home into a house?? Are we leaving a house for a home (to call our own) or are we merely moving our “home” aka our love and fondest memories to a new address.
I remember living in Regina when I was about 9 years old. I believe I attended Grade 4, 5 and 6 at St. Pius X. I had very good friends there..Margie and Louise Boss and they lived in the most magnificent house I had ever seen. Well at least to my 9 year old perception…it was amazing and I loved going there. It was an older house with much character. Brick and/or stone on the outside as I recall and surrounded by plenty of old wonderful trees. The inside was full of nooks and crannys and it had wonderful vintage furniture…it was so homey and comfortable and there were usually homemade cookies when I was lucky enough to get invited over….I would think of any excuse to go to Margie and Louise’s house (I would pick them for project partners and join the same extracurricular activities as they…anything so our paths would cross often). I think it was the memory of this house indelibly etched in my brain that set the blueprints for the kind of house I would want to raise my children in sometime in the distant future. I didn’t even know this was formulating in my subconscious mind.
This year we are moving to a “new” house…new in every way. I believe I am going to have to secure therapy for my own kids to navigate the move with the least emotional damage. (These are adult children, 19 & 22). They are utterly devastated to be leaving their childhood home. They are dragging their heels on all fronts. I can’t get them to pack up their rooms or get excited about the move or talk about decorating ideas. Every suggestion is met with distain. In fact the weekend I told my daughter we were buying a new house…she didn’t speak to me all weekend. I took her to see the showhome, thinking that seeing the wonderfulness of the new home would change her course but it only made it worse. She hated everything about the house…and did not want to talk about it. In fact tomorrow she is hosting a tea party with her childhood chums and their moms in honor of all the many precious memories she has experienced in our current home, before I start to dismantle it on Monday. I do use the word “home” on purpose as this is why this move is a crisis in their minds. The day we moved in to our new home she took off for New Zealand for 3 months.
At first I was upset that they were upset and I thought they were being unreasonable but it has started to occur to me that what they feel for this “home”- the house we live in now is exactly what I wanted them to feel. This was my goal and it all started at Margie and Louise Boss’s house. I was never fond of the idea of moving and upgrading and uprooting every two years or so. (Because this is what we did all of my childhood…moved every couple of years…always having to make new friends and live in uncomfortable houses…just when it started to feel like home we were uprooted again). My idea of home was find a place you love and stay there forever, make memories and always have somewhere to come home to. Let the place grow and evolve with the family. God has allowed me the fulfillment of that dream. The fact that my kids love their home and don’t want to let go of it tells me that I was successful in providing the wonderful atmosphere for home that I always dreamt of.
The kids remember all the cookies baked in this “one bum” kitchen (Lexie even has taken to baking cookies as a hobby), they remember the tea parties hosted, the wonderful Christmases, the umpteen birthday parties (all with a different theme), the backyard BBQ’s, the growth of the trees, the games played and movies watched (All the princess and Christmas movies), the sleepovers, the sewing classes I taught in the basement, our home group get togethers, the fun on the trampoline (laying on it at night and watching for falling stars – this was how we discovered Andrew needed glasses), our wonderful dog-Oliver (who passed away in that backyard in Andrew’s arms), the many rabbits and birds that have made our backyard their home, the snowmen built, walking around the reservoir (and picking Saskatoon berries and throwing Grandpa’s ashes in the reservoir), our long afternoons at Heritage Park riding the caterpillar (so close to home), Camping out in the backyard, their wonderful bedrooms, the seasonal decorating (that will continue), the Grow Op across the street, the hail that killed my plants and damaged our roof, the homework and projects done around the kitchen table, the stories read (finding a little nook and hiding out to read all afternoon or evening(Harry Potter) – I enjoyed doing that myself), the cousins and grandparents visiting and most recently for Andrew being able to come “home” from University where there is food in the fridge, laundry done, warm bed, surrounded by all your favorite things….sitting by the fireplace (which Lexie has been doing all week).
When I first laid eyes on our current home….I fell in love with it instantaneously. There were several obstacles that needed to be dissolved but one by one they disappeared and God allowed us to live in this wonderful house. I fell in love with the huge backyard (full of evergreen trees) before I even saw the inside of the house. I loved the double front doors. Once inside, I loved the stone fireplace and mantle and the wonderful flagstone patio and wall I could see through the dining room window, I loved the one bum kitchen with its entire wall of cupboards and little eating nook. I loved the main floor laundry and the little room off to the side that I imagined as a sewing room (we used it for that for many years and now it is a computer room), it even had a little milk door slot thingy in it-still does actually. For you millennial’s – (In the olden days people used to get their milk delivered and the milk man would put it in this little cubby so he wouldn’t have to bother you at 4:00am and you would just leave the money in the cubby for him. Life was so simple bafck then). I digress – Then I went upstairs and saw these two wonderful rooms on either end of the hall with these quaint slanted ceilings and a window in the middle and I knew this was where I wanted to raise my kids. I gave one room to each of them. I had no idea we would live in this house for 16 ½ years….we literally raised our kids here. This house had SO much character and it became our home. We painted the walls red and green, we stenciled sayings and scriptures on the walls (as in the Word it says to write them on your doorposts and foreheads), we put up our own window coverings and light fixtures, Mike made little sitting areas here and there for us to hang out in, We took furniture out into the backyard to have an outdoor living room, we bought a swing which we swung on for hours and had many memorable talks on, we bought a gazebo to hang out in during the summer months, I semi finished off the basement as a sewing studio and classroom, we worked out in the basement and Mike installed a big screen and projector for watching our favorite movies. Lexie was always afraid to go to the basement alone because of the spiders. I love the fact that we had a computer on every level and would MSN each other to come for dinner or to talk….technology. So this house became our home in every way.
Of course the kids don’t see the same things Mike and I see. They don’t see the tree root problem in the backyard that sabotages our garburator. They don’t realize that it is just a matter of time before we have another sewer backup. They don’t see the daylight between the walls and the door frames or feel the cold air coming in through the antiquated windows. It doesn’t bother them that only one person can fit in the kitchen or that I don’t appreciate the bathroom aromatherapy that permeates the kitchen when the main floor bathroom is used (Not to mention the sounds…LOL). They don’t realize how much work that yard is to maintain. Up until they started to drive they didn’t understand the detached garage thing….not that just having a garage isn’t a luxury but now we will have an attached garage (bonus). They don’t hear the creaky staircase in the middle of the night because they are usually the ones making it creak as they sneak in when we are already asleep (not). I’m not sure they even are inconvenienced by the fact that there is only one shower facility in the house and no proper ventilation in that bathroom so Mike has repaired the peeling roof many times, plus it is freezing in there and there is not enough hot water for more than two showers and there are four of us. I think they have finally begun to understand that if anyone is having a shower, you can’t flush the toilet, use the washing machine or dishwasher or even fill the sink for dishes as the person in the shower screams bloody blue murder when they are scalded or shot with a blast of ice water.
My heart leaps for joy as it occurs to me that (with the Lord’s guidance) that I was able to make our house a “home”. A home is not about the 4 walls it is about what goes on inside those 4 walls. You’ve heard the expression “Home is where the heart is”…that is so profound because truly home IS where the heart is and right now Andrew and Lexie’s heart is with this “home” but what they have yet to unearth is the fact that home is about being with people you love and that love you…home is about safety and memories and they will still have all of this in the new house. We will be packing our memories and our love up with the rest of our earthy possessions and moving it all over to 230 Bridlerange Place. By wisdom a house is built, but by understanding it is established. It is wise to build a house and then fill it with the understanding that it is love and memories that make it a home.
If I could use this move as an analogy of what God has taught us…this world is not our home. We are moving on to something far better….so we are not to get too attached to it. We need to let go of something great for something far better. I believe it is the same with moving on earth….we need to let go and make room for something better. God’s best. We must be careful not to hold SO tightly to the past that we don’t make room for the future. Letting go is hard, to be sure. I have experienced this in the entire process of letting go of my kids (not to say I have achieved this yet-I’m working on it). We want to hang on so tightly…there is a certain safety in hanging on (for dear life) and yet not. I believe God has revealed to me that “Behold He IS doing a new thing…Can we not perceive it?”….I, for one, can perceive it. For Mike and I, it is time for a change. Those of you who have been married for 28 years and counting know that we need to let go of past pain and disappointment and stress….it is said that a change is as good as a rest and I am ready for a rest. I believe God has SO much in store for us in this new place. No it is not the Trump Tower, the Playboy Mansion, the Banff Springs hotel or even the Hansen’s ranch but it will be “home”. We will make new memories and move into a new phase in our lives. Mike and I have spent our entire lives doing things for the kids and I believe this new house is something we do for “us”…something God has blessed us with. A home is not about 4 walls (just as a church is not the building…it is the people). I am pretty sure if Mike reads this he will be thinking “I thought I was just buying 4 walls, a roof and a garage…who knew how deep all this was?” because, of course, Mike did not have the dream of Margie and Louise Boss’s house in mind when we started out (and he didn’t even know I did).
So I DO totally understand my kids “mourning” for what they are leaving behind. Go ahead and mourn kids. It is good for the soul. There is a time for everything and there is a season (In fact I have decided I am going to collect old European clocks for this new house as a memorial to that fact). There is a time for mourning. Yes they are leaving a wonderful blessed childhood behind and Praise God that is what it turned out to be for them. Luckily we can take our memories with us wherever we go…it is only the four walls that remain.
I will endeavor to turn our new house into a “home” for us all. It will also be a place to come home to. When you come to this home you will find love, safety, warmth, comfort and even a few new and improved luxuries. So often I have had friends and family come to our place and not want to leave because of the homey atmosphere and that is what I would like to create in our new home. The Lord has blessed me with a knack for creating this atmosphere and it will be a challenge to take those new, freshly built and painted cold lifeless walls and ceiling and turn them into “home”. I am excited….hopefully when the kids are done mourning the excitement will catch on. They are off to bigger and better places anyway….and they will leave Mike and I alone in our new “home” but it will always be there for them whenever they want to return (with significant others and grandchildren and friends and memories). We are their home!
January 8th, 2010 – Two months before moving into our new home.
The Red Plaid Apron 