We leave behind a house…but our home is our memories that travel forward with us.
Jim and I are in the process of prepping our house to put on the market. An exciting time…a new chapter in our lives. Up until now, I’ve been too busy and occupied with other things to really think about our home and how much I will miss it. Until today that is.
I’m giving the closets in our house a fresh coat of paint. While arranging the drop cloth in the closet in the livingroom, I felt something hard underneath it. It was a BB.
You know…those little round metal balls that kids have for their “Red Ryder carbine-action, two hundred shot Range Model air rifle with a compass in the stock and a thing which tells time” BB guns.
Many years ago, one of the boys spilled a carton of BBs in the closet. We cleaned and vacuumed and cleaned and vacuumed…but every now and then, a BB shows up. Today was such a day.
I rolled it between my fingers and I began to cry. No more finding BBs in the closet (and no, I don’t want someone to spill a carton of them in my new closets)…no more hanging Christmas stockings on the nails in the living room doorway…no more evenings on the “south vista” watching the birds splashing in the pond.
I think of all the whiffle ball games…the water balloon fights…watching Jim and the boys play MLB on Sega…Craig and Robert playing racquetball against the garage door…listening to Derek play guitar in his room. All the friends and family that had meals at our home…the Bible study groups that met here. The list of memories goes on and on.
Sitting up with the boys when they were sick…helping with school projects…late night talks when they came home…watching Derek leave home to join the Army…watching Craig move onto campus at U of E. Welcoming a new daughter-in-law to the family (love you Brittany!)…enjoying the boys’ friends when they would come to visit.
So many memories. We have lived here for 15 years. It’s been a good home. We have been so blessed. We still are.
I’m looking forward to the move. But I once heard, in order to know where you are going, you must know where you’ve been. I know that this home knew love…it knew good times and bad…it heard a lot of laughter and some tears. I know where we’ve been…and we’re taking all those memories with us.
So take the photographs, and still frames in your mind.
Hang it on a shelf of good health and good time.
Tattoos of memories and dead skin on trial.
For what it’s worth, it was worth all the while.
I hope you had the time of your life.
Good Riddance (Time of Your Life) by Green Day
Writes 4 Him 