Houses

Eight years ago, we sold our Ruston home of 31 years and moved to Baton Rouge.  We had raised our family in that house and built an attached cottage where we enjoyed my mama for the final 10 years of her life on earth. To say I loved the place would be a big understatement. We especially like older homes with their own distinctive character and history.  That kind does bring with it challenges such as squeaky floors, less than optimum energy efficient windows, and shout outs such as, “Don’t flush! I’m takin’ a shower!” Maybe you know about the burst of water that’s too hot when this happens.  This blog would be much too long if I were to share even a portion of the memories we made there, but I want to mention some of them.  There were nights rocking babies and feeling terribly unqualified to dare to adequately raise a human. There were times I was so thankful to not have to be a single parent, times when Pat would sit for hours to listen and struggle alongside a teenager with the angst of growing up.  There were birthday parties, first dates, proms and graduations. There was the time we returned home from delivering an 18- year- old to LSU, going into that empty bedroom and weeping, knowing that part of my heart was somewhere else.  That event occurred three times….Three children, three empty bedrooms. The first time didn’t actually kill me, so I knew a bit better that I would actually survive when it happened again.  The sweetest thing happened after Number 3 left. A mother bird built a nest in a little tree that sat in a flower bed between our old house and my mama’s cottage.  We called her home Mamie’s cottage.  I would often sit in a porch swing on the breezeway between the houses, and that’s when I became aware of the nest.  It may seem the obvious metaphor of “letting the children leave the nest”, but ya know, I actually believe after a time of watching the mama bird tend the nest, that three was the actual number of babies that left her little humble nest home.  God is in the details.  We had a glorious wedding reception in our house, the attached cottage, and the yard in between.  Mama’s last breath was breathed in her cottage, and her daughters were at her side. That was a difficult and yet beautiful experience.  I’ll save that bigger story for another blog post.  One of our final acts before driving away from that house for good was sprinkling the ashes of our much- adored dog Fletcher throughout the backyard. Through it all, I found myself continually amazed at the grace God had given us to pack up what felt like so much of our life and to release that piece of earth to another owner.  It was so very “un me”, for lack of a better way to say it.  That place was a pride and joy.  I had assumed I would live there for the rest of my days.

We moved into a tiny condominium in an old building with many of the traits we love.  We rented the place and found ourselves so content there that we proceeded to purchase it.  Our youngest even joined us there for a period of 10 months as she completed her years at LSU.  950 square feet, 2 bedrooms and one bathroom. And it was grand.  A bit too much bathroom humor, perhaps, but it really worked.  When you are where you are meant to be, there’s that grace again that God pours over the circumstances.  I was so often in awe and would ponder, “How is this so enough and abundant?” Well, the grace does lift when it’s time for a change.  She moved out when it was the right thing to do. During our years in the condo, our hound dog Louie and I would walk the sidewalks of the neighborhood and I would admire houses I liked and wonder and ask God, “Is that it?”  We were content where we were, but I would consider that we would eventually buy another house. God knows ahead of time where we need to be.  He just does.  We bought an adorable little blue cottage a few years ago. Yes, it was an older home as well with uneven but lovely wood floors, less than efficient windows, and a big arched window in front for the Christmas tree in a room where my piano could rest.  Without making a list of all the reasons for this place to be our home, God knew.  He picked the place and He picked the time. 

After spending a month in New Mexico last October, I returned with what felt like a strange inkling…might we move back into our tiny condo?  On the one hand, why would we?  The blue house was quaint and roomy enough.  It had a perfect floor plan.  Overall, it seemed just right for us and our stage of life.  The event we were a part of in New Mexico was something only God could have arranged (because spending a month anywhere away from home was way out of my “norm” and comfort zone).  We lived so simply while we were there.  The experience we had is truly difficult to capture in words.  Perhaps that too is a story for another post.  In fact, I am certain it is. I continued to consider the idea of simplifying and letting the house go.  The idea felt like a nudge from God, one that I didn’t need to fully understand or get my head around.  We had many fond memories in the blue house, but I began to reminisce about the good ones in our days in the condo as well.  After two days on the market, we have signed a contract to sell this adorable house.  God knows the why and the time.  It’s for our “next” that only He can really see.  God has again graced us to let go of a place we love, also filled with an abundance of memories in only a few years. I expressed my feelings like this a short time ago in a text message, “I guess it’s okay to really not understand but to trust.  But that won’t stop the tears.  This just hit me…when you love a place or a person, you embrace all the good and the bad, the heaviness and the grief and all the hard stuff that happened in the relationship or in the house too.  Cause it just is that way.  Hard painful stuff has happened here and in each place we have lived.  In each relationship.  The hardest most painful stuff of life happens in a home, in the place we care about and with the people we care about most.  But you still love the place and you still love the people, no matter what.”

We left town to allow the house to be empty and to be viewed after it was listed for sale.  One night as I lay awake, I felt some sadness about leaving the house alone there, for strangers to walk through and critique. This house, like all the others has been a friend.  It has sheltered us, comforted us and served us so well. But as I lay there feeling sad for my house, I told her, “YOU pick your new people.  As they walk through and look and consider buying, you, little blue cottage, choose who you want to cover and tend to in the years to follow.”  Louie and I will be walking by quite often to admire you, to say hi and to say thank you. 

Our Ruston Home

Our Little Blue Cottage

Ode to My House, April 2010

Oh House, your lovely windows bring in a new day’s light.

How tenderly with strength, you’ve covered us, held us tight.

Though older than many others, you hold firm this piece of land.

Weather beaten, season blown, yet steady you still stand.

I wonder….are you weary? Are you tired of all your living?

Sometimes I feel you breathe with us. Oh House, you’ve been so giving!

I’ve tried to give to you my best, to honor you, keep you clean…

Windows, baseboards, wooden floors…Is it our time to wean?

Are you willing, House of mine, to fill with unknown faces?

Not so familiar as are ours and come from foreign places.

And if so, how will it be that we could pack our things,

To leave this nest built’ round our life. How can we take wing?

This I know that God is kind, generous our hearts to ready,

Not letting grief arrive too soon. In small waves, our feet can steady.

You’ve tucked us in night after night, seen babies grow and go,

Displayed our lights and Christmas trees and donned new-fallen snow.

You’re beautiful in snowy white, even in winter’s drear.

Through springtime’s green and summer’s heat, lovelier with every year,

For now, oh House I’ll live with you. Window’s bright, you smile at me.

You seem to whisper, “All is well. You’ll see, my dear, you’ll see.”