Hello my dear dear friends. Having a LOVELY week, I hope?
Life is treating me fine, nothing to complain about, well other than a cranky-I-don’t-get-this-novel-nano-crap Husband. Can I see a showing of hands for those who think they’re married to the same man?
Anyway, I’ve asked my friend Kelly at Bama on the Brain to share some thoughts with you all today. I didn’t give her any guidelines, just asked her to write. I don’t know if she’ll take this as a compliment but her words could have come out of my head (maybe just not so eloquently.) So please enjoy her writing and when you’re done, go over and say hello. She’s ALSO doing NaBloPoMo! Yeah, she’s another wackadoodle.
Title: You Can Never Go Home Again?
Remember when you were younger and living at home, and you got upset about a friend who fiercely betrayed you, an evil boy who broke your heart, or the fact that your mom squinted her eyes just so when you told her you only needed $50 to buy those purple Doc Martens you’d been eyeing? Remember running your bedroom, slamming the door, flinging yourself dramatically on your bed and sobbing uncontrollably into your pillow? Perhaps you’d pull your favorite blanket over you, clutch your beloved (albeit severely battered) stuffed bear as if it was the only thing connecting you to the here and now; afraid that if you let go, you’d spin away into nothingness sad and alone. There’s something really comforting about the sanctuary of it all, isn’t there? A place where you can be your slobbery-sob self if you want to. You make the rules there. “Keep OUT!” the sign on the door reads. “Dork Free Zone!” keeps the younger siblings at bay. You hang the posters, you play the music, you set the tone. Wanna be happy? Be happy! Wanna be sad? Be sad. It’s totally up to you.
Inevitably, things change. You grow up, you move out. You have roommates, and spouses, then children (and maybe not in that order). Suddenly you find that, completely unintentionally, no sanctuary is totally your own. Even when your bedroom turns into the most generic of guestrooms, you still feel the static of familiarity when you enter. Sure, the bedspread is different. Hell, your furniture may be gone! But only you can recall the exact moment in time that you panicked and stuck an entire wad of contraband grape bubble gum to the wall behind your hamper so you wouldn’t be discovered. Only you can detect the trace smells of that incense you insisted on burning, even when you were explicitly told not to. You know every stain, every mark.
I’m 32 and I finally lost what was left of my sanctuary this past week when my mom handed over the keys of my childhood home to the new owner. It was a non-event of sorts since I live 900 miles away and have for nearly 10 years. After all, I have a house of my own and a husband and two cats to share it with. But it still stung. A lot. This time, though, there was no dramatic door slamming, no theatrical flinging onto the bed. No crying, no spinning into nothingness, sad and alone. Instead, I found comfort in a cup of freshly brewed tea, the best hugs a grown man can give from my husband, and the knowledge that I don’t need anyone’s approval to buy a purple pair of Docs.
Check out more musings from Kelly at her sanctuary on the web at Bama on the Brain
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My folks sold my childhood home around 10 years ago, rather unceremoniously too.
I’ve moved away from here, and now am back here, where I grew up. And I still drive by the old place… even went in once when it was being sold again. Though all the furniture was different, walls a different color, rugs where there were none before…it still felt like my home.
WTF?? I’m crying. Stupid period.
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my childhood home fell into other people’s hands a long time ago. in fact, no one’s left in the old hometown from my family; we all live up here in the mid-atlantic. i have an aunt and uncle across the bay, but that’s about it. i went through this to some extent when daddy left, but really, i was ready to move on. but every now and then, i think about something related to growing up, and i get a really sharp stab of bittersweet-ness. the man and i grew up together (in ‘BOTB’s hometown, actually), and we were talking about something that happened in high school the other day. his roommate, who apparently just realized how long we’d known each other in that moment, cracked up; i teared up just a bit.
homesickness hits in the weirdest ways…
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I have a hometown, but not a childhood home. We moved about every 2-3 years and one house does not hold more affection of fondness over the others.
The Husband only moved once as a child, but stayed within the same school district so he has friends that he’s known since he was five. Such a different world to me; I cannot relate at all.
This was a great post, Kelly!
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I moved away from home at the tender age of 17. I gave up my sanctuary and traded it for a dorm full of smelly wannabe-soldiers. I went home on occasions but my little hidey-hole had lost it’s sense of security.
After a number of years in the Army, having toured N.I. and participated in the Falklands conflict, I learned that my ‘safe haven’ was in my own head where I could find my own little cloud to sit on and relax, reminisce, cry or just have a good old laugh to, or at, myself.
I have moved home (including my time in the Army) a total 34 times.
Now I am settled.
Maybe mow I’ll be able to change the habit of over half a life time.
Who knows?
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I don’t have a childhood home actually. We moved so frequestly. Since both of my parents are gone there is no “home base” to go back to unfortunately.
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I don’t have a childhood home. We were always moving.But I can remember my childhood friends, specially my older protector from the time I was 3- walking hand -in-hand through the woods.I actually met him in another continent some years later. That’s it – a place where you can have a big mug of tea- that’s home.
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I moved around a lot, too – even 4 different houses in one town. I now have learned that home is where Mom is, not just a ‘house’ – so – I’m a lil bit jealous of your “Dork Free Zone”.
Just live in the memories
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