1043 Birch Cliff Drive

So, the house in which I grew up now belongs to somebody else. Strangers, occupying the space where Cobra Commander did battle with GI Joe. Where the Transformers fought their eternal quest for Energon and where countless games of Monopoly where played.

I wonder if they'll ever find the top hat? We never did.

It's a strange feeling when your parents decide to move on and find a new place to call home. Granted, both their kids are now married and starting families of their own. The family unit, as a whole, hasn't occupied that space in quite some time. The house just looks different than when we all lived there. So much so, that it's hard to see it as the same house in which I grew up. Yet, underneath the cosmetics and on some spiritual level, the house is tightly bound to us. I keep imagining the ghosts of our younger selves running around with cardboard swords and doodling imaginative creations on computer paper. I see the forts that we built and the celebrations we had as living memories. Still carrying on in some fashion, long after they ended.

We had birthdays in that house. We had fights in that house. We laughed and appreciated life in that house. My room was my sanctuary when I hated living with my parents. My room was a laboratory where I experimented with improvisation and jazz music. We had dinner almost every night together and we kept up with each other's lives as we ate. All in that house. My parents built that house and we were the only people to occupy it for over twenty five years. Our lives and memories fill that house and make it live and breathe. Our hands marked the walls, our feet wore in the carpet. Our stuff filled the basement and the closets. We gave it life and warmth and a personality. We took an empty shell of wood and dry wall and made it a home. We did that.

And now, it is passed on to someone else. The keys are handed over to strangers so they can create their home and fill it with a whole new set of memories. But I have this idea. This strange supernatural idea that they'll be unable to get rid of our mark completely. That, somehow, who we are as a family will be ingrained in the wood and in the foundation. I still imagine that the ghosts of two boys running around with GI Joe figures and cardboard tube swords will still be found in that white house with black shutters.

It's not true, I know. But I hope those strangers who occupy my old home will appreciate it. I hope they fill it with love and realize that it's more than just an address on a purchase agreement. I hope they notice that it's more than just a chance to build more equity and "step up" in the real estate world. Once the paperwork settles and the loans have gone through and all respective parties have their slice of the pie, I hope the new owners sit. Sit and appreciate this house that housed a family as they built a lifetime of memories.