It’s still mine. Even if it should be torn completely apart it will forever be mine. Every room filled with memories, every board filled with pieces of my heart. A house is only a building until you make a memory in it, until laughter fills the hallways, until decorations line the mantle above the fireplace. Until a little piece of you is given it would seem to just be walls, ceiling and doors. This place has all of the hurts with tears, the trust and confidence and the love of my family etched within the walls and doors. My first and only home located in a small town of New Hampshire.
My house was over 200 years old with original wallpaper still tacked nice and tight to the walls of the living room. Above was an etched tin ceiling that always made the room seem to echo usually with our screams of laughter of tickles with Dad or games of chase with Mom. In the corner was my mom’s pride and joy built in china display cabinet and on the other side a door bell chime that occasionally went off for no apparent reason. There was also a fireplace that was dangerous and never used. However the chimney ran through my room on the second floor which Dad would ring Santa bells in it to make the magic of Christmas morning come alive.
My parents room on the bottom floor was not exactly impressive and I’m sure it was never designed to be so. Pink roses marred the wall like ugly reminders of the fact that an elderly woman had lived there prior to our arrival. Simply adorned with a small closet where Mom’s shoes took up most of the floor, it was a room converted to be a room for snuggle naps with Dad and our cat’s’ feeding area.
Connected to my parents room was my Dad’s office and then computer room. As children it was fun to play chase since you could run through the living room to the parents room through the office and back to the living room. The office was taken up with Dad’s enormous wood desk with computer upon it, however there was also a computer for the rest of us as well. This is the computer I used those huge floppy drives with kids games on, and then smaller floppies as technology evolved. The office had a closet which became the closet of mystery since we weren’t allowed in it. Little did I know that was the closet which stored dangerous things such as my Dad’s crossbow. My mind cannot remember if I ever saw his old military uniform in there or whether I’m remembering a picture of his unit on the mantle in there.
The upstairs was extremely uneventful except that my sister and I had our own rooms both with slanted ceilings that if you woke up on the wrong side of the bed and sat up you were sure to knock your head silly. The giant hall closet was used for storing extra bedding, winter clothes and our cat was notorious for getting shut in there while she sniffed all the interesting smells that lured her in there.
The lowest place in the house was the basement which was unfinished and always smelled musty and moldy. Located down there was a lot of Dad’s woodworking things, and our chest freezer. Basements meant spiders to me and so venturing down there was something I rarely and distinctly hated doing.
The kitchen was newly built and the color scheme was horrendous and a definite tribute to the 60’s. Metal walls colored salmon pink on the bottom half and seafoam green on the top half still burn my eyes. White metal cabinets adorned those ugly walls and care was needed so the corners of those cabinet doors didn’t penetrate your skull or shins.
Off of the kitchen was the weirdest bathroom I’ve ever been in. Green granite floors, a giant tub that was fun to play in and then there was the red stained glass of the top portion of the windows. Perhaps the old woman got the glass at a cheap price, but there was a lack of interior decorating skill that was quite alarming.
My favorite places in the house were the two porches we had, the front porch was the entrance to the house. It was our playroom as children and where the Christmas tree was put because we could lock out our tree climbing/ornament breaking cat out! Eventually a day bed was put out there and was the best place to watch thunder and lightning fill the sky on summer nights. Dad even used my leftover doll house pink paint to paint the windows on the inside which added charm to the coziness feel it emitted.
The back porch was like a gateway to this magical land that we all read about in books. It was my mom’s pantry for canned items but the best thing was this wicked old can opener. You pulled it up and would slam it back down on the can where you’d crank the handle and watch the magic happen. The downside was watching all of the rust from the old machine leave bits and pieces on the can lid which more often than not would end up in our food.
The last part of our house was the garage/ barn. Tools that my Dad used lined the wall and the garage door took a little getting used to before giving in to our struggle to pull up. The stairs to go up in the attic of the barn were scary because there was no railing to hold onto. Mostly empty save stacks of wood, spare items that had nowhere else to be put and the constant flutter of dust from being disturbed; the barn was a magical place. Secret things seemed to be hidden up there and we were only allowed with a parent due to the lack of integrity of the floorboards.
Its still mine to this day, gone for 13 years. I drive by and tell my passengers “Look at my house!” I’ve had dreams where I go back in it to just look around, and dreams where my cat talks to me there. I’ve cried with longing to go back and with what it represents, I’ve smiled with such joy filling my heart of being able to grow up so securely. Forever my first home.