Showing posts with label home. Show all posts
Showing posts with label home. Show all posts
Wednesday, May 11, 2011
Cara: Home
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Cara "When we walk through our front door,
we should be able to leave the stresses
and the strains of the outside world.
A home should provide us with a sanctuary for the soul..."
~Jane Alexander
I have always been a firm believer in bloom where your planted, no matter where you "live". As a pre-married woman my room was where I was planted. I had it decorated the way I wanted...chose all the colors, bedding, had my own phone and phone number and it was where I went to get away from the world. When I got married I lived in an apartment, an awesome apartment might I add but still not some grand home. It was mine. Again I made it our home.
Subsequently the next homes we owned, we again made them ours. A place to come in, lock the door behind us and breathe.
While I was away a few weeks ago we went to look at model homes in the development where my in-laws live. For someone like me with interior decorating OCD it's just too much. Perfect everything...neat as a pin...like no one lives there. Well, that's cause no one does. Beautifully placed throw pillows on the couch unmoved by a hairy dog that throws them on the floor so she can sleep there. A gourmet cookbook open to an elaborate recipe on the granite kitchen counter...waiting for someone to start cooking. (No one will...the squeaky clean oven has never been used) Children's rooms decorated to the umpteenth degree, Pottery-Barned to the max...without a thing out of place. You won't find a sock under the bed or science projects growing in a glass on the desk. A pool to die for out on the lanai covered back patio. You won't find a leaf or a dead bug in that pool, as you sit at the underwater table and sip your Pina Colada.
Then I come home. And I initially want to take a match to the joint. I see every unperfect thing. Every wall that needs to be repainted. Every stinking dust bunny that rolls by. Furniture that I want to hack up and put out in the fire pit and roast marshmallows on.
You can tell who lives here from the dirty cleats at the front door next to the hockey stick leaning against the wall. The folded laundry basket at the bottom of the stairs waiting to be brought up and put away. Dirty breakfast dishes in the sink, papers piled on the counter...and on an on.
But we do live here. And no it's not perfect, though I unsuccessfully strive for perfect all the time. It's lived in. Amongst the dust and hot messes...there's laughter, yelling, running around, celebrations and memories being made everyday. It's a house that's been made a home by us. No matter where you are planted can be home. Not matter how small or in need of repair it can be home. "Home" isn't physical or tangible. It's a feeling, a state of mind.
Quakers (of whom I would never aspire to be like) have a saying, "There's no dirt in heaven". I beg to differ.
Monday, July 19, 2010
Cara: Home again
Last night was day three of a 3 day reunion of the town where I grew up. Bff's and I went to 2/3.
The last night was at the beach in the town where we lived. Beach was packed with people from classes ranging from the 70's to early 90's. Everyone brought their significant others and kids. It was so nice to look out over the beach and see people hugging and taking pictures, introducing their spouses to old friends and showing off their kids.
For a few hours times stands still and you are just a kid at town beach with your friends. Some people "poo-poo" it and say they don't want to see people from their past. I don't know maybe some you don't. But even with the people that maybe you weren't the best of friends with back in the day, time goes by you are adults and whatever issues there were are gone and you are truly happy to see each other.
So even though life for me now is good it's nice to go back...drive through my town (which is very similar to Mayberry guess that's why I ended up here) and remember all the places I hung out and were part of my life. A time in my life when it wasn't a rat race, no mortgages or major responsibilities. Just my friends, walking home from school on Main Street, hanging out in front of Friendly's, driving our crappy first cars (no one got convertibles for their first car like here in Mayberry).
Last night driving past the neat little unpretentious houses dotting the road down to the beach...it felt like home. Home where I can just be me, a kid from the neighborhood going down to town beach to hang with my friends.
Jenn's two cents: (via Bon Jovi): It doesn't matter where you are, it doesn't matter where you go...If it's a million miles aways or just a mile up the road....Take it in, take it with you when you go........who says you can't go home
Jenn's two cents: (via Bon Jovi): It doesn't matter where you are, it doesn't matter where you go...If it's a million miles aways or just a mile up the road....Take it in, take it with you when you go........who says you can't go home
Tuesday, May 4, 2010
Jenn: Location, Location, Location
I have been in my home 8 months and the location makes all the difference. I moved 1 mile and I feel like I changed states. In my old house, I had to drive everywhere - the kids could walk to the 7-11 but not without a grown-up. I didn't feel comfortable letting them out on their own. My son had to be driven to all his friends houses and there were no kids in the neighborhood who my children played with. Sunday I had 8 kids playing in front of my house, parents sitting on my porch - everyone just hanging out having a great time. My kids can walk to a friends house across the street or down the block. I let them go to town, without me, for ice cream. They have the kind of freedom I had as a kid. When I was a kid, I could walk to the candy store. My mother would give me a note for the guy at the corner deli and I would walk over for groceries and cigarettes. I walked to school and sometimes even walked home for lunch.
Where you live and who your neighbors are can make all the difference in the world. I got lucky with my neighbors, I got lucky that Lu has a "best friend" right across the street - that Sam has friends down the block, that Mae found girls she can walk home from school with. I am looking forward to spending more time on the porch, watching the kids play and talking to my neighbors.
Cara's two cents: I couldn't agree more! A perfect day on H Lane is kids running from one pool to the other, getting the ice cream man before dinner, and kids and parents "marshing mallows" in our pjs around the fire.
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