My parents just sold and moved out of their home (my childhood home), and I didn’t think it would affect me as much as it has.  I’m guessing that whoever said, “home is where the heart is” had just moved out of their childhood home—or home of twenty years—and was feeling groundless and displaced, and thus came up with that phrase to ease the pain a bit.  I’m really happy for my parents, but as I walked through the house one last time,  saying, “goodbye room” in Goodnight Moon fashion, I felt like I was also saying, in a small way, “goodbye childhood.” (I know, so dramatic!)

That said, during my last evening in the house, as I sat in the living room with my parents and cousin and a glass of wine in hand and played the “I remember…” game, I realized that a house is just a house is just a house, and it’s really the experiences you have in a place (all of the “I remembers”) that breathe  life into a building or place.  I am thrilled for my parents and for the new adventures that lay ahead.  Packing/unpacking is an acute, back-breaking, and emotional reminder at how easy it is to accumulate “stuff,” when, in reality, memories are all that we can take with us.  One of my good friends sent me this quote a while ago and, well, it just seems apt right now: “Own only what you can always carry with you. Know languages, know countries, know people. Let your memory be your travel bag.” -Alexander Solzhenitsyn

So, so long old house.  Here’s to past memories, and here’s to yet-to-be-had ones, no matter where it is we call “home.”