October 16, 2016
Hello, blogosphere. It's been awhile. July, to be exact, since I voiced a nugget here. But the mood has struck. So here I am.
I have never considered myself a gal consumed with "stuff": I rarely pay full price for anything; I have few worldly treasures that, if lost, would break my heart. There is, however, this house.
I live in a magic house. We moved here in February. The house was beautiful as winter faded, it was lovely in the summer. But this cozy brick spot with its wraparound porch and open windows and friendly rooms and endless trees was MADE for fall. I'm in love: the shadows cast, the setting sun shining on the front porch, the fifty-year-old Hickory trees pelting us with their nuts in apocalyptic fashion. The place is charming. That's all there is to it.
Well, maybe that's not all there is to it.
It's mine. It's Gracie's and Drew's and mine. I've never been truly and solely in charge of the place where I rest my head. I went from my dad's house to the dorm to my dad's house to my husband's house. Now, by the grace of a merciful and loving God, I'm in my house. Our house. And the delight that rushes through me is indescribable. The happiness here is palpable.
When I'm away, I long for home for the first time in my life. I relish hours spent in its company. I love how my children light up when they walk in--or even when we turn onto our street and see it there on the corner, awaiting our arrival. Sometimes it looks like it's smiling at us. I know I am smiling back.
It is interesting what happens when a house is a home. When the ease of it and the responsibility for it coexist in harmony: no one is demanding clean floors, folded laundry, a mowed lawn. But it gets done, and happily so.
Of course, the doggies make even friendlier this magic house. Their unconditional love and exuberance at the opened garage door melts us one and all. This is their home, too. I had no idea non-humans could define a home and enhance a family like our Halpert and Oscar do and have.
In a great many ways I feel that maybe I've been living in the dark for 42 years. Everything is so much brighter now. And it's not the house. I know that. It's liberty. Liberty that happens to manifest itself in this home in ways innumerable. We LIVE here. Freely.
The house is magic. Happiness lives here.
