Goodbye, Childhood [Home].
How saying goodbye to my childhood home felt like more like saying goodbye to childhood.
Over the weekend I said goodbye to my childhood home. After 40 years in the same house and an entire lifetime in the same town, my parents are moving to the Des Moines metro to be closer to my sister and me.
It was a bittersweet farewell. As my daughters and I pulled out of the driveway for the last time, my six year old asked why Nana and Papa were crying, which (of course) prompted my own tears. “Well, it’s complicated,” I said. “We’re so excited that Nana and Papa will be closer to us, right? But a lot of life was lived in that house. So it’s hard to say goodbye.”
My parents brought my sister and me home from the hospital to that house. We survived the Great Ice Storm of 1990 in that house. We played hours of catch in the backyard of that house. I listened to my dad spew profanities as he tried to set up the Christmas tree every year in that house. Somehow my sister and I didn’t murder each other as we fought for time in the single bathroom of that house.
Sleepovers. Birthday parties. Snow days. Sick days.
My mom battled (and overcame!) alcoholism in that house. She battled (and survived!) cancer in that house too. And my dad loved her through it all, unconditionally, in that house.
Like I said, a lot of life was lived there.
For my parents, the bittersweetness is obvious. They’re leaving the house they’ve called home since before they were parents and the town they’ve called home since they were born. But the upside? They’re going to be minutes away from their daughters and their daughters’ families—a luxury that will only become more valuable with time.
But for me, it’s a little more nuanced. Because there’s a strangeness that’s crept into my life and my friends’ lives as we’ve entered our late 30s and early 40s. It’s as if overnight, our parents’ bodies and/or minds are starting to fail them. And we, as their children, are collectively and all at once having to face the reality that our parents are, in fact, not immortal and will, sooner than later, need our care and assistance.
We knew this was coming, of course. But not yet. Many of us have small children of our own. And we’re in the thick of our careers. In other words, we’re dealing with our own shit—much of which, by the way, requires (or is made much easier with) our parents’ help to navigate. So, no, we’re not ready for our parents to need us; we still need them!
But, like it or not, it’s happening. And I guess saying goodbye to that house on Main Street solidified that reality for me.
Thankfully, my parents are in pretty good health, so I’d like to think I have many, many more years of needing them ahead of me. But I know life is fickle. So I’m promising myself and them to make sure we live a lot of life in their new house, too, even if they’re the ones needing me.
Yes, I feel for you as well. We finally sold my parents' home in 2020 just before Covid hit and we lost my mom. I miss that place every spring when I used to walk out into the wooded areas, or start riding the horses for the season, . . . so many stories. I can't even drive down that road any more because I know I'll cry when I see that place.
I moved out of my 100 yr. old , 2 story home that I Iived in for 34 yr. It was so hard to do. I loved the uniquely beautiful home, the historic, forested neighborhood. I had raised my son there, had 5 dogs buried there or their cremains sprinkled in the garden and a lilac bush planted in memory of a dear friend. I planned to live in that house my entire life. It took my son several years to convince me there were easier ways to live than maintaining a 100 yr. home. I now have a new town house I love that is much easier. I couldn't drive past that house for over a year, and I still mourn its' loss. Now, it is becoming a much loved and treasured memory. I truly understand your pain.