All my life I have heard this phrase and I thought of it once again as I drove past our old house on Crescent Hill this morning. It looked so forlorn and sad! My heart was heavy as I looked at it and remembered all the happy days Kevin, Loretta and I spent there. The endless hours I spent in the yard. Hauling rocks from Martin Marietta to build flower beds. The day lilies I carried from my Mama’s yard when I was married and carried from place to place as I moved through the years.
At one time I had around sixty rose bushes, not counting all the different other plants scattered here and there around the yards. Front and back! I would come home from the restaurant, rest a few hours and then outside I would go, happy as a lark, working with my flowers. Sometimes it would be dark before I decided to come in, reluctantly.
One day, on my birthday, Ted Ford asked Loretta what she thought I would like for my birthday. She told him, jokingly, that I would probably kill for a fish pond. Well, what do you know! He sent one of his employees to our house and I got my fish pond. I used to sit for hours by that pond, listening to the water and watching those fish swim happily along. Cares and worries seemed so far removed at those times.
The grass is overgrown there now. I try to peek at the back yard as I pass by but the weeds are so high. I could see that my yellow climbing rose was in bloom though. I remembered walking around in that back yard , all of our cats following behind my heels. Especially “Stripe”. If I walked across the street to the neighbors house, I would look down and there she would be. There was a bird who nested in our yard every year and she hated Stripe for some reason. Every time she went out into the yard, that bird would swoop down and peck her in the head or else try with all her might to. Stripe would mosey along just like she didn’t know that bird was even there. I would laugh and laugh at their antics.
If I close my eyes, I can see Kevin sitting in that swing I had bought him, both arms on the back of it , just swinging and dreaming about a better tomorrow. I can also remember the day he was working in the yard! He had let his hair grow out and this day it got too much for him. He came in the house and much to my shock and horror, went into the bathroom and started shaving his head. He cut it with sheer abandon, didn’t matter which way that shaver was going, but as it worked out, he did a good job (for his first time). haha
I could probably sit here for hours remembering and reflecting but as I turned the corner to go to my sister Sue’s house, there at the corner of the front yard of our old house sat that big maple tree that Kevin and I had so long ago planted and it was ablaze with the most gorgeous yellow, gold foliage. It almost took my breath away.
At that moment I knew that one day, some family would move into that old house, probably with the same hopes and dreams that Kevin , Lo and I had. They would have a chance to make all their dreams come true and our old house would be a happy place again. Just as it was with the three of us. God Bless Them.
I hope some day I can think about the house without feeling like I can’t breathe. I haven’t forgotten all those good times that happened there, but I can’t think about the house itself without feeling like my heart is breaking. I guess it’ll get easier with time. But losing that house will always eat away at me. Maybe I’d feel better about it if someone else was living there now, but it’s just sitting there, like it wonders where we went, and I feel like I abandoned it when I should have put up more of a fight.