House(s) Beautiful

Zappos had exactly one pair of black suede kitten heel boots in size 7.5 on clearance, and they were meant to be mine. In a big big hurry, the online deal was closed without much thought, and I smugly looked forward to a stylish future (at a good price). Later that day, e-mail happily proclaimed the boots of my dreams winging their way to me with an ETA of exactly one business day. The message said they would soon be waiting in splendor on the front door step—of our former home in Atlanta. Alas, I had neglected to change my default shipping address. Oh boy.

That metaphoric house sitting at the top of the hill I came down almost five years ago has played my heart and mind with the mastery of a skillful symphony maestro. And I thought I had become newly amazing in February when I finally found the courage to look up at it as I walked by one Sunday evening—a big deal meriting a self-congratulatory moment about moving ever onwards. Now a snappy pair of boots was making me do what I believed I could never do—go back up that hill and see the place that often appears in drifting thoughts of the past.   

The family now making that house their own special place is warm and kind—especially to a former resident with a sentimental attachment to what most everyone else in the whole world recognizes as simply bricks, mortar, and wood. But beyond the array of building materials artfully fashioned together, there are crazy intangibles made of up souls and memories existing only in that spot, my children’s official childhood home, thoughtfully built with bright expectations found in a different time and place. Without a doubt, these reflections are bolder because life took a different direction leading to a leave of the hill in challenging circumstances.

So on a gorgeous Saturday afternoon, I found myself going back up a familiar concrete driveway. I smiled passing my mother’s last little ornamental Christmas tree planted there in 2007, and didn't quite recognize the cedars and crepe myrtles that had somehow stretched way high into the azure sky. When I reached the top, I was standing in intimacy once again with the tall brown brick façade of an old friend. The front door opened and I was standing in the house on the hill. 

There was beauty I had long ago forgotten in every direction. The first thing captivating my attention was a fabulous wrought iron dining room chandelier. With graceful arms of subtly gold-tipped leaves flowing with shimmering crystal droplets, I marveled at its magnificence and was surprised to learn I had selected it in a lifetime long ago. There was gleaming and pristine white woodwork under impossibly high ceilings—smooth and also perfect white—complimented by heavy wood molding everywhere I looked. 

Like a tourist at Versailles, I was a stranger in a strange land marveling at splendor. I was surrounded by what used to be scenery from every day life but is now someone else's tasteful interior design and a special occasion for me. I wanted to touch everything I saw, partly to admire it again (like long lost friends), partly to conjure up memories of the kids being little, and also to inventory where I have been and where I am going since the last defining days in that place. 

My visit continued through spacious rooms with amazing wood windows and across hardwood floors stretching forever. Just beyond tall French doors leading to the backyard, bright but vague apparitions of little Annabelle and her neighborhood BFFs looked back at me from the much-loved swings on the playset. In the family room I could see a small William lying on the sofa watching SportsCenter and, if I squinted my eyes just right, I could see an ethereal (highly) decorated Christmas tree standing in the corner by the bookshelves and windows.

My gracious host was indulgent, letting me admire her exquisite home and enjoy a sojourn into kaleidoscopic yesterdays for just a little while. It was sweet being back in the only place where flashes of days gone by live in perpetuity, vivid and tangible. I was suddenly grateful and glad my boots had landed me in that place. 

Beyond the visages and images found solely in my head, little pieces of our days happily remain and are made better by their now-owners. Precious new children love the playset where Annabelle’s initials are carved in the wood. Pretty hydrangeas I received as gifts from various friends years ago flourish today because there is someone way better at gardening than I to love and pamper them.

But the sweetest holdover for me is in the kitchen. On our last day at that address, the physical and emotional workload of clearing out possessions was overwhelming, and my sainted realtors and I worked with a daunting 5:00 p.m. deadline. Bad decision made on top of bad decision was the rule of the day, and many things—from trash to treasures—found their hurried benediction in a heap of seemingly unwanted belongings at the bottom of the hill. 

Eventually my successor as lady of the house arrived at her new home and spotted a really lovely, fresh picture of a long stemmed, purple flowered plant in an elegant cornflower blue and white container, abandoned on the mountain of remnants. She thoughtfully rescued it from an imminent one-way journey on a garbage truck. And now the memento from the earlier days in the life of that house graces a perfect spot on the kitchen wall, brought back up the the hill by a woman with a heart for special things.  

My life now looks little like the one back in that Atlanta house, and I am good with that. I will concede living in a really beautiful home is an exceptional privilege, but this other way of life is fine, too, and comes with peace. Subtle peace found in a small, slightly dowdy--but somewhat charming—home for the children and me. Peace that is a by-product found in acknowledging and being in the place where you know you are supposed to be. There is beauty to be found in a new life lived from another perspective. While our accommodations are unlike those found on a hill in Georgia, I am ever thankful for having been there and for the wonderful people who populate the scenery--in both places, and points beyond.    

I appreciate kind new friends who graciously allow a sappy, sentimental woman to stop by for a wayward package and let her admire the present and look fondly at the past. And I am grateful to a God who seems to have a great deal of confidence in me and who works in crazy ways to make me go back up a hill to really see and understand where He has taken me in the five years since He brought me down off of it. 

Thank you so much, Whitney.