I Lost My House

We can't always hold onto the stuff that is important to us. Sometimes circumstances are beyond our control. There are some things you just can't anticipate.

I never expected to lose the house. It and the number that made the rotary-dial wall phone ring were the only constants in my life for forty years. The old neighborhood had, over the decades, changed from a hip subdivision of little ranch houses inhabited by young Ford Motor Company Mustang-designing engineers and their Baby Boomer families to a community where women wearing Jibabs and Abayas pushed their baby strollers around the cul-du-sacs. Still, despite the passing years and changing demographics, the houses looked the same as they did when we rode our decorated bikes in the annual Fourth of July parade or ice skated on the frozen fish pond -- like a subdivision of little Monopoly houses.

My brother and I both left Dearborn Michigan years ago and had no desire to ever move back so when it came time to settle my father's estate we (after I talked my HGTV-watching brother out of sinking a lot of cash into major updates and renovations) covered the school bus yellow exterior paint that was my dad's signature color with a nice neutral taupe and put the house up for sale.

Little did we know that by the time the tulips my mother lovingly planted years ago poked through the spring snow our house would be gone.

Gone. Bulldozed. Razed. And in its place: a McMansion

I can't describe the feeling I had when one of my former neighbors called me with the news. It was like hearing about a death. My house was gone.

Gone was the picture window where we'd position our Christmas tree and Vernor's green velvet Santa Claus every year. Gone was the backyard patio canvas awning that was unfurled to signal the start of summer and methodically rolled, folded and put away every October. In its place a gazebo overlooking a built-in pool dug in the very spot in the yard where we used to play Jarts. 

Gone was the kitchen, once the most fashionable in neighborhood, with its royal blue and chartreuse flowered wallpaper and kitchen carpet to match. The living room where we all sat around on that humid night in July to eat Jiffy Pop and watch a man walk on the moon was gone too. So was the bedroom where I did my homework and played Beatle albums backwards listening for clues in the "Paul is dead" mystery on my yellow plastic portable record player.

The basement where we recorded our own "radio" dramas on our Say it! Play it! and partied to Elton John's "Goodbye Yellow Brick Road" and Bob Seger's "Live Bullet" and on my 16th birthday performed the slumber party ritual of "Light as a Feather, Stiff as a Board" was now dwarfed by two huge stories and a garage built to hold three cars.

It was like the new homeowners took our little Monopoly house and replaced it with a hotel. It made me cry.

That being said, I feel a little guilty. I didn't lose my house to a flood or an earthquake. I had plenty of time to gather and move my belongings and never had to make a rash decision on what was worthy enough to be the only thing I carried out of a burning house. I didn't lose the house because I couldn't pay for it; quite the opposite. Still, my house is gone, taking my childhood with it.

They say you can never go home again. In this case it's not just a saying, it's the truth.

This is a an original 50Something Moms post. Lollie is a former Michigander who flew south for the eighties and nineties and now lives in Philadelphia (the City of Motherly Love). She also contributes to the Philly Moms Blog.