Not Just a House

2726 Levans Rd was just an address to anyone who drove down the road and passed it by. It was a house; a very small, salmon colored house with ugly green shutters. It had four thick concrete walls, an old roof in need of repair, and a small fenced-in yard. It was our first house. Some called it a cottage or a bungalow, but to me it became so much more than a house. It was home.
It all began as the house my mother-in-law didn’t want us to buy. But it was the house I had to have. I didn’t understand why - I didn’t know the house’s story yet.
I can still remember the first time I saw it. December 26, 1999. Greg, my fiance, and I drove past the house and saw the sign taped up in the window. FOR SALE BY OWNER. It was a small red and black plastic sign; the kind you can pick up cheaply at the local hardware store. We examined every aspect of the house we could imagine. Timing - our wedding was barely 10 months away and finding a place to live was the only thing left to do. Do we call today - the day after Christmas? Do we wait and hope no one else calls first? Location - the park was not even a full block away; the elementary school less than a mile down the road. This was exactly what we wanted. Price - there was only one way to find out. We called that day.
Even after all these years, I can still vividly remember the first time I walked into the house. It hugged me. It held me. It made me want to hug it back and never let go. I had to have this house. There was no furniture in the house. The previous owners had moved out and a contractor bought the house and fixed a few things in order to re-sell it. Why, then, did I feel so warm and comfortable? How did I have such strong feelings? This house was just an empty shell. One bathroom, not big enough for two people, two tiny bedrooms, with hardly enough room for the beds, a living room so small our couch and small chair needed to be squeezed into it, and a kitchen that became too small for three of us to eat dinner at the same time once our daughter was born. But, there was something there. Something I couldn’t see. Couldn’t explain. Something that made me want this house. More than that; I needed this house.
We didn’t know a thing about buying a house, however.
What was a pre-approval? Why did it matter? We wanted the house. Wasn’t that enough?
No, it wasn’t. “Call the bank and let me know when you are ready to talk again,” the contractor bluntly advised us.
What if it took too long? What if someone else made another offer first? I panicked. Looking back, I don’t think I needed to worry. It was meant to be. The house wanted us...

I ran to answer my phone a few days later knowing it would be Greg. I hoped he had good news. We had been pre-approved by the bank and he was going to call the contractor to set up another appointment to meet at the house again. We couldn’t wait to go back with our parents...I answered...He sounded upset. His mom didn’t want us to go back and see the house again. She thought we were rushing things. She told us we were making a mistake - we shouldn’t be thinking about a house yet. Greg told me that, although he had made an appointment to see the house again, he was going to cancel it and we would wait a bit before looking again. We hung up and something happened. I had an intense feeling that I could not let this happen. I called him back. No! We can’t let this happen. We liked the house (I kept my feelings very reserved). If your mom doesn’t want to come along that’s fine, but this is our house and I don’t want to pass this opportunity by. He agreed and a few days later we went back.
The feeling returned. It didn’t take me by surprise; this time I expected it. I walked into the house and knew this was it. Our parents joined us. Our dads looked over everything they could. They couldn’t find anything wrong. I wrote a check to convince the contractor we were serious. I don’t know what it was. Maybe because we were young. Maybe because it was our first house. He seemed to doubt our intentions at times. But we wanted the house and it wanted us. I was sure of that. We had closing on February 23, 2000. We fixed a few things up: Greg landscaped the yard with decorative rocks, he planted young trees and shrubs, and he even planted a garden for me. We bought all the major appliances we’d need, had the furnace replaced, and added shelves along the basement walls for storage.
I especially liked our neighbors. They were the ones who told us a wonderful elderly woman had lived in the house before us. Sadly, she passed away. I could tell they missed her. They told us how Mrs. Lecky would be so happy to see what we had done to the house. Karen cried the first time she came to visit us. She hadn’t been inside the house in a while and it looked quite different. She assured us it was better, but different. Greg moved into the house on his birthday, June 29th. We moved him in throughout the day. He had moved on. I was slightly jealous. I wanted to be there as much as he was. Not because I disliked where I was, but because I felt I needed to be there. That was where I wanted to go home to after a long day. I brushed it off as just wanting to be with Greg, but it was really more than that.
My first night in the house was our wedding night. My last night in the house was a week shy of our 6th wedding anniversary. In those short six years, I slowly discovered what made that house so special. I think Mrs. Lecky was still there. I believe she liked us and made us comfortable in the house she had left behind. And, I am convinced she allowed our other loved ones to be there with us in spirit when we needed them. It sounds crazy but, when I say that house hugged me, I mean it. I could feel it wrap its arms around me. Hold me. Comfort me.
It didn’t seem to matter when or how often I walked into the house, it always felt the same. In fact, when we were packing to move, needing more space for our growing family, I still felt like that house was holding me, trying to keep me as long as it could. Even empty, the last time I looked around at its bare walls, I felt a warmth I had never felt in any other house I ever visited. Sometimes I even find myself longing to return. It’s funny how that house on Levans Rd. was not right for us in so many ways, yet the feelings it produced have left such deep marks on my heart.

Moving Day

The boxes were everywhere - every corner, every room, piled high against every wall. Some stacks were as high as I was tall.
Some boxes were packed full. Full of our treasures. Full of our memories and the life we had built together. They were taped shut. The strong smell of the black permanent marker I had used to label them filled the house and burned my nose. It wasn’t a pleasant smell, but today it indicated that something exciting was going on.
Some boxes were waiting to be packed. They waited patiently. Just sat there knowing they could be next. Each box would be full in a matter of days. Each with its own label and unique contents. On the floor were the stacks of newspaper for all those boxes that would need to be labeled, “Fragile.” Something fun was definitely going on.
Just about the only thing not being packed yet were our 2-year-old daughter’s toys. One corner of the living room had three small shelves full of her toys and books that would not be placed in their special boxes until the very last minute.
That time arrived one Thursday morning. It was cloudy and cool. A typical late September morning in Eastern Pennsylvania. Hopefully, the rain would hold off for a few hours. As I awoke, I realized how excited I was. It was an excitement marked by butterflies in my stomach and that feeling that feels so good it almost hurts. I was so thrilled about what was coming, that I wanted the day to be over; yet I wanted to relish every moment of it. I couldn’t decide if I was having fun or scared to death over what was around the corner. What a day it was going to be!
I took our daughter to daycare and our dogs to the vet to be kenneled for the weekend. I dropped the cats off for their, “vacation” at my mother-in-law’s, then picked up a dozen donuts for all our helping hands and headed home. It would be one of the last times I would call it home.
I had only been gone about two hours, however many of the boxes were already packed away in the moving truck. The rest of the day flew by so quickly I thought we might run out of time and daylight (every time I turned around, I found more boxes), however it seemed like it took forever and our house would never be emptied. By about 7:00pm, we were finished. The only thing left now was our grill and some burgers in the cooler. The rain started to fall as the grill heated up. How wonderful to know we finished just before the rain started! Luck seemed to be on our side. We made supper (after realizing EVERYTHING else really was packed and we’d have to borrow cooking utensils from our neighbor!), then packed the grill away in the bed of my husband’s truck and left to spend the night at my mother-in-law’s house.
It was hard to sleep that night. I knew I would never sleep in my old house again. I knew that the next night I would be in my new house. I knew I would be somewhere we were all so excited to go. There would be new smells and new sounds. All our daughter could talk about the last few days was her new room in her new house. She was going to get a big-girl bed to sleep in! I was going to have a dining room! And, my husband, Greg, was going to have a fresh, empty lawn ready for all his landscaping ideas to blossom.
Friday morning we left and finalized a few things before we could go to closing - you see, I packed all our bedding where I knew I would remember it and it would not get lost. However, it happened to be one of the first things that got packed in the back of a very large moving truck. So, we bought a set of bed sheets and a blanket, then off to the lawyer’s office to begin. Between the closings on both our old house and the new one, it was an all-day affair, but by about 6:00pm, we were walking through the doors of our new house. That night we slept in our new bedroom. It was still hard to sleep. It was hard to believe everything worked out so well. Saturday morning we unpacked the truck. Someone asked us if we were sure this was a bigger house. There just didn’t seem to be enough room to put everything away. I walked inside to see where we could go with our last few possessions...
The boxes were everywhere - every corner, every room, piled high against every wall. Some stacks were as high as I was tall.
Some boxes were already unpacked. On the floor were the stacks of newspaper from all those boxes that had been labeled, “Fragile.”
Some boxes were still packed full. Full of our treasures. Full of our memories and the life we had built together. They were taped shut. The strong smell of the black permanent marker I used to label them had faded. It wasn’t a pleasant smell anyway, but it indicated that something exciting was going on. Those boxes waited so patiently. Just sat there knowing any one of them could be next. Each box would be empty in a matter of days.

Impressum

Texte: Copyright 2012 Heather M. Borger Photos by Heather M. Borger
Tag der Veröffentlichung: 23.01.2012

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