Well, the time is here, we are moving this week. Tomorrow is our last day here. G and A already headed up north with Grandpa and Grandma for the weekend. Their last night spent at the only house they've known already done. Nolan and EJ are sleeping now and all is quiet. The last night I will put babies to sleep in this house that I put our first baby to sleep almost exactly 7 years ago. It's odd how an object or space can hold so many precious memories and seem to keep them alive. Like when you drive through an area of your past and you can see your younger self almost perfectly. I hold memories like still photographs. I can visualize the blue shirt that Jeremy wore when we brought Graham through the door and toured him around his new house. I remember the first night we slept here I was 2 weeks from giving birth and Emy our dog and I lay on the floor on a mattress waiting for furniture. I dreamt of filling this house with babies. I dreamt of every room the colors they would be and accessories to adorn the shelves and walls.
I can picture taking our first vacation as parents and walking slowly up the stairs to see Graham- 9 months old at the time, hanging on to the railing- standing- standing up for the first time smiling as he greeted our familiar faces. It feels as if those tiny little finger prints are forever etched in that grain. I can see painting Audrey's room 3 times for the perfect pink only to end up with beige! Bringing her home and rushing into her room at all hours of the night, not because she awoke, she slept 8 hours straight the night home from the hospital! But, because I kept thinking I was dreaming and she wasn't really mine, that perfect, pink bundle. I rocked her endlessly as I nursed and stared out the window of her room at the dim streetlight on the corner. I dreamt of our future together, her and I and we talked about life lessons. She was and still is the most beautiful child inside as well as outside. When she was born she looked at me with the most peaceful, calm, gentle eyes, our sensitive girl.
I remember our sweet Emy lying on the back of the couch "tanning" in the sunshine, cuddling under our blankets in our big bed. I remember running with Emy for the first time, that I ever ran that is, and listening to music in the woods behind our neighborhood. She ran so effortlessly and the train horn of the Zephyr slowly chugging by, her and I found peace and strength in those woods. We lost our sweet Emy in this house, I remember her first seizure here. The sound of her body thumping against her kennel in our room. The foam from her mouth and her dazed, crazed look for hours after. It was terrifying. I miss sweet Emy girl. We were going to lay her ashes to rest behind our house in those woods, but I just never could. I didn't want to leave her here, so I still have them, 3 years later. I am glad I waited, G and A still talk about her and want to lay her to rest with us.
I remember the day that the news came of Nolan and that infamous phone call from the genetisit, three days before his birth. We pulled up to this very house. Shaking. A pink balloon honoring a sweet girl that tragedically died in our community was swaying int he breeze from the pillar on our porch. I untied it slowly. I can see my hands doing it now. I can see Jeremy sitting in our living room chair, in the dark. Silent. Still. Shocked. Tears stream down my face because that pain is still so tangible. I don't access that place often, but that visual will always remain.
I take baths like others take showers. It's my thing. I have rubbed four pregnant bellies and visualized four baby's lives in our bathtub. Four babies have taken baths in that bathtub. "Mama's bath" as it's known around here. The "kids" bath no one ever wants to go in. Wouldn't you know that bathroom is rather useless around here, it's a good thing we are building two "kids" baths at the new place, HA! Either way, I have dug out legos from the drain, picked horse hooves out of my hair as I laid my head back, might have thrown a buzz lightyear across the room after a long mom day. Oh the memories of that bathtub.
I can tell you the exact 6 inch square of carpet in which Nolan did his inch worm crawl. The exact inch where he said, "mamama" for the first time. Where I was sitting and running down the stairs when my doctor rang the door bell to tell me about EJ. Where I stand every day to see Graham at the bus stop. Where Audrey strums her guitar and plays her "cd" music. Exactly where Audrey climbs up on the stools for breakfast everyday. How proud she was the first time she could reach the sink. Graham's first day of school and how proud he sauntered up the bus steps and also THE day that he refused to get on the bus and was kicking and screaming MAMA MAMA MAMA while the door closed and the bus pulled forward, it was this house that saw the tears streaming steadily down my face. My back appeared stoic.
The memories pain me, make me feel like I am never leaving this house. I can NEVER leave all that I have learned, loved, cried, lost and gained in these walls behind. And yet I am. We are. Something you may not know about me, I love moving. Like literally love it. I thrive on change and uphevel. I like purging junk and re-organizing. I don't care where- I just love it, would move every year if I could. That is until now. The first place since my childhood that I lived this long and more importantly, this was my first home. Sure Jeremy and I had a previous house, together, no kids. But, this was our home. It's part of us and our hearts forever.
My uncle bought a house a couple of weeks ago that we are renting. It was built in 1865. I have been building it up to the kids because it looks like we may be there awhile. Did I mention I shouldn't be building a house because I like change so much and that includes I can't stop messing with the floor plan, seriously, can't stop. Anyway, I have been pumping the kids up about living in an old house, a piece of history. Graham is ecstatic since he looked up who was president and found out Abe Lincoln himself was around and basically that means he lived in MN in THIS house. We have talked about the claw foot tubs and why are they called claws?? Um, not sure. I was moving some shit, oops I mean copious amounts of toys today and walking their rooms, deciding what was going to go where to have the movers ready. I was thinking about the little girl and boy that left their hand prints on the concrete. The memories they made in that house. How that is their home. I spoke- yes I realize totally insane and a little creepy- and told the house we would take care of it- we would fill it with love and a little bit of crazy. The kids saw it last night and went bollistic, shouting from every room how cool it was (yeah it isn't cool), but it is to them. To them it's new and exciting and change is fun!
I have been consumed with whether or not we will not be in our house before Christmas and I just keep telling myself. Who cares? The kids don't. What I have realized with kids moving anywhere with them is home. Wherever we are, big or small, new or old, dirty or clean. As long as we have each other we will be home.
