Yes, You CAN go home again...

So this is the house that I came home to after I was born. This is the home that I woke up in for the first 18 years of my life, until I went away to college. This is the home that I laughed, cried, played house and babies, dug in the dirt and made mudpies, played trucks, army men, cowboys and Indians, built treehouses and forts, played kickball with the neighborhood because we were the corner lot, played Barbie and played the piano for hours when everyone else was outside - ugh - I finally figured out how to record myself - then put the tape on, and sneak outside with the rest of the neighborhood kids. This is the house where I was picked up for my first date, my first prom, my driving lessons, and after that found the corvair parked in the driveway. This is the house where in the middle of the night on Jan. 10th - when I was only 14, my best friend's mom came in to wake me up, and tell me that my Daddy had died. This is the house where everyone hung out in junior high school. They kept hanging out in high school. This is a house that was full of love, family and fun times - where going to church was always one of the best parts of our lives. This was a house of "the wonder years", moms meeting for coffee in the mornings, neighbors gathering for funtimes together, heading to our elementary school for polio sugar cubes, sitting on our porches crying and talking about what had happened to President Kennedy, and wondering what would become of our country. It was at this house that we learned of the death of my cousin in VietNam. It was here that I learned the meaning of true family, extended family, Christian family - cousins, aunts, uncles - being with them and having fun with them, standing for what you believe no matter what the costs, and going the distance. I remember listening to my Daddy talking politics before I knew what that meant. I remember both of my parents studying to teach Sunday School. I learned the importance of being involved in what's going on all around you - not just sitting back and letting life happen to you. It was in this house at an age too early that I learned what real - deep to the gut grief was, it was here that I saw what losing the love of your life really means. It was in this house that I learned what I needed to know to be able to go away, live on my own, and begin my life as educator, wife, mother and friend. and now...it is sad to see someone else living there.