The Joy of Grace

Another ode Jul 25

I gave an ode to Charley in my early days of blogging.  I've been wanting to write an ode to our former home and this is the first day that I think I could sanely do so, so here it goes...but first let me say that I don't even really know what an ode is so I'm not sure I'm classifying this writing piece correctly.  Forgive me, all my English-lover readers.  

I loved our house on 3819 Kenwood Avenue.  Sure it was 60+ years old.  Sure it had a weird smell to it hence my constant buying of Wallflowers and candles.  Sure it still had one of the window units in the window even on the day we moved out despite our having put in central heat and air 4 years earlier.  Sure all the lighting fixtures in the kitchen/back room area desperately needed replacing.  Sure we killed a lot of plants in the front yard and utterly failed in our attempt to grow things in our jungle of a backyard.  And sure there was a fake ceiling in the back room (the same room with the ugly lighting fixture). But it was home and I loved it.

I loved the crepe myrtles that actually beautifully bloomed right on time every year.  In fact they just had begun blooming when we were about to move.  I loved the way the front door creaked reminding me every time just how old our house was (and how badly the door needed to be replaced) and letting me know that family and friends were entering our home.  I loved the 5 windows in our living room looking out to our street.  I loved the houses around our house and that in fact is what I incessantly looked at as we were looking at houses in Louisville~I always want to look our my front door and like what I see around me.  I loved the colors we painted the rooms mostly thought up of by my husband except for the living room~that was my crazy idea. I loved that by the time it was all said and done and we put our house on the market, I had just finished decorating things the way I had always thought of since we bought the house (save that back room with the fake ceiling).

More than the house, it was our home.  I loved that I got to carry each of our daughters through that squeaky front door their first times entering the house and tears were being shed as I actually was holding both of them (at the same time I must add...don't even ask me how I pulled that one off) the last time they left the house.  I loved that it was the house that we began to desire to have children in.  I loved all that the Lord taught me during my early mornings in that house about waiting on Him and His timing.  I even loved that it was the house we came home to after we found out we had miscarried our first child.  Aaron and I fell on the couch in that back room (yes, the one with the fake ceiling and ugly lighting fixtures) and cried together that day in that house.  I loved that we got to be a family of five (Charley is of course included) in that house.  I never would have ever dreamed that would actually happen.  I loved it that it was our first house.  We learned to paint walls in that house.  We learned that we hated big yards and all that comes with a big yard in that house.  We learned that we need not rush into weekend home projects or we would be sorely disappointed come Sunday night.  I loved to leave our house and go on walks through our neighborhood.  I loved that neighborhood.  I loved to come home to our house after a trip or even after a day of work.  I loved taking naps in that house.  It was a good nap-house.

Aaron keeps on telling me we'll make memories in the next house.  And where our family is is where our home really is.  He is right and that is why I am silly for my watery eyes this very moment.  But still.  It was our house.  Our first house.  Even the girls' first house.  Our home...