A Story From My Journal

Hello all my friends.  This post is going to be long but a heartfelt story that I wrote three years ago today as my life took a drastic change.  If you are reading this and have parents that are aging and still own their own home, please take this to heart and talk to them and make whatever changes that need to be made.  My heart is saddened every day as I look across the street and see a home that is no longer ours.  This WAS my parents home .

                                                            
                                                                             The Key

To millions of people, today will be a normal day.  Adults will go to work, children to school and the business world will conduct business as usual.  For me on this warm May day, I am locking memories of a lifetime away in my mind to open only when loneliness overpowers me.  I am selling my parent's homeplace.  This will no longer be the home of my Mother and Daddy

Before the closing, I decided to visit the homeplace for one last time.  With my old key into the lock, I pushed open the door pondering in my mind the many times I had performed this task throughout the years.  Many nights coming in from a date, I would turn the key so quietly and enter into the security of a loving home. When Daddy's health deteriated, we would get calls during the night for help and hurriedly with a racing heart opening the door could not take place fast enought.  When Daddy passed on to heaven, we continured to be there for Mother.  Unlocking the door to take her grocery shopping and to doctor's appointments became a weekly task. As mother grew more feeble, calls from her lifeline monitor came more frequent.  Opening the door not knowing the condition we would find her upon the floor was frightening. Unable to take proper care of her, she now reside in a nursing facitlity where we visit her regularly.

Thus the process began.  Sorting through my parent's personal belongings was not a job I looked forward to.  Then came the estate sale.  Unfamiliar faces pondering over items that meant so much to the two people I loved so dearly was almost unbearable.

Today entering the empty homplace I feel as if part of my life is gone along with the material items that helped to make this house a home. If only these old paneled walls could talk, the stories they could tell.  I closed my eyes and in my mind I could see the old black piano.  As a child, I banged on its key and played church as my dolls sat patiently as my congregation.  Years later, I took lessons on that piano and play the piano in church today.

I could almost smell the scent of a lighted match as the old gas heater was lit in the living room.  The same heater that warmed me as a child still sits in its place where it sat during my childhood.  Christmas mornings the smell from  that heater gave me an overwhelming sense of love and warmth as in the wee hours of the morning, so full of excitment I would wait to see what Santa had left under the tree.  Crawling back into bed between old handmade quilts and snuggling into a feather mattress with the smell of my new plastic baby doll in my arms is a memory I will cherish forever.  Oh for the innocence of youth.

My grandmother lived with us and the memory of her baking during special holidays was a time I grew to love.  Pies, cookies, and home cooked meals filled our house with a delicious aroma. Anticipation of all the happy times sharing our bounty of food with friends and relatives seems like yesterday.  Today, most of those people have passed away but their memories remain.

I began and ended my school years, got married, and years later brought our newborn baby girl from the hospital to her grandparent's home here.  But today, the homeplace has changed.  It's no longer filled with laughter and love but looks tired and lonely.

As I took my memories and walked out, the same old key locked the door behind me.  No longer would I turn the key with anticipation of what I would find inside.  Closing this part of my life was not an easy task.

Yardwork needs to be done, but I looked past the driveway and said a final farewell to the memories of grandchildren playing  there as a loving "PawPaw" looked on with a smile that only a grandparent could wear.

I closed the door knowing the next time I saw the yellow house on the hill, it would belong to a young couple, in love and so excited to purchase their first home.

Today was an emotional day.  This same old key will be passed along to a new family as they begin their journey in the old homeplace.  Our journey has come full circle.  So much can change by the opening and closing of an old door with a key.        The end!

Today has been an emotional day.  Thanks for hanging in with me.  Tomorrow will be a better day and I have lots of pictures to share.  Don't forget if you haven't already to visit my giveaway post and enter my giveaway.  Wishing a great weekend your way.  Until tomorrow...