Who Says You Can’t Go Home?
I can’t. I can’t go home. At least not really.
The house that was.
This past Monday, my parents closed on their house, and that same day packed the last of their belongings and hit the sunny trail to a retired life in Florida. While I am beyond thrilled that they are finally following their dreams and relocating for warmer climes and far superior diving, it is still…odd. The house that I called home for years no longer belongs to a member of my family. My strongest connection to my hometown, where I lived until I moved to Boston for college, is gone.
Londonderry, NH is and always will be a part of my identity. It helped to shape
Idyllic, no?
who I am, and has been the base of many fond memories (and many memories that I wish I could forget). Yet having this house was like my security blanket of familiarity. I liked knowing that I could drive up 93, and get off exit 4, and I could pass the standard landmarks that I now feel a strange nostalgia for, and sail into the driveway. The sale of this house of course does not bar me from visiting Londonderry; from driving the hilly back roads, or passing the seemingly countless apple orchards, or getting ice cream from Mack’s in the summer, yet it does not feel the same. Not having the tether of a house filled with my parents and their belongings makes me feel like I would be a visitor in my hometown.
The Londonderry Marching Lancers are world famous.
But is that really a bad thing? Leaving Londonderry for Boston to attend college was one of the best choices I ever made, and my recent move to Virginia for school and my future career is proving to be another smart choice. So do I really need this house to be the manifestation of my past? Does the house mean that it’s not home?
I know this strange feeling will fade, as will this sudden attachment to the idealized notion of home. We all need to keep moving forward, and the sale of the house is helping my parents move forward. I think it will help me too.
Falling Feet First 