Thursday, June 28, 2018

My House Will Fall Down Someday

I'm a fan of abandoned things. Abandoned vehicles, shopping malls, playgrounds, churches, houses.

There's something so profound about such things. I think I love them because they remind me of how temporary all this is. Everything we cherish here on earth will pass away. Or maybe we will pass away before it will.

Abandoned houses are the best. I always imagine the day the first family moved in. The joy as they started their lives in this house that they built or that they saved up for and purchased. And all they experienced while they lived there. The birth of a baby, an argument over something silly, a dance across the kitchen floor, heartache, laughter, tears. A house is a shelter to protect us from the cold and the rain, and it's a place where we experience happy moments as well as tragedies. So much happens there. And then it's empty.

I wonder what happened. Did the kids move out and the parents die? Did the house get flooded and condemned? How could a decent house, where there was so much joy, come to this? Boarded up windows, collapsing roof, vines growing everywhere. What happened?

And then tonight, for the first time ever, I realized that my house will be like that one day, as well as every house I ever lived in. People might keep this house going for decades, full of life's best moments, but one day, it will be empty. Maybe it will be condemned, maybe it will burn, or maybe some folks (maybe us), will decide to just up and leave. Take the last train to Clarksville and let somebody else figure out what to do with it.

Who knows what this house's story will become. But while we're here, before it, or we, go away, let's make some good memories, and maybe dance across the kitchen floor one more time.