Home

enter the side porch

tea at the kitchen table

woodstove, apples, home

Last weekend we travelled back to my parent’s house for a visit. It is a late 19th century Ontario farmhouse (although located in a small town), and my parents bought the place when I was just a baby, so it’s the house I grew up in. I have strong, wonderful memories of the place. It was always a little spooky (the place creaked all the time, floorboards, doors, etc.; and the unfinished basement with its cobwebs and critters and low ceilings and dark corners certainly creeped me out sometimes!), but at the same time, was warm and welcoming. Everyone feels the good vibes when they enter the house. You can always sit for cup of tea.

On the weekend my Mom asked me about what it felt to return ‘home’ now that I am all full grown and since do don’t get back all that often. The house (and yard) has changed quite a bit, but the character is the same, and I responded that feeling I have walking into the kitchen from the side porch was one of positive nostalgia. There is a lot of emotion walking into the house, and sometimes it makes me long to be a kid again.

My sister and I commented about how the wood stove (an old Elmira one) was strong in our memories, and while the stove has been replaced by a gas one, somehow the house still smells faintly like wood smoke. Dad used to get up early every morning and start the fire, and we’d come down to the kitchen to its warmth and comfort. The autumn months included the smell of apples. In winter we would sit next to the first place and have hot chocolate and warm our toes after cross-country skiing*. I can close my eyes and take myself back there, immediately.

I left that house in the mid 1990s, and have lived in my current home longer than my childhood home, yet I also think of that house as home. Home can be multiple places. We can hold space for more than one home. One might be a faraway place, in time or space; another one might be immediate. When I am asked where I am from, I can answer in two ways: “I grew up in…”, and “I live in…”. I can love my parent’s home and my own home. There is comfort and satisfaction in that.

And, of course, a house is only a home because of the loving people who inhabit it. Certainly a reason I love my childhood home so much is because my parents still live there, happily.

* Reading this one might wonder if I grew up in the 19th century! Somehow my childhood home and my childhood generally has a timeless, forever quality.

© Christopher M Buddle 2024