Today is August 8. An interesting day for me. It’s some sort of milestone that people celebrate, but I usually spend some time to look over the next 12 months and make some plans. Recently someone told me about an ’30 essays in thirty days’ project. I have no idea if I can do an essay a day for the next month, but am starting with this.

—

Where do we live? Where do we call home?

For me it was a little house on Glenrosa street, west Phoenix.

My family moved in when I was 5, and while I can sort through faded and misty memories of the first house I lived in, it was this ranch style house that dominates my formative years.

It was low and sort of a pinkish color that my mom loved. I remember walking through the door the first time thinking “why is it pink?” It was probably the last time I thought about it being pink… it became home.

The floors were polished concrete, and the walls were a flat white. The kitchen had a place for a dining table and the ‘swamp cooler’ made everything a  bit damp.

My mom was in tears from the joy of her and dad owning their own home. We would stay there for a few years, then move to the east side of Phoenix closer to Motorola, where both worked. Dad just smiled and walked around thinking about what he had to do to get it ready for us to really live in it.

I got my own room. 10’x12′ with a window to the east.

I can still see that room. It would eventually become my sanctuary, but when you are 5 years old, it was simply a cool place to play.

The backyard was huge (to a 5 year old) and seemed to became smaller each year as I grew older. When I went over to clean up after my parents passed, I realized just how small it was.

And how small I felt standing there.

The backyard was once the focus of my life. We had swimming pools that sat above the ground, scooters to race around the ‘track’ we made, and some great places to sneak out and meet girlfriends.

The house was still what it was when I had first set eyes on it 52 years earlier. Yeah it needed some shingles and it needed some more work to bring back the once proud little pink suburb house, but the essence of the ‘home’ was there.

The new owners would have fun in that backyard with the now huge trees giving shade to most of the space, and the new fence my dad put in a few years before he passed.

But all I could see was what was lost. The house that was a home had now become a listing “as is” at the local real estate office.

It wasn’t home. My home was with my kids out on the east side.

Where is my home? With my family… where ever that happens to be.

And when family is gone, well… then it will just be where I live.

—

When I saw this house in Bermuda, I was reminded of my parent’s house. I have no idea why, as there are no similarities between this little cottage and the ranch style suburbs that we lived in.

But it had a feeling about it that said it was someone’s home.