It’s always the same routine:
- I fly into Cincinnati – my hometown.
- I get off the plane and right before luggage retrieval, I ascend the escalator, look up while tears well-up in both eyes – soon to be freely running down my cheeks.
Why?
Because for so many years, whenever I returned home, my parents waited eagerly at the top of that same escalator for the first glance of me, their eldest child, returning home.
- I gaze upward. No one awaits.
- I head for my sister-in-law and brother-in-law’s house where I will be staying.
- I make one detour along the way – driving slowly past the house I grew up in.
It is an unusually warm, balmy night for the month of March in Ohio. I pull-up to snap a quick photo – hurrying before darkness descends.
I notice a woman hovering around the front porch. I stop abruptly in my tracks, realizing that this is an opportunity that has never presented itself before in all the decades I have been revisiting my house.
Heart beating rapidly, I tentatively step-out of the shadows and approach her.
“Hi,” I call out (probably too brightly). “I’m Iris and I grew up in this house in the 1950’s and ‘60’s.”
“Really,” she replies. “I’m Bobbie and I’ve lived here for 32 years. What would you like to know?”
We stand outside chatting for over 30 minutes before I finally have the nerve to ask if I could go inside.
“Of course,” she replies. “I’m divorced, live alone and retired from the post office a few years back. My house is pretty filled with a lot of stuff, but I’d be glad to take you through.”
Having not set foot in “my” house for over 57 years, and with my heart palpitating wildly, I simply reply, “YES.”
Of course, it looks smaller.
Of course, it looks so damn familiar.
Of course, the noise of my family bantering/teasing/cajoling each other comes roaring back into my ears. I try hard to ward-off the ghosts of the past – welcoming and comforting and discomforting as it is all at the same time. I try instead to focus on what Bobbie is pointing out.
Yes – so much of the house has changed. Built over 100 years ago, amazingly much of it is also the same:
- The random width hardwood floors
- The two full baths on the second floor, still sporting the original Rookwood tile
- The wooden shutters on the breakfast room windows
I’m not surprised – those types of things have a rather long shelf life – but what I see next simply astounds me.
When my parents moved in, they thoroughly re-decorated. One of their splurges was fancy black and white tile for the front foyer floor and attention-grabbing black marbled wallpaper for the walls. The tile is long gone, but the wallpaper? Still intact. Still in tip-top condition.
It takes my breath away.
I immediately snap a picture.
And then my cell phone runs out of juice and dies.
The dining room – to my great disappointment – has a different lighting fixture hanging from the ceiling. Casually I ask Bobbie if she knows when the original fixture was replaced.
“Oh,” she exclaims, “you mean that gorgeous sunburst hanging flush with the ceiling?”
“Yep,” I reply, with sinking heart. “That one.”
“Why my grandson and I just took it down shortly before Thanksgiving. It’s right here in my living room under a blanket! I’m still trying to find a place in the house for it.”
Seconds later, I am looking at the lighting fixture I haven’t set eyes on in decades.
I take a risk.
I intensely lean forward and say with the utmost seriousness, “If you ever decide to dispose of it, Bobbie, it would give me great pleasure to buy it from you.”
She doesn’t really commit either way.
I thank her for her time, her hospitality and her willingness to let me tour.
I hand her my card with my contact info.
I sense that maybe, just maybe, I have a chance of coming into possession of a cherished item from my childhood home.
For now, I’m content to travel back to Florida accompanied by the drawing my granddaughter Remi made for me of my beloved family home.
Keep Preserving Your Bloom,
