Sticks and Stones and all that magic.....or in other words......

Out first house was imminent. We had saved for the down payment , trading Smirnoff for ABC brand vodka on Friday nights and buying ground chuck instead of sirloin. Clink! We cheered! “We’ll buy a house” “With two cats in the yard” “And a garden” “And a fireplace for marshmellow roasts” Blah! Blah! Blah! Blah! About three week-ends into house-shopping we were fighting. What I though was adorable, he thought was a money pit. What I thought was water front, he thought was built on a retention pond… God, the man had no imagination!

So, it was perfect! The week-end of our anniversary he went boating and Kimbies and I went house shopping. Actually, we just looked at one house. Through kaleidoscope eyes. We were in awe at the designer refrigerator in the matching pantry. The “French windows throughout” were so romantic….. 13 giant oak trees danced in the sky, their petticoats shading the double lot. “This is it!”

He pulled the boat in just after dusk. His neck and cheeks red with the twelve-pack flush and a little sun! He was smiling. Better be. It was our anniversary! “Baby Cakes, I’m sorry we’re so late….there was a barge on the river and……” “Just sign here, We found the house, the perfect house, you are so gonna love it!”

And he did.

Drinking on your anniversary does strange things to you. Anything to make her happy.

The designer fridge was a rust bucket covered in wood grain contact paper. It hummed and churned and belched for a few months and then croaked. The fireplace draped in the vintage mantel was our only source of heat that winter and the “French windows throughout”, that depended on 80 year old rope pullies to move up and down, our only source of air conditioning that summer. The floors dipped, the walls creaked, the oak trees tossed 10,000 wet leaves on the tar paper roof. We had parties there, babies there, love there.

And then one day, it was over.

My second house was perfect. The Stepford Wife thing. Only there was no Stepford Husband. Skinny and I and the babies made love beads there, and peace sign wreaths out of stolen grapevines. Jonah threw up on the perfect Berber carpet, we scorched the ceiling of the perfect screened room grilling hotdogs at midnight, we packed the perfect garage full of hot wheels and seashells, driftwood and trash from the neighbor’s garbage…. "surely, we can use this for something”, we used the perfect dishwasher for our bar, stacking martini and shot glasses on the top rack, Nana’s vintage stirrers and straws in the silverware bucket, and bottles on the bottom rack, we used the perfect disposal to shred love letters and rant letters to less than perfect lovers…We hated it…..

We fertilized the yard and mowed it twice a week. Planted bulbs in the spring time. From the road, we were happy campers……..

My third house was an accident. Waiting to happen. Waiting a zillion years for just the right person, just the right vibes, just the right karma. Waiting for me.

Sometimes, when you least expect it, in places you’ve never looked before…..you find that you’ve wandered aimlessly forever…

and simply fall into the arms you’ve known all along…..

Home……



Tree fort courtesy of unknown Magpie Fairies.....
Discovered on the perfect Sunday.....