It is quite natural to get attached to homes if we have invested our hearts into them. Even the walls of such homes become receptive.
Recently I happened to read an article, which stirred my emotions intensely and took me down the memory lane.
My dear friend Lisa Thomson says, “A house has no feelings or attachments. It doesn’t love us back. Walls really don’t talk, and that’s probably a good thing.”
We convert a house into a home when we get emotionally attached to it.
HOME THAT NURTURED ME:
The home in which I grew up is still very much a part of my ardent memories as this was the place that nurtured me from the age that was most impressionable.
The excitement of an eight-year-old child is still very fresh in my mind. I can smell the fragrance of new paint and wood even now. Whenever I go down the memory lane, I can experience the friendship of all the nooks and crannies that I explored the very first day I stepped into this house our father got designed for us.
This house cherished my dreams, cushioned my lonely moments, provided solace to my disappointments, gave shape to my adventures and inspired me to aspire high.
Every wall was a supporting shelter, how much I could share my thoughts with them, silently!
The walls of my room empathized with me when I didn’t sleep well due to examination fever. They rejoiced with me when I turned up the volume of my radio, to celebrate my little moments of joy. They resounded with my giggles in the afternoons.
As I grew up, every brick seemed so precious, every tree of the little garden I loved seemed to cherish my thoughts and provide solace to my distressing hours.
Then came the time to leave my treasured surroundings, my home.
I can still feel the tears of poignant parting on my cheeks.
I hate this age-old tradition of some countries – to leave your maternal home after marriage. The one who created this tradition must be a man for according to this orthodox convention, he doesn’t leave his home; he has the choice to continue living in it or sell it.
I thought I would keep coming back to my home whenever I wanted and I did during the initial years of setting up my new home.
It remains the epicenter of my dreams even now. All family get-togethers are hosted in this home even now… but in dreams.
I can no longer visit it in real life because it was sold…and that is another story!
HOME THAT DEFINED ME:
Despite all those attachments I had with that home, which remains the backdrop of all my dreams, I was pleased to find a new one that anchored me and promised myself to make it more loving than the one that had raised me.
A home cannot be built in a day…it encompasses in itself the dreams and the aspirations we hold close to our heart, the hopes that we gather with each passing day, the goals that we achieve together.
A home lounges on the care and affection we shower on each other, the time we offer to understand the needs and desires of a family, to live through the difficult times together and to support each other despite minor differences.
This home I acquired became my treasure house, a nest, which was filled with the babble of my little children and the love of my hubby. It accumulated and absorbed all the memories, all the celebrations and the moments of intense joy, of raising my kids and exult at their little achievements.
I have no doubt that even the walls around me shared my elation.
Time just whizzed by and before I could realize its pace, my kids grew up into fine individuals, ready to soar!
Now I could grasp the truth of this statement and what my friend Lisa has articulated: “Home is people. Not a place. If you go back there after the people are gone, then all you can see is what is not there any more.” – Robin Hobb
THE VOID:
Though my work kept me very busy and the walls of my home as welcoming as ever but time stood still.
A part of me seemed to have walked away with my grown up children.
Now I just clung to my home and the loving memories that were attached to them. I tried to make it warmer with more pictures of my family.
I have been trying to understand the ironies of this life, which provides natural attachments.
I have been trying to detach from all those people and homes, which hold us to ransom, extracting all our emotions.
I have moved once again from my home, into which I had put my heart and soul to be near my children.
Now I have double memories and none of my dearest homes – one got sold and the second lies locked with all those treasures I had amassed!
Do you have any such memories and attachments? Do they haunt you?
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Balroop Singh.
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Emotional Shadows 
This is beautiful Balroop. The home I grew up in as a child is the same in which my Mother passed away in. That house will always be home to me even though I no longer live there. Leaving it behind to move into a house with my new family and father was very hard. I wanted to stay in the same home where I believe my Mother’s spirit was; where her and I had endless conversations and giggles about life. There hasn’t been a house that I called “home” until the one my husband and I purchased in 2004. They say home is where the heart is. I say home is where I’m most comfortable and where I have the most memories.
Thank you for sharing this and bringing back some fabulous memories Balroop.
Hi Brenda,
Welcome…at last some post did touch your heart! I am so glad to have you here!
I can relate so much to your thoughts. I didn’t mention in the post but the home I grew up in was the dream home of my dad who was snatched away by death just when we were little children and therefore I always felt he was there, watching us grow and fulfil his wishes of being well educated and successful. That is why it could be the backdrop of my dreams and celebrations.
Thanks for sharing your most precious memories.
Oh Balroop. Many have caught my eye. I finally decided to comment. (Shh…had some free time today)
I’m so sorry to hear about your Father but it makes more sense now of why you were so attached to the home. Bless your heart.
It’s great to think back to all those precious moments. Some people thing a house is just a house but people like you and I are more sensitive and know it’s much more than just a house..
I was able recently to visit the home I lived in until I was about nine, and oh how different than I remember. Seems so much smaller and open than my memory. It was a good visit, powerful yet releasing to me.
Hi Suzi,
It is really gratifying to note that the mention of home transports us into our most loving moments we had spent in childhood homes. You are so lucky to have visited the home you spent your childhood. I am so happy for you!
Thanks for sharing!
Aw, yes Balroop I can relate to your feelings. Thanks for the lovely mention by the way and I’m delighted that my post inspired you. My quote that our ‘homes don’t love us back’ might sound a little cynical because when we’re in the throes of raising a family and making all of those memories, it feels like the house is LOVE. I’ve only learned through loss that in fact, the house is a shell that surrounds the love itself. Home is where you make it and you’ll make it close to your grown children. I love the Maya Angelou quote! Great post! ❤
Hi Lisa,
I wouldn’t call your thoughts as cynical…you can see how inspiring they are! They had the power of veering my thoughts and see the other side of the coin.
I agree with you, if you are loved that is the place, which can be converted into home! However, memories never fade, they are like the waves…sometimes the high tide is indomitable!
Thanks for the inspiration!
Beautiful …..home is where the heart is ! You have put your heart & soul in writing this post by going down the memory lane …lovely !
Stay blessed & keep sharing your wisdom 😍
Hi Upjit,
Thanks for the encouragement! You are always in my mind, dear friend. Yes, heart goes into the home, who can know better than you? Love always!
I didn’t have a true home or safe place as a kid but this is an awesome post, Balroop. Second Maya quote I’ve seen in the blogosphere in 24 hours – really good one. My house now as an adult is my kingdom, my escape but as Lisa mentioned above experiencing loss it can become just a shell. I will one day learn to again enjoy the wonderful memories. I hope you have a great day 🙂
Hi Mike,
We all try to make our home a loving and comfortable place and I am sure yours too must be, you are such a friendly and warm person. I can understand your state of mind and I am sure a day will come soon when your kingdom would be full of new joys and you would be able to come out of that shell you are trying to bury yourself in.
We all have difficult moments and times but at the same time we have to emerge out of them.
Stay blessed and be happy!
Hi Balroop,
That was SO beautiful and touching for me too 🙂
Just like Bren, I also lost my Mom in the home she made, and being from the Army, I remember her going to the very place and standing for hours instructing the workers how to put each brick, wall, and all the smallest of details.
Sadly, she never lived there herself and passed away much earlier. The real home was where we all stayed after my Dad’s retirement, where we discovered that she had cancer, and all those moments….ah…can never forget them. She passed away there too, and somehow that was a farm land, which was acquired by the Government for building other projects, and we finally made Dad shift to the new house Mom had made. Now, the home she made with so much love is there, but it’s not really home without her. Dad’s filled ALL the walls with her pictures…but we miss her. Just glad my sister is there to take care of him though.
Yes, a house takes time to become a home and those memories you can never forget. For years, when we were young, we traveled all over and lived for 2-3 years in different houses, as Dad was in the Army. But the real home came in much later, and with time all the attachments with it.
You are right, each little corner, wall, tree, plant, surrounding – everything is so valuable. Of course, it’s worse for us girls who get married and have to leave our homes to make our new nests, but that’s how life is….and now my nest would soon be empty as my kids will fly their way. I’m glad I have my blog and hubby around, but I wonder how life without the kids would be though. Making the most of what I have now and living it each day.
Thanks for sharing and taking me down memory lane. Have a nice week ahead 🙂
Hi Harleena,
Isn’t it wonderful how memories bring us to the same platform and we have so much to share!!
I can understand the ache associated with the home you have talked about…the home that your mom got made, such a place is very dear to the heart of a person who puts all her time and energy into it. Such are the times when my questions about Almighty, the all powerful – become a sort of shout – why does He snatch away what is most dear to us.
Isn’t it strange that the nest we nurture with so much care and affection gets empty so soon? My younger daughter, in an attempt to calm my emotions down, chided me saying: mama, even the birds let their young ones fly away and I was taken aback by the wisdom and resilience, which she had displayed at the age of 18 when she was eager to join a university here!
Yes, I agree that is how life goes! Thanks for sharing your personal memories. Have a blessed week!
Reading this post was like going down memory lane, to those cherished remembrances of events and people associated with the house where I grew up in, the ancestral homes of my grand parents, all of which are now only memories; my maternal grand parents’ house has been sold out and the house where I grew up in has passed on to my sister and so I have no connections with it now. I have since set up a house of my own some ten years ago in my native Cochin, to where I will be moving in by end of next month, after I am through with my corporate life in Mumbai. Brick and mortar make a building and memories and associations of long years make a home….best wishes…raj .
Hi Raj,
I am glad that my words could take you back in time to experience the exhilaration of those precious moments, which get lost in the haze of time. Childhood memories can be relived when we sit and look back…each one bringing along a special charm, even the unpleasant ones come back with gentle reminders of how brave we were to let them pass!
Home is where we are surrounded by our loved ones, whether it belongs to us or someone else. I guess you are retiring next month, I offer my best wishes to you and a blissfully happy life in your native place.
Thanks for sharing your memories.
very nice dear
Thanks Fais, I am glad you liked it.
Many thanks for this charming and heartfelt article Balroop; I can imagine that the very writing of it acted in some small way as a catharsis for the regrets you harbour. Sometimes the heart must ache a little as we release those things we love, whether they may be of the material world (our homes or possessions), the bodily world (our children or lovers), or the psychical world (our ideas, memories, beliefs). Transition is often an uncomfortable experience is it not? And yet frequently we find that what we initially thought had come to us as unfortunate news, was actually an arrival in our life which, after all, came bearing a gift.
Hariod. ❤
Hi Hariod,
How well you can understand all the emotions embedded in this article! Thanks for focusing on the positive aspect of all those memories and ideas. There are no regrets, just an uneasy feeling…letting go is an inevitable part of life, we accept this harsh fact of life slowly as we are humbled by the experiences of life.
Writing in itself is so cathartic as it is a natural outlet for all the feelings and emotions, which may not be understood by others. When we share it with our digital partner, they assume a persona, they respond in our favor, they satiate the urge to communicate meaningfully.
Thanks for taking time out to read this and contribute your reflections.
H ❤
I do agree that homes can take on emotion. It is through relationship. A companion. Everything is sentient. And the way you describe your childhood home is beautiful. For everyone, it is different, for you, it is special!
Thanks Jodi for understanding the emotions so well! Yes, you got it absolutely right…for me my childhood home is really special.
I absolutely second you. As you know from my post, my parents worked hard to build home in our hometown and i am so attached to it because even i used to stand in the sun during construction for most of the days. Even otherwise, i have so many memories there.