The Houses We Leave Behind | Baby care | Women's health | Beauty

We drive by them every day, lots of them. We hardly give them any notice. Most are rather ordinary. Some stand out because of some distinctive feature. Most just blend in together as a one big blur as we whiz by, one hardly distinguishable from the next. They are evaluated by bank appraisers and real estate agents based on their physical condition and current market values. Many of us long for a larger one, a higher class one in a better neighborhood to call ?my home?. Yet there is so much more than brick and mortar to the common family home.

Houses aren?t just houses, they?re symbols of humanity. More than that, they?re symbols of the human experience. It?s not just because we spend all of our time in our houses; we don?t. In fact many of us spend considerably more time outside our houses than in. Still, our houses are the places from which we launch our days and then retire our days. Our houses are where we let our hair down and take off our masks. Our houses are where we dream our dreams and scheme our schemes, conjure up ideas and wrestle with fears. Our houses house, contain, hide and at the same time express our lives.

Our houses don?t just house us and our furniture, they house important life experiences. Even though some of the biggest experiences take place outside of our houses, it?s in our houses where we truly digest those experiences, reflect on them and determine their meaning to our lives. Marriage for example. The wedding and honeymoon may take place in fancier and more exotic locations, but the marriage itself and all that it means, takes place to a large extent inside our homes.

Many other important experiences also take place in our houses, mostly rather ordinary experiences, but nonetheless immensely important experiences that will become even more so in hindsight. This point becomes especially, and perhaps even painfully clear whenever you drive by an old family house from long ago. The effect is magnified greatly if you?ve not seen the house in some years. You can just sit there in your car and stare at that house and soon countless memories will come flooding into your mind. If it?s a house you grew up in then there are countless firsts you may remember there. There are pets you may remember, games you played, and times of simple pleasure. There are the daily, mundane steps of growth that took place, from doing your homework, to learning to play an instrument, to practicing a sport in the yard. There are the family moments, Christmases and other holidays, family gatherings and celebrations. Then there are the hard things, the tears and conflicts, worries and stresses.

Each house has a story, lots of stories. The older the house, the more stories. Sometimes we may not really even realize just how numerous how potent those house memories are until a house is long removed from our present situation and we at least drive by it again. Whenever we do, we?re given reason to pause, remember, and reflect. To gaze upon that old house from yesterday and remember who we were when we lived there, the lives we led, the people we knew, the events that took place there.

There?s a website set up where such memories can be posted and shared on a map. Check it out, it?s free and anonymous. http://www.housemarx.com

Riley Jones is a blogger and daydreamer who occasionally gets inspired.

Source: http://www.womenfavor.com/home-and-family/the-houses-we-leave-behind-2.html

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