I've lived in a lot of houses in my time. By the age of 24 I was in our sixth house, which works out, on average, as four years per house. But forget averages - I've only actually lived in a house for four years on two occasions, the other periods of tenancy ranging from as far apart as one and a half years to eleven years.
Anyone who's ever read Scots-born author KENNETH GRAHAME's classic book The WIND In The WILLOWS will no doubt be familiar with the fifth chapter, DULCE DOMUM, which (roughly) means 'home sweet home'. In this episode, MOLE, while out on a ramble with Ratty one Winter's day, picks up the scent of his old home, long forgotten and neglected since he unwittingly abandoned it in pursuit of adventure one fine Spring morning many months before.
The chapter relates how Mole re-acquaints himself with many dear and familiar possessions and memories, and reminds him (and us) of the value of having an anchorage - a place to return to - in life, no matter how far and wide one may roam in the meantime. As the author writes (and as Mole thinks): "...it was good to think he had this (Mole End) to come back to, this place which was all his own, these things which were so glad to see him again and could always be counted upon for the same simple welcome."
Funny thing is, I feel that way about every house I've ever lived in. If ever I'm walking along a street in which I once resided, I almost find myself walking up the path to the front door and unconsciously putting my key in the lock. If I were lost enough in thought, it's no stretch of the imagination to envisage such a thing actually happening. (One evening, while out walking our dog Tara, I was passing a previous home when she turned in at the stairs as though we still lived there - and I almost followed. It's that kind of 'instinct' - or 'force of habit' - that seems to dwell within me also.)
Or should I espy a former home lit up at night, I can 'see' (as though with x-ray eyes) my father, pipe in mouth, sat beside the fire, watching TV or reading his paper; I can also see my mother, darning socks or busy in the kitchen with domestic chores, or my brother in our bedroom listening to records or reading comics. Furniture, ornaments, wallpaper - everything as it was.
Or should I espy a former home lit up at night, I can 'see' (as though with x-ray eyes) my father, pipe in mouth, sat beside the fire, watching TV or reading his paper; I can also see my mother, darning socks or busy in the kitchen with domestic chores, or my brother in our bedroom listening to records or reading comics. Furniture, ornaments, wallpaper - everything as it was.
Each house beckons to me, summons me to obey its call to 'come on home', regardless of however many years have elapsed since I actually lived there, almost as if I'd only just popped out to the shops or to visit a pal mere moments before - with such clarity that the intervening years since we vacated whichever house seem like only a dream that never really happened.
Even more bizarre is when I seem to see a younger version of myself beyond the gleam which radiates from behind the curtained windows, engrossed in some book, or sat at the dining-room table, doodling or building an AIRFIX kit. On occasions such as this, it can be disconcerting to suddenly have the moment disrupted by the intrusion of a stranger looking out of the window, or entering or exiting through the front door.
Then, just like Mole and his chum Ratty as they stand mesmerised by a lit-up window, the bitter winds of reality catch the back of my neck and return me to the present - though usually unwillingly, and not without a strange, sad sense of loss and longing.
The past continually calls to me, but never more so than when I revisit the scenes of my youth, where shades of my younger self and family, and friends long departed to either the other side of the veil or the globe, yet inhabit these enchanted places from so many years ago.
If ghosts do exist, I wouldn't be surprised to find that they aren't only ghosts of the dead, but also of the living from an earlier time. That would perhaps explain why the shadows of yesterday dance forever before me.
9 comments:
I lived in one house for 3 years, when I see it now, its as though I never really LIVED in it. I wonder if any of the houses you've lived in remembers you.
Must be so in my case. Would they call to me otherwise?
Loved this post. When I took a photo on my phone of my dad's house in Chapelton a couple of years ago, I was quite perplexed at first when the current owner came out to investigate.After all, it was my house for twenty-one years and always will be. I didn't tell him the new trellis over the gate looked shit, naturally.
That's how I feel, Dougie. Even when a subsequent tenant lives in the house for longer than I did, I still regard it as MY house more than theirs.
And you probably looked after it better than THEY ever will. A house is an emotional investment as well as a financial one. Monitoring how well your old home is being cared for is a natural thing to do in my opinion.
I was shocked a few weeks ago to see one of my previous addresses mentioned in a newspaper report of assault and drug offences.
A strange experience indeed.
If I won the Lottery, I'd buy every house I ever lived in and take turns staying in them, depending on whichever one I missed most at the time.
When you go back to a street you frequented as a child, do you find that it seems shorter but wider than you remember? Or is that just me?
Actually, no, Steve - but I think I know why. I've regularly visited old neighbourhoods over the years since I first moved from them, so they've never had a chance to fade from my memory. Hence no discrepancy years later between how I remember them and how they actually are.
However, I know what you mean. A friend and myself once visited our old primary school years after leaving it and, in the course of the tour conducted for our benefit, were shown into the toilets.
We were amazed to see that the wash-hand basins were almost at our knee-level, and that adults could look over the doors of the W.C. cubicles. We had never realised when we were young that the 'jannie', had he been of a mind to, could have watched pupils as they sat on the throne.
Funnily enough, the floor-space seemed exactly the same - just that the fixtures had been designed for hobbits.
Rereading that last comment, I just realised that part of it could be misinterpreted. I didn't mean to suggest anything 'pervy' about the jannie, only that he could've checked to make sure we weren't hiding inside reading comics with a quick glance over the door.
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