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Empty

My favorite place in the whole world for a very long time was my grandma's house in Aitkin. It to me was a sanctuary from everything going on in the crazy, crazy world especially after we moved back to Minnesota. I could go to her house and everything seemed right with the world and I was in a 14 year old cocoon reading John Irving under the trees while grandma sat in her chair in the lawn drying her hair on a Saturday afternoon.

Since grandma left us almost a year ago I have waited for the day to come when her house would be ready to be sold to another family where little girls would hide in the storeroom and sit under the maple trees.

Last weekend I searched as I do every week for her house and this week I found it there. I was taken aback at first almost scared to click on the button that would unveil my sanctuary for the world to see. When I finally did, I found only a house, with bare floors and strange colors.

There were things so familiar and some in front of me for the first time. In the end I felt sad more than anything and wanted to wish back my click and leave it the way that I remembered it in my memory full of life and not so empty.

Comments

Karen said…
Oh, Susan. It looks like the perfect sanctuary, really it does. Maybe close your eyes and go back to it the way it was and you'll forget about that click.
8:53 AM
Susan said…
I think I will. Love that place, widh I could just buy it and be there forever. However, the commute would stink.
8:55 PM
bobbione8y said…
i'm sorry it's empty...it's a beautiful house... i do kind of want you to buy it and maybe let me live there :)

what a wonderful place to remember, though, eh?
3:56 PM
Anonymous said…
What a special place! Thank you for sharing this. I can practically see you reading a book under the tree. And your memory of your grandma drying her hair in the lawnchair made me :)..
4:30 PM
Anonymous said…
I feel the same way about my grandma's house. When she died, I took pictures of all of the rooms before anyone could start picking their favorite things. It's nice to look back and verify that my memories are intact. And it's even cooler when I see some of her stuff in all of my cousins' houses. We're lucky girls that we had such amazing women in our lives.

nikki
4:33 PM
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