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This week is our fifth anniversary of moving to the (Real) Big Red House.
That means that I have now lived there longer than anywhere else in my entire adult life. The previous record was held by our first house, The Little Blue House, where we lived for four years and seven months. The all-time record still belongs to my mother's house, sometimes known as El Segundo among the family, where I lived from the age of 8 to the age of 18, and off and on again a couple of times for various periods in my early adulthood.
When we bought the house, I entertained dreams of living there for twenty years. Charlotte had just turned one, and I let myself fantasize about it being her home for her entire childhood. Uprooting from Massachusetts to Maine when I was 8 made me an outsider for those entire ten years, and has defined how I see myself in relation to the rest of the world to this very day. Always on the outside, never at home anywhere, never welcome anywhere. I did not want that for my little girl.
Charlotte will be finished with kindergarten this week, and as such will have completed her entry into the wider world of the community where The (Real) Big Red House is located. For the first four years, her world was very tightly circumscribed -- she was part of a tiny community of tiny people at her day care, where the children came from many different towns. The kids in her day care shared no physical community except the day care itself, and when the "school day" was over, they commuted home to whatever suburbs their parents lived in. Attending a birthday party might mean having to take her almost anywhere in the Greater Boston metropolis. Play dates with her day care pals were rare and always informed with the understanding that these kids would not become lifelong friends once the gravitational pull of their separate hometowns kicked in.
That gravitational pull has begun. Her birthday party this year was attended almost exclusively by the other kids from her kindergarten class. Her connections to her town exploded this spring with her first forays into organized sports, and were reinforced with a number of school-based social events. Each place we would go, she would be greeted by lots of familiar faces -- children and parents alike -- and warmly welcomed by them. She is part of their world, and they hers.
Every time we go over to the soccer field, swarming with dozens upon dozens of kids, parents, coaches, siblings, grandparents, and so on I am instantly reminded of the scene in (of all things) "Rudolph The Red-Nosed Reindeer", where the young reindeer are first introduced to one another, organized into their "reindeer games", and surreptitiously watched by Santa Claus to see which ones might have promise for the future. Charlotte fits right in as if she belongs right there. Which, of course, she does. Which is so alien to me, having spent my entire life being the misfit elf (not to overextend the metaphor).
The friction comes from the contrast in our experiences. For Charlotte, she is becoming part of something bigger and finding her place in it. For me, the house represents a series of changes that have left me even more unsure of who I am and where I belong than ever. If I could, I would run as far away from it as possible to try to undo all of those changes. Now I almost cannot bear the thought of living there a dozen more years until she is ready to take leave of it herself.
Nothing is certain in life. I am a fool for allowing myself to be seduced by my own fantasies, but I also recognize that Charlotte deserves her own place and her own opportunities. The bittersweet nature of life simply cannot be denied.
Time moves too quickly. I remember when you and your family moved into the BRH.
I've learned that absolutely nothing turns out how you plan for it to. I've quit planning for the most part and expect anything to change at any minute.
Despite my year of hell back in 2003, things have changed for the better for me... even that was a surprise!
Like you, I've been the misfit most of my life, but I finally feel like I'm home for the first time ever.
Posted by Sarah [URL] at 06/11/07
Welcome to the wonderful world of adulthood, kimosabe. Just wait...before long, you'll be sitting by the front door with a shotgun waiting for her to come home from her first date. :O)
Posted by Jack Cluth [URL] at 06/13/07
Dude, this ain't Texas. Here in Massachusetts we use baseball bats.
Posted by Brian [URL] at 06/13/07
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