. . . to their house? I think about this frequently whenever I’m paying attention to whatever it is I’ve built, rebuilt or remodeled around our house. I’ve done so much to the place over the last 12 years if previous owners were to come in and look at the house they once inhabited I’m sure they’d barely recognize it. And so if and when it’s time to sell I cringe at the thought of some uncaring schmuck redoing everything I’ve done with generic big box materials and fixtures, and ho hum details. Or even worse letting the place go to hell. Does anyone else get the same creepy feeling when they think about letting go?
Edited 9/9/2009 2:31 pm ET by ted
Replies
I do, but then I think about all the money I made selling the old place and that warm fuzzy feeling comes back again. Or maybe its the Lorazepam kicking in ...... Ahhhhh
Obviously I do.. If you've seen pictures of my place you understand why..
16 inch thick walls done with black walnut, stone, and white oak.. Built entirely out of hardwoods.. Including some of the prettiest burl you've ever seen in your life..
Not burl veneer, solid Burl timbers and planks.. Granite veneer around the foundation.. exterior wood is all black walnut including solid black walnut timbers 4 foot on center. (morticed and tenioned)
Massive beams, ornate chrystal chandeliers. raised panel walls Including fiddleback maple. Stained glass, Delicate french Poclean cistern sink, Old fashioned pull chain toilets and claw foot tubs.
Fantastic lake views, Unique form of construction, towers that start on the third floor and go up over 20 feet. Massively steep (27/12) roof lines..
I built it my self, with my own 2 hands over a decade of evenings and weekends..
Yeah I'm emotionally involved..
I remember you sharing your house's "growing pains" on this forum (the rain starting before you were "dried in") so many of us understand the amount of sweat and tears went into building your place!Have you posted any pictures of it lately?
Sounds amazing...
jencar.
there are 3 sites with pictures 39444.1 85891.1 and 94941.1
Be sure to go though and click on all the pictures in each location. For examople I think there are something like 25 pictures in 85891.1
To get there all you need to do is go over to the left and click on advanced search scroll down to the botton and enter the number and hit search..
Thanks...
I'll have time to see them later tonight.
Frenchy,
A bit off topic but have you considered renting your mansion out? It might be some way out of your jam.
~Peter
It's not a jam yet! I have untill thanksgiving to find a job and get back to work. I can delay things for a while after that. maybe as much as a year..
Besides it's not yet finished. Trim and flooring to do in some rooms.. some other things..
I"ll find a job.. I just have to keep on trying..
>>> Frenchy,A bit off topic but have you considered renting your mansion out? It might be some way out of your jam.~Peter <<<
Actually, I hadn't thought of this as a suggestion for Frenchy before. ("It's so crazy, it just might work!")
I was in Chicago last week visiting my brother and we went to dinner at their friend's house. Both are architects, and did most of the building of their house. It is waaaay cool! I will try to post some pictures later. It's 3 stories, and their archy offices are on the bottom floor. They often have Playboy call them up to use their house for a "shoot". She says, "No big deal. We are just downstairs working. They come in for 4 hours, pay us $2000. What's not to like?"
Work for the greatest vital intensity - the greatest solidity and aesthetic reality. Finally, eleminate everything non-essential. Reduce to the absolute essence. ~ F.C. Trucksess
Like Frenchy's early post, when you, DW, and the kids , even though preteen then, drove every nail, poured every ounce of concrete, painted everything and all 100%else, how not to be a little attached.
Edit, of course, like one neighbor that did likewise and sold for $3 mIL TO DEVELOPER who dozed the house down , like ponytl, if the $$ is big enough, what is emotion.
Edited 9/10/2009 8:14 pm ET by junkhound
A place to go relax where you feel safe and warm is such a basic human need...
Frenchy- I haven't been coming to breaktime for too long so haven't seen the progress reports etc on your house, but I just went and looked at those pics. All I can say is WOW. That is absolutely amazing. Do you give tours? That's one house I'd like to see close up and walk through!
Show up any time and I'd be honored to give a tour..
If you'd like directions just e-mail me..
Hey Frenchy--next time I am up in The Cities, can I invite myself over? I have seen your pictures and I would really like to see the real thing.
I'd be honored.. call me or E-mail me I'll give you directions.. Or if you have one of those GPS locators it's at 3550 Ivy Place Wayzata MN.
Any time!
Oh yeah...
Our place is also unrecognizable from it's condition when we bought it as a rental for many years, to now.
It keeps evolving as I get new ideas. My family has got used to something constantly being in a state of demolition...
I'll have to stop at some point.
I know that feeling. I get emotionally invested in some of my larger and longer running projects.
I just rented out a house I have been renovating in my "spare time" for far too long to admit to. It felt strange to go out there to pick up some stuff and not go inside. I am going to miss many aspects of that place including features that I built because I thought they were pleasing. I hope the tenants treat the house well.
Part of being a craftsman is creating fine work, enjoying the process and the result, then letting go and moving on to the next challenge. That's something that a dedicated tradesperson learns and applies daily.
I still love and respect the work that my body and mind have done over the years but the initial feeling/illusion of attachment has been gradually overtaken by the real connect I have with my work in spirit.
It feels much better to create something new than to live in an old dream. But sometimes it takes a small jolt to release my attachment and get the creative process going again.
Hey, thanks for an excellent question. It's something we can all benefit from contemplating, now and again.
Edited 9/9/2009 3:21 pm by Hudson Valley Carpenter
I figure that by the time we need to sell I'll be so old, decrepit, and well into my dementia years that I won't know the difference....
But until then, yup, I know how you feel.
Scott.
I am sure the original owners would not recognize this place. To start with we cut down the citrus forest (AKA rat cafeteria) in the back yard, paved a significant part of it, put in a fire place, tiki bar pool and spa under about 2600 sq/ft of screen cage. The driveway got a lot bigger
There are a few less walls, an interior door moved and the bathrooms got a lot bigger.
The tacky aluminum and glass "Florida room" is gone, replaced by a 150MPH rated bedroom for the grand kids (impact glass etc).
There is also a G gauge train running through 3 rooms.
When I am gone I have no interest in what the next guy does. I would not be shocked if this was a tear down. The lot may be worth more than the building.
I live in NW NJ and the taxes are killing me...but I can't bring myself to move. I bought my house in 2000 and have done a lot of renovation...some modest, some at an intermediate level. Nothing in the house would turn the heads of the pros here but I've put in alot of time learning how to fix and then fixing the house up.
It would be very tough to walk away from 10 years of a great learning experience, pride, and blood and sweat equity.
I've said to my DW that our old house is happy I'm here...does that constitute emotional attachment?
Everything will be okay in the end. If it's not okay, it's not the end.
I thought about some else living here just today. I wonder how long the place would keep up if it was neglected.
A lot of people treat their houses really badly.
Right now the front padio is on hold because of finances. I really want to build it.
Will Rogers
Edited 9/9/2009 11:48 pm by popawheelie
I am... or I was.
The last three homes we owned where very emotional. The oldest was a remodeled and extended with a large detached shop for business. Sold due to illness
The next was a lake front that I built from the ground up. Should have been closer to retirement, but that didn't happen. Wife also wanted to move.
The last was remodeled from the foundation up. Wife took a job transfer in another city.
Now, I live in a home that I have no desire to do anything to it. Maybe someday, but I doubt it. Mainly because of wanting to be emotionally detached and the economy makes it pointless.
I am, but I have little choice. Pre -not-so Civil war log home with more "character" than I am, in the midst of salvage / rebuild. I hope it's my last home.
Owned free and clear, and if it weren't for taxes, I'd be sitting pretty. making it self sustaining and self sufficient REQUIRES emotional attachment. Without that, you ain't got a home, you have a house.
Spheramid Enterprises Architectural Woodworks
Repairs, Remodeling, Restorations
"If Brains was lard, you couldn't grease much of a pan"
Jed Clampitt
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A year and a half, nights and weekends.........20 yrs ago?
I'm so attached that when I die you bet they'll talk for years on that spirit that still can be felt in this house.A Great Place for Information, Comraderie, and a Sucker Punch.
Remodeling Contractor just outside the Glass City.
http://www.quittintime.com/
>>making it self sustaining and self sufficient REQUIRES emotional attachment. Without that, you ain't got a home, you have a house.
I like that.
I lived in the same house for 32 years. It became a home with my second wife and a paid off morgage at about the 24 year mark.
What's that old expression?
Home is where the heart is,.....as long as the morgage company doesn't own any of it!
I have spent for than a few years on a number of my projects... I put a ton of "me" into everyone... and have never built anything with a pure "profit" motive behind it... and I've been witness to people really screw'n up work i'd done.. but attached NO... not once It ain't mine anymore... same thing with cars and motorcycles... once they are gone... thats pretty much it... I've moved on...
drive'n by places that use to be mine... I really don't even look... UNLESS I think they have improved on what i left... then I feel good about it... most are worse now than when I sold em... no feelings on those...
p
Hope the monthly check from the new owners makes up for it.
My grandchildren forced the move or we'd still be there.
Joe H
I Grew up In mine, watched my father and various builders work on it while i was in school. Got married and move away, inherited it after both parents died within 8 months. Now in the middle of remodeling it, and seems like every time I open up a wall my first thought is "What the hell was he thinking?". A 40" wide front door without any header or any additonal framing. Rooms with 1/2" plywood behind the drywall, more than half the house has 3/8 rock lath behind the drywall. A bizarre floor plan, he always complained about houses that when open the front door you could see down the middle and see all the bedroom doors. So what's he do? that's right right down the middle!
Brian
The day we closed on the land I bought a chain saw and started chopping down trees. Subbed out the excavation and foundation, the chimneys and the drywall. Did everything else solo.
There's a lot of "us" in this house. It's designed by us on graph paper and built with a lot of sweat and a few drops of blood. It's built for how we live and it works well. While building, my kids (then 3 and 5) hid goodies all over the place. Drawings, photos. journals, notes. Between subfloor and underlayment, under and behind cabinets, in stud bays, etc.
I see the details in this house and remember the day that detail came to life. Funny to look through my notebooks of drawings/designs and cut lists. Pretty crude. Wondering how I built "this" from "that" drawing.
This is the time of year when I really am able to appreciate everything we've done. Sitting out under the pergola, blue skies, white clouds, perfect temps...
No plans to move. I might even dig a hole out back that they can roll me into when the time comes. If I had to, I think I could move. But I'd want to come back to this house in 10 or 20 years or 30 and see it again.
It's part of me and I'm part of it.
I did a walk-through this evening of a small new house I'm doing for a customer. Flooring subs were in today and finished. It's just about ready to go.
Went through from room to room late in the evening. Everything is where it is because I decided that's where it would be and then I put it there or arranged for someone to do it. I can walk through the whole thing with my eyes closed after seeing it for months, first in paper sketches, then drawings, then 3D renderings on screen, then all the construction phases.
Yes, I'm very attached to the houses I build.
But a few weeks ago I went to see a customer from last year. Their house is very nice but I don't feel attached to it at all now. All their stuff's in it and they've made it their own and I'm glad not to have it any more.
j
I guess I don't understand. I have built and remodeled hundreds of houses including my own. While I feel proud and personally involved, I don't feel "emotionally attached".
Assuming that I got paid and maybe got some pictures along the way and after completion, I could care less if after I drove off for the last time they bull-dozed the whole thing.
Why would you be "emotionally attached" to a house? or car or anything material? It's like, I have a saw I use everyday... I like the saw and enjoy using the saw, but if it broke I would just buy another saw or if a deal on a better saw came along, I'd get that other saw. Same with my house, my truck, my tools, etc.
I think you need to understand that being "emotionally attached" to personal possessions is an unhealthy habit that could end up ruining you.
Imagine going for a jog one day and coming back to see everything burnt to the ground... how would you get over that? You could literally go insane.
Let it go, it's just a house.
DC
You see the differance is we "marry" our homes.. you hire your work out like a prostitute. You simply cannot get invested in your tricks..
That's probably the real differance between pros and us DIYers.
If we're lucky it's one house for us that we put our heart and soul into. We can take time to do stuff that would simple not be profitable for pros to attempt to do.. We already accept that we're less efficent than a pro has to be so added time is spent on what we are doing out of love.
Yeh! Kinda a sappy word but pros care about their work but would rather be off fishing playing golf or stamp collecting (whatever)
We DIYers mostly do it out of desire. A lust for things we could not otherwise have or a lust simply for doing it ourselves.
It's not an unhealthy relationship as you suggest, Rather it's a willingness to invest our efforts into something that will provide us with a long term home built as we wish to satisfy our desires..
"You see the differance is we "marry" our homes.. you hire your work out like a prostitute. You simply cannot get invested in your tricks.."That's where you are wrong. I have been (and currently am) highly invested in my own home. I include details that otherwise wouldn't fly financially or aesthetically with paying clients. I am often the most proud of these high end custom details. The time, expense, intricacy, and level of custom fit put into such details are far from profitable. But it is not "out of love".To me, knowledge and skill are the most valuable commodity. Fortunately I can take those with me when my house burns down and my car dies. I would just build another one, and better than the first.But you are consumed by the lust for your house (almost all your posts around here are about your house and how it's the best). If it burnt down, you would feel as though you lost a child. You'd become an emotional wreck who would never be the same. You would move on -gotta live somewhere- but you would always carry a sadness for that perfect house you used to have.Am I wrong? I'm not trying to be facetious, just thinking logical.DC
I,m ready to bulldoze mine
Heck, I'll even do the bulldozing if you want.
You are confusing love with practicality..
I started dreaming about this place in the Gulf of Tonkin sweating out the heat while I was patrolling the coast line.. my skin inflamed from prickly heat and 130+ degree temps in the cockpit.. Noisy unmuffled engines roaring in each ear Muffled only by a thin layer of Aluminum....
To keep from going insane with the fear, tension, heat and exhausting hours. I put my mind into dreaming any time I had a safe moment when my actions wouldn't endanger my crew.
This wasn't a part time thing with me to fill out 8 hours or whatever and earn money..
The location had been choosen for me when I was 5 years old. I fell in love with this lake. My parents were seperated and I was being tossed from place to place. My uncles Home on this lake was haven.. As a young boy fishing, catching frogs, exploring the surrounding area, etc.. was like the Adventures of Tom Sawyer.
The home itself came together over decades of dreams, planning, and hunting for the oppertunity to build..
No way can you be that invested in a product which in the end is simple a number on a bank balance to you.
I wish I could explain this in way that doesn't denigrate what you have done.. I respect professionals.. I've understood them for the past 20 years of my life..
It's just that love and the bottom line are differant.. A whore doesn't love the tricks she works.. She sees them as a means to an end. Now the word whore has a perjoritive tone to it that I don't mean..
Let me be clear.. Professional contractors do a very needed service. In return they are paid for that service. There should be nothing denegrating about performing that service..
I realize my choice of words has a connotation, but please accept the fact that I am not calling your profession prositution, simply that there are great similarities.
With love you do things for the joy of doing them.
You bring up a very valid arguement.. What would happen if say a fire burned down my home.. Well yes I would be crushed.. That's why I went to great deal of effort to reduce that likely hood.. Same with tornados and every other risk I could foresee.
But yes I could build another, better than this one.. or at least differant. I would focus on differant goals, differant methods..
I don't for a minute believe that what I have is Ideal.. Some of it was dictated by city rules, Some were a compromise to get approval to build.. Some methods I used to build this place weren't worth the effort involved. For example This place is double timberframed.. mortice and tenion work inside and out. In retrospect I spent far too much doing it that way.. I suspect it added 3 years of work plus more than a 1/3 of my budget..
In retrospect the sun bleaches out the black walnut so I'll eventually have to paint it. which to me is a major sin..
In addition If I were to do it all over again instead of SIP's for wall panels I would use ICF's. The costs would be about the same, but the time involved would be 50% less. It seems really simple. Put together 4 foot wide panels the whole length of wall. Turns out you need to use clamps to pull it together and squeeze the adheasive/sealant out.. Doing it in mid winter took hours because the adheasive wouldn't flow and you'd gain 1/4 inch or more on each panel. It also meant that the panels weren't together as tight as they should be unless you screwed blocks onto them and pulled the panels together which took hours! Whats worse is if you squeezed the top together and worked your way down you were more likely than not to have a bar clamp fall on you head. I'd use a minimum of 4 bar clamps on the shortest panels. Some of the really tall ones got 8 bar clamps.
Since I covered most of the state, some of Wisconsin and some of Iowa, selling telehandlers to contractors. I got to watch tens of thousands of houses being built. 99% were stick built.. I had to learn the tricks of assembling SIP's myself on the job as I went.. Once I was done I watched a team of contractors build a house made of SIP's and saw the speciaized tools they had to achieve the same thing I did in minutes rather than hours.. Plus the technique I figured out for myself 1/2 way through they were doing from the start.
Previously I'd seen one timberframe home go up with SIP panels that contractor didn't use any adheasive which the manaul clearly called for IN addition instead of the recommended screws he nailed the panels together with long nails.. much, much, faster than the long screws I used.. However in the event of a tornado no where near the retention.
I would still Use SIP's for roof panels though.. nothing in my mind is as good.
I could go on and on..
"Why would you be "emotionally attached" to a house? "
For me it's being attached to the memories that went in to building my house. Lots of reminders about the kids, etc. A big investment in personal time building it. Again, this isn't a house I bought. We created it.
I'm in my office now and I remember my 5 year old daughter dragging around a 50-lb box of screws and setting the screws into the underlayment in a grid pattern with a a couple of taps of a hammer so I could follow and screw the underlayment down to the subfloor.
"boom-boom....boom-boom....boom boom..."
Two whacks with the hammer to set each screw, a perfect grid pattern. And man, was she fast. And accurate. It's stuff like that that cracks me up at unexpected times, and it's generated by me looking at the floor and remembering.
As far as being "attached" to a paid job, no, I've had pride of a job well done, but no thoughts other than that. The question of the thread is "...emotionally attached to their house".
It's cool if you're detached from your abode, I'm that way with cars. I have never understood people tricking out and babying cars. I've had junkers, I've had luxury cars. They all get the same treatment. Fluid changes on schedule and a wash maybe every one or two years.
But if I found a shell of a '56 chevy and did a ground-up restoration? I might become attached to that. But probably not. Unless my kids helped me and that, too became a memory-generating project.
Mongo,It sounds to me that you are attached to your kids, not your house.Big difference.DC
For me it's being attached to the memories that went in to building my house.
I'm certainly with you on that score. But my memories, like all life experiences, are meant to be built upon, not stored up in a particular place which holds me there, in an associative pattern.
If you feel at liberty to walk out the door and begin again, creating a new best set of memories, aren't you spiritually freer and emotionally healthier?
Relationships which depend on past impressions, kids at certain moments, rather than enjoying them fully in the present moment, aren't as viable as they might seem.
Isn't that one of the major divisions which happen between parents and their children, not growing as individuals, in parallel? Other relationships too.
Edited 9/10/2009 11:32 am by Hudson Valley Carpenter
What, I have a fond memory of my daughter helping me build the house and because I remember it well it now makes me a dysfunctional person, unable to create new memories?<g>I'm not moving from this house. I'm too tired to build another one.
It goes without saying that anyone who spends as much time on this board as you and I do must be dysfunctional...LOL.
It's all in how we perceive our relationships to anyone or anything. Attachment is contrary to emotional and spiritual freedom so it's healthier to see it and transform it by continuing to create ever new and higher personal reality.
That certainly doesn't require moving out of a place that you built with love, just that you remain detached from it as your house.
As a pilot, you've certainly felt the freedom of flying over a familiar landscape, low and slow. There's recognition but no attachment, an experience that liberates the spirit. That's what I'm getting at.
Then there is the old " If you love something, let it go..if it comes back, it's yours, if it doesn't, it never was''.
I've waxed and waned philosophically on "attachments" and its right up there with expectations, have few or none, and rarely are you disappointed.Spheramid Enterprises Architectural Woodworks
Repairs, Remodeling, Restorations
"If Brains was lard, you couldn't grease much of a pan"Jed Clampitt
View Image
Then there is the old " If you love something, let it go..if it comes back, it's yours, if it doesn't, it never was''.
Some have said that, in order to find God, you have to be willing to let go of everything. The willingness is what confers freedom from attachment.
Oh, no worries. I'm in and out of the house today, hands black from charcoal black grout. I'm finally getting around to grouting the pool patio. 1800 sqft of slate. Grout bag in hand.I'm about a third done and at this stage I'm fully capable of detaching this house from me, bulldozing the patio into the pool, and going on a loooong vacation.<g>My back is rested. Sort of. Back to work!
at this stage I'm fully capable of detaching this house from me, bulldozing the patio into the pool, and going on a loooong vacation.<g>
Here I'm trying to convey the impression of detachment being a magic carpet ride overhead whil you're talking about bailing out of a flaming wreck. LOL.
You can always tell who the well adjusted dudes are. stinky
Oh yeah sure. I've worked on many houses too. Clients houses I seldom bond to. I was referring to ones own place. And as many have expressed on this thread I'm not alone in my sentiments. Many look at their own places as an extension of themselves. Other innate items such as cars, motorcycles may be easier to let go because those items tend not to reflect an owners personality or be as intimate with their owners.
Don't have to imagine what its like to come home to a burned down house, and yes I was very attached to it. We had purchased it when our oldest was a baby. Raised 4 kids there. With some help from kids and DH, I had built a kitchen addition, converted the attic to a master bed and bath, planted trees that would require years before we'd see any benefit from. Did projects that took way more time than I could ever pay anyone to do so I could afford to make it the home I'd feel happy coming home to. I knew that house so intimately I could still tell you the exact dimensions of all the rooms,etc. This was the home we intended to live in the rest of our lives.
When it burned down we decided to embrace the opportunity to build a house much like the old house only more energy efficient and lower maintenance. No more dragging ladders around every fall to wash windows. No more splitting and hauling firewood.
Yes, I am emotionally attached to the house I built for my family, that's just the sort of person I am. Houses I've done work on for other people I'm proud of the work I've done and would probably be a little hurt if they destroyed it, but I hate to see any house remuddled or badly neglected. One of the things I love about building is the lasting evidence of my efforts. Always hated decorating cakes or wrapping gifts only to have my work gone in seconds.
I was going to post this long philosophical argument but instead all I want to say is that I believe those of you who say you are "emotionally attached" to your homes are actually just emotional about thoughts and memories of events in your homes. I have seen true "emotionally attached" and it isn't pretty.Thinking back, I remember having a client - possibly the worst client I ever had but the best project I ever worked on. We turned a 1700 sq. ft tri-level into a 5000 sq ft craftsman style mansion for a middle aged husband and wife and their 2 children, ages 2 and 5 (they also had one who just started college). The man was emotionally attached to his home in every way; because of this attachment and the emotional turmoil it caused him to see his home being torn apart, he became distant from his family and was even diagnosed as bipolar during the project. He was consumed with the house, both in it's old state and what it was to become. When we started demoing walls, his wife and kids couldn't take the dust so they moved out. He stayed. When it came time to remove the kitchen, he turned a bathroom into a makeshift kitchen. When the bathroom went he got an RV. When we would leave for the day, he would go into the house and sit and eat all by himself. He used multiple copies of the blueprints to wallpaper a room (literally) in the old part of the house. Sometimes we would enter in the morning to find him scribbling notes on the prints, once in a while he would just be sitting in the middle of the room sobbing. His emotions were off the chart. He might cheerfully okay changes in the morning only to come at us screaming by the afternoon. I could go on and on about this guy but the point is he was emotionally attached to his home... in a very bad way.DC
I was sure I would never sell my last last house - planned to ride it out there, which would imply emotional attachment. And then someone knocked on the door one 4th of July morning and offered me over 3x what I'd paid for it a few years before and I sold it right then without consulting my wife. And she was happy when she came home and my emotional attachment had vanished into thin air. But I often drive by it to make sure the new owners are taking care of it. So far, so good.
copper p0rn
Yes that would be incentive for me to lose my attachment real quick.
"... someone knocked on the door one 4th of July morning and offered me over 3x what I'd paid for it ..."Around here, when that happens the house is usually bulldozed the day after you move out. I've heard many stories (even been articles in the local papers) about houses selling for $300K to $500k just to be dozed so a huge mansion can replace it. Lots of lakes in this area.DC
That's exactly what happened to the home I sold to buy this place... good for them! It was a tiny little 910 sq.ft. house witha 1 car garage that I simply outgrew.. I paid $27,800 for it and sold it for $99,000.
Today the house they built to replace it might sell for around a million.. My new house that I bought with the proceeds? A lot more than that!
Emotional about my home, you bet. ####, I cried when I sold my Jeep
Comanche after l6 yrs. of great comradare, work and pleasure. It was still cherry with 173,000 miles. The house,do what I have done in the past, take the $$$$ and NEVER return.
A picture, a clock, my old denim jacket I got in '74 for the ranch-work, Uncle Lane's folding knife he brought back from Spain just after the Civil War.
I'm thinking...
There are a few other things, but it doesn't matter.
The houses I may have had emotional attachments to are either gutted of most of my traces, or they're part of a landfill.
These are all part of memory, the make-up, the history of my life...even those which remain. They were points in time, nothing more.
They are an indelible part of that mystic storage area of my brain and heart, and like a house, this vessel is here to contain them for a while and be content with that.
We're members of the same species who desperately preserve & reserve while bounding ahead of ourselves to peer around the next corner.
And so it goes.
"I'll be right here..." E.T.