A lot of the time, we go through life and tend to forget about what means the most all the while caught up in our busy lives. We grow up and we move away from our homes, families, and friends. Miranda Lambert said it best in her hit song “The House that Built Me”. The song is about a girl who goes back to her childhood home to find herself and realize what is most important in life when it seems like there is no way but down. Whether it is a house you grew up in, a family home, or just a home that means something to you, almost everyone has this connection to a house. I would like to thank that specific home for giving me so much in such a small portion of my life.

Lemont, Illinois circa 1975. My grandparents just finished building a house from the ground up in an undeveloped (at the time) neighborhood twenty-five miles outside the city of Chicago that was three bedrooms, two bath, and five stories of beauty that somehow never had a shortage in regards to sleeping capacity. Their two kids, my mother and her brother, grew up in this house along with the house next door that housed my Great Aunt, Great Uncle, and their two boys. Fast-forward 20 (give or take) years and the now-developed neighborhood includes half of my family. My parents built a house on the street over, two of my uncles built houses next door, down the street, and extended family is scattered down the road. My sister went to grade school at the same school that my mother and her brother attended as well as where I attended preschool. It wasn’t shortly after this that I started to move around the country due to my father’s career.

After leaving Illinois in 2001 we moved to West Virginia, Kentucky, California, Iowa, and then finally, Kansas. It didn’t matter where we lived or how busy we were, we always made time to go back “home”. Ever summer growing up I remember I would go back and spend weeks, even months, there. I had this sense of completeness and serenity when I rolled into town. Whether my life was on a straight path or completely in twists, nothing mattered as soon as I stepped inside.There was something about the luscious neighborhood, the massive yard, the gorgeous pool, and the feeling when reuniting with family that still resided in the area. I drove a car for the first time in that neighborhood (Okay. Not really, it was a golf cart, and I was four sitting on my sister’s lap), I learned how to ride a bike on the hill in the backyard, and learned how to swim in the pool.

In August of 2008, my grandfather passed away and we always knew there was something missing after that. His jokes, wisdom, and personality lit up that house like the Fourth of July and ever since then, going back felt like he was still there enjoying every minuet with us and when we came back it was like we never left. We memorized every drawer, every creak on the floors and steps (fourth step going down to the basement to be exact), every light switch, and every room. The complete interior remodel in 1999 was just what the house needed while not changing anything that it meant to us.

Last year, my grandmother decided to put the house up for sale. Her reasons, which were very justifiable, were that it was getting too expensive to keep up on her own, a lot of us didn’t have as much time to visit as much as we used to, and she wanted to live full-time in her condo in Florida. We had one last "hoorah", as we knew it would be the final time our whole family would have in this house. I made a scrapbook to give to my grandmother filled with pictures sent to me by family and ones I gathered myself. It was basically a chronological timeline with all pictures at the house starting from the late 70’s, my mom and her brother growing up there, then when they both starting having kids; including birthday parties, wedding pictures, and other celebrations. Also when those kids starting having kids. Four generations were able to experience this house and all of its glory and that is something that I will cherish for the rest of my life.

Thank you for teaching me that there is so much more to life than the materialistic things. Thank you for setting the bar for my future home. Thank you for giving my family forty years of memories and lessons. Me, specifically, thank you for giving me a consistent home I was able to go back to the eighteen years I had the privilege to experience it. I hope to one day go back and get that feeling once again that I felt all those years growing up. Lastly, thank you for connecting with the young, newly-wed family that purchased it last year who can hopefully start their forty years of memories and learn just as much as my family did. It started with just two then grew to almost twenty and continues to grow. That house is 100% the house that built me.