Depersonalization, with a little help from the Beatles and R.E.M.

Every source I have found talks about the need to depersonalize your house before selling it. There is a good amount of talk about how to let go of your house, and view it as a home.

The thing is, I don't think most of these people have had babies at home, or taught their kids to read at home. My house is my office, my birthing center, and my home, all wrapped up in one package. I'm so very excited for us to move, especially assuming that we get the house we all want, but I'm also having a hard time with the thought of leaving, permanently.

Once we leave, there's no way I can stand in the sunroom and tell FB, "This is the spot where you were born." There's no way I can sit in the upstairs alcove with EG beside me the same way we sat as she learned to read. PC will not remember living here, much less the living room where she emerged. FB's memory of running in the backyard will fade with time. I would never want us to stay here indefinitely, just to stop these thoughts from cascading through my brain, but cascade they do, nevertheless.

We moved two months before EG was born, and again just before she turned two. Less than two years later, we bought this house. This house represented stability for her, in lots of ways. It will always be the first house that the mister and I bought together.

There are places I remember
All my life, though some have changed
Some forever not for better
Some have gone and some remain
All these places have their moments
With lovers and friends I still can recall
Some are dead and some are living
In my life I've loved them all...
Though I know I'll never lose affection
For people and things that went before
I know I'll often stop and think about them

And this limbo, it's ceased to be my house. The house works and we can live here, the way it currently is, but it's not mine. Each step we take leads us further and further away from it being ours, closer and closer to being just a commodity. A house. A piece of real estate. I know it has to be this way, and on most levels, I'm embracing that fact.

The first time we moved, I wasn't ready. It wasn't our plan to move when we did, and I had a hard time letting go. Luckily, though, we hadn't lived there long, and it was just a rental. The next two times we moved, they were still rentals, and I was definitely ready to see what was next. This time, though, I'm much more conflicted. Maybe there's something about ownership versus renting, but I think it's more how much of us has sunk into this place. As I said, babies born, children taught, every day - life, and how we live it.

Burn bright through the night, two pockets lead the way
Two doors to go between the wall was raised today
Two doors remain before your others and your own
Keep these books well stocked away and take your happy home...
Listen, listen to the holler,
If I write a book it will be called "Life and How To Live It."

So I may shed a few tears, and I'll wish for time to slow and speed simultaneously. One foot in front of another, we'll get there.