I knew this link would be sent my way eventually, yet I wasn’t quite prepared when the email arrived in my inbox earlier today.
My family is selling my grandma’s house on South 32nd Avenue in Omaha.
I can’t look at the photos on the realtor’s Web site. I feel like such private moments among our family are now exposed for all the world to see, for anyone with a down payment and pre-approved mortgage.
I’m having a hard time coming to terms with the fact that new owners will soon move in.
That I won’t be able to stop by and visit the house I’ve come to love so very much.
That the home will quickly become just another house on the block.
When we were younger, my cousin and I would spend the night at my grandparents’ house. We’d stay up late, watch a scary movie and then head downstairs to share the hideabed in the basement. I would quickly get scared and sneak upstairs, and my cousin would follow.
We’d then crash on the living room floor.
In the morning, when my grandma awoke, she often said her living room looked like a crime scene, with bodies flung about in a tornado of blankets, sleeping bags and pillows.
During family dinners, while the adults ate at the dining room table, us kids would eat in the kitchen. Even recently, with all of us in our early to late 20s, we’d still dine in the kitchen together. There wasn’t nearly as much room around the tiny table, but something about those meals felt very, very right.
We’d try to force Matt, my cousin, to eat chicken or turkey. He’s allergic to poultry, and we’d always hope we’d get to see him throw up or at least get a little green during a family meal. (For the fun of it, you know.)
Then there was the porch swing where we spent countless summer nights swaying back and forth in the warm breeze. And from that porch and the bridge across the street that spans a section of Interstate 80, we’d watch the Omaha World-Herald fireworks show from Rosenblatt Stadium every July.
There was “Charlie,” the (fictitious) naked, bloody man we feared lived under the basements steps, and who would try to grab our legs as we walked (ran, really) up and down those stairs time and time again.
The attic was certainly unique to this home. It was 50 degrees warmer in the summer up there, 50 degrees colder in the winter. We’d hide and play in the attic, amazed at the pillows of pink installation along the walls and the high ceiling we never seemed tall enough to reach.
We’d grab the flagpole in the front yard and run in circles until we were dizzy or nauseous or both. (For the fun of it, you know.)
I love this house and only pray a loving family moves in, discovers its charm and makes it a home of their own.
