Home is Where the Laundry is
When you think of home – what do you think of? Do you think of coming through the front doors walking straight to the fridge? Or kicking off your shoes stumbling in through the garage yelling, “hello!” and always hearing a voice on the other end saying, “we’re in the living room!”
Your home doesn’t have to be the house you grew up in. Home can be where you’re living now. Home can be your best friends house, your grand parents house or a cabin or cottage. But when you think of those places is there anything in particular that jumps into your brain as to not be missed, what are the feelings you feel? If I may be so bold as to share with you, I have two feelings of home. First is when its just becoming fall and Thanksgiving is biting at our heels. My Father makes home made apple pie and apple crisp from the crab apple tree in our backyard. Every fall walking through the front doors of my childhood home, I would walk into a house filled with the wonderful scent of fresh apple pie. Fresh apple pie will always bring me home. Second is when my Mother would take the laundry out of the drier. My brother and I would be young, sitting on the couch watching T.V. My Mother would come with a big basket of fresh, hot laundry and in an attempt to get us to help her fold it; she would toss the laundry on us. We laughed; we threw socks in the air and wrapped ourselves in the warm laundry as it poured over us. Fresh, hot from the drier laundry will always bring me home.
They say home is where the heart is. My hope is that we will always have either the opportunity to go home or the opportunity to build a home. Where are our homes, either past, present or future – what community are they in? I grew up in the mean streets of Shawnessy. South Calgary will always be home to me. I lived in north Calgary for a fleeting period of time, in the actual mean streets of Bowness. I could never get over living in the “North West,” once a south kid, always a south kid. I find vice versa is true. My boss at Creative Nobility, Rebecca, grew up in Edgemont and has always lived in North Calgary. I asked her if she would ever move to the South now that she’s older. Rebecca scoffed at me and said, “I’ll never live south!” We both laughed because that’s exactly what I said about living in the north. Don’t get me wrong it’s not like I’m a north Calgary hater, I love all the quadrants of Calgary. The point I’m getting at is that theses communities we grew up in never really leave us. I find it safe to say, no matter where we go; we always go back to where we came from.
What is it about these childhood neighborhoods? I actually blame it on my Dad. My Father never liked “the north” so wherever we lived it was always on the south end of the city. And now I have followed suit. Absorbing his beliefs has also led me to cheering for the Winnipeg Blue Bombers and Minnesota Vikings, so it is safe to say following in what my Father thinks doesn’t always pay off…
What I’m trying to say is your neighbourhood, wherever it may be, houses your home and your home houses you and the people you love. We become so proud of where we grew up and the neighbourhood we planted roots in or will eventually plant roots in. These are always common questions, “where did you grow up? What neighbourhood did you live in?” Questions that lead to part of your identity, that lead to knowing a little bit more about you and your life. These communities and neighborhoods that we enjoy memories from and feel love from and have been harbored in, will live in our minds forever. We are every bit proud of where we came from, as we will forever be in love with the neighborhoods that we played hide and go seek in or kick the can or nicky nicky nine doors in.
Our roots are our history, which is part of the reason we started Local Laundry community shirts in the first place. Our communities are something to be remembered, take pride in and are the insides and the corner stones of this beautiful city.
Before I go I will leave you with this last thought about home. When you’re home dwell close the ground. Our homes, no matter where they may be, are there to keep us grounded and to constantly remind us of what’s important.
Hope this blog brought a little nostalgic light to your holiday Monday. Much love – catch you on the flippity flop Calgary!
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