Skip to main content

The Old House is Such a Spiritual Place.


 
Selling the family home these days is commonplace for many families as so many people change jobs and relocate across the country more often than in the past, but some old homes remain in the family for generations and such is the case of the family home at 276 Nantasket Ave in Hull, MA.


And as for 276, I understand 'striking while the iron is hot' and selling it in its currently maintained state, before a major problem develops that the family can ill afford to fix down the road. I've visited the house several times and have fond memories of it as well, especially my hours within it, in 2015, before my sea legs disappeared from our sail trip with Jerry across the Gulf of Maine, and its grand stair steps would rise up to meet my feet and its shower walls were anchor points as it was luffing up in my mind--and I was laughing because it was such a weird experience.

The old house is such a spiritual place in anyone of the family's sense. All the kids and adults, and friends of the family as am I, fill up with it just stepping across its threshold as the memories flood in. The young still leap from Grandpa Joe's sailboat in a swim race to shore; Nanna still putters about her little kitchen making sammies for guests and a hundred kids; laughter and music is heard in every room of the great old house; someone quietly reads in a chair on the porch overlooking Hingham Bay; Mark repairs some window sill, door hinge, sailboat part, bathroom tile patch, plumbing leak; The garage door open, neighbors stop by to drink a beer in the basement; Someone rows the dingy out to the Navho for an evening sail; and a million other memories will return on the waves along the shore there.

Sad to see it go.

Comments

Joe - Wednesday's Child said…
I can just see those windows - 20, 30, 40 years from now - still looking down the road for WannaskaWriter and Ned's father to pay another visit and make another memory.
June 22, 2019 at 6:13 AM
Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

A Memorial to Jerry Solom August 24, 1945 -- July 23, 2019 No. 2

               Jerry Solom, August 24, 1945 -- July 23, 2019 This is a random image memorial post about my late friend, who died a year ago. I wrote a memoir/tribute to him in the Wannaskan Almanac on July 23, 2020. Here's the link to that: http://wannaskanalmanac.blogspot.com/2020/07/thursday-july-23-2020.html Me and Jerry with Marion in background in Stonington, Maine in 2015 prior to setting sail to Hull, MA. This is an excerpt from the story  "A Louisiana Ruse" by Steven G. Reynolds Published in 2000 in THE RAVEN: Northwest Minnesota's Original Art, History & Humor Journal      This describes the end of a 43-hour bus ride we took from Fargo, North Dakota to Slidell, Louisiana, where Jerry's boat was in dock prior to his voyage to Norway in 2000. I was there as part of the maintenance crew, accompanying Jerry, his son Terry Solom of Minneapolis, and their fr...
1 comment
Read more

April 5, 2025 Sven is Dead

     "OH MY GOD! SVEN IS DEAD!" the new neighbor Jack Krag said, running from his car to the swing set in Sven's yard where Sven Guyson laid prone on the ground, one foot still afloat in the seat of the swing, his face against the sod, his cap ajar.      "SVEN! SVEN!" Krag repeated plaintively, gently turning Sven over onto his back; the imprint of grass and dirt stuck to Sven's open-eye slobbery face.      " HE'S JUST A'FOOLIN' YOU, bon ami! " shouted Monique, Sven's wife of two years and some months from the porch. "He's just workin' up to his expiration date and wants his death to be just a part of our normal routine. He doesn't want to surprise anyone by dyin' unexpectedly. You know what a shock a death can be. He's just tryin' to ease us all into it, one act at a time.       "WHAT??" Krag fairly hollered in disbelief, looking at Monique, then back st Sven, and back to Monique...
1 comment
Read more

The Chicken Coop Revisited

 “Just  of Scientific Mind: The Chicken Coop Revisited.” by Steven G. Reynolds Gramma Eff was not deaf, not dumb, nor was she blind. She was not daft this Gramma Eff, just of scientific mind. She wore knee boots, a long white coat, goggles, special gloves, and entered in, a study of, chickens, and their loves. “Chickens, and their loves?” you ask, incredulously, with one raised brow, as if of what she studied hence made a mockery of you now. Gramma kept her chickens clean and altho you might think it mean she washed their feet, their beak, their bod --the neighbors thought it very odd. That no one out should enter in Gramma’s little chicken pen For Gramma too, removed her clothes her boots, her coat, her goggles--those gloves, that Gramma always wore whenever she opened that very door of all her chicken coops there we’ve learned strangers there, their presence spurned Gramma found these chickens smart, they liked color, music, art. Gramma learned their innate needs went far b...
2 comments
Read more