On moving into Grandma’s house
Four weeks ago, we moved from this lovely yellow place…
…to this quaint little tan place, a place my grandmother called home for more than 60 years, a place where my father and uncle grew up, a place I visited often my entire life.
There’s a difference of about 600 square feet between the two homes, a difference that became glaringly obvious once we tried to stuff it with our belongings, along with dozens of my grandmother’s that I couldn’t part with. See?
That’s the basement, and it is literally overflowing with boxes and furniture. Here’s what it looked like when my grandma and grandpa lived here.
That’s probably the way it looked for the last 40 years, and then we came in and ripped it all out, tossing carpeting and mildewy cabinets, joining my family in efforts to sort through an entire house packed full – as in every square inch had a nook or cranny hiding something – of my grandparents accumulated belongings. And then selling a lot of it to strangers at an estate sale and giving the rest to various nonprofits.
That’s been the hardest part of this – degrandma-ing this house to make way for us, and whoever moves in after us. My grandparents built this house and raised their family here. My great-grandmother passed away here. This was the hub of Christmas celebrations, the constant in so many of our lives.
My grandmother is still alive. She is 94-years-old and has only been gracious to me and my family as we take over her home and as she was rushed to make final decisions about what belongings she would keep because the rest would be finding homes elsewhere. She will never admit it to me, but I know this has been hard for her, especially now as she hears how her home is being transformed from the place she created into a new place that holds little trace of her, aside from the items I held to.
If you can’t tell, I feel guilty about this, and sad. It’s hard to erase the details from a place I remember with such love, a place that reminds me so much of my family and the many, many memories we all have here.
As we work to update the house, I find I’m putting a lot of pressure on myself to get it right. I don’t want to make bad choices, simply because this is a place that’s so important to my family, and my family’s future. The main reason we’re renovating is to resell the house in a year or so, all the money going towards keeping my grandma in assisted living for as long as she needs. My grandmother’s grandmother lived to be 104. I’m hoping my grandma’s got at least that much left in her.
Living here and going through all of my grandparent’s things has been like a suburban archeaological dig, unearthing decades of memories, momentos and stuff. I feel closer to my grandma than ever before, like I’ve gotten a glimpse into parts of her life I otherwise would never have known. As I unpack my belongings into her cupboards and closets, I think of what she housed in each of them and her devotion to detail and organization and utilizing every inch of available space.
While living through a renovation with 2 small children is not easy, nor is transitioning from a home with plenty of space to one where my children have to share a room, I am starting to love our new community and enjoy our new home. However, I do miss the grandma-ness of how it used to be. I feel sadness now that every cabinet has been emptied and my grandma’s treasures (and junk) have all been revealed. In a way, I feel like we evicted her, even though she moved out well over a year ago. When it is all said and done, the interior of this home will look nothing like it used to. Every room will have been dewallpapered and decarpeted, freshly painted and refurnished. But for me, no matter how long I live here or how different it looks, it will forever be my grandmother’s house.
Before and after photos to come, but probably not for a few more weeks. Because in order for me to type this, I had to climb over furniture that’s been shoved to the center of one room and shimmy under a drop cloth that’s protecting it all while the living room gets painted.
While in the house of it, grandma-ness seemingly resides in the stuff, the wall paper, carpeting, and hard to forget aromas that come to mark a house with people/person-ness. Finally, grandma-ness is in grandma, and is with her where ever she may be. You know, from experience, that over time you make a house what it is, gradually allowing what was before you to naturally slip away. So it is with grandma’s house. You, Joey, Crosby, and Adeline are loving stewards in transition, before the bigger changes to come.
Thank you, Dad. Love you.
I have a key to the house. So, if you want to eliminate the possibility of me absent-mindedly dropping in at 3ish some morning, perhaps I should give it to you (not that a 3 am visit wouldn’t be welcome).
Since you offered your help in case of an emergency and because my son is astonishingly accident prone, it’s probably best that you keep your key. Just in case.
I’m sure you’re right about it being tough on Grandma, but I’m also sure it’s a billion times easier than it would have been any other way. If the changes to the house have to be made, who else would she rather have making those changes than you guys?
More importantly: I think your dad hit the nail on the head when he spoke of aromas that define a house. So if you want to retain some of the house’s Grandmaness as the holidays approach, I recommend you make her “Mounds Bar” Christmas cookies. Not only will they make the house smell great, but you can then send me Mounds Bar Christmas cookies.
Mounds Bar Christmas cookies? I don’t remember those, but you can bet I will dig through the zillions of recipes of hers that I saved in search of the secrets to creating them. Maybe I will send you some. Or maybe I will eat them all and not even share them with my children. And you make good points that also make me feel better. Thank you.
My grandpa was 94 when we moved him from his lifetime home into my parent’s house. My dad, brother, husband and I got the unpleasant task of cleaning out his house. Since I was the only woman there I was assigned the kitchen and bedrooms. What an awful feeling deciding what should be saved and what should be pitched. Everything that they ever worked for. I never want to have to do that again.
Kelly, the kitchen and bedrooms – those would be the hardest rooms to go through! I understand just how you feel. It’s beyond hard to parcel off another person’s belongings when you know they were important enough to them to hold on to for that long.
Dad and Ky are right… It’s a tough situation made better because you’re helping steward the transition, and no one is better suited to this important work than you, Liz. Plus, Grandma seems really happy in her new surroundings, with new friends. Her grandma-ness is well intact. I wonder sometimes if it’s me who will have harder time moving on than her? Speaking of which, we will be having ham rolls in your dining room on Christmas Eve, right? And lots of black olives! Love you!!