THERE'S NO PLACE

We are thinking of selling the house I grew up in. My brother, sister and I, that is. And it feels bizarre. Most folks, I guess, come to that point in their lives where the place you grew up in no longer is part of your family. At least in the sense that you no longer can go there, no longer no that the stairs you ran up and down are available to you. That the tree you climbed so many times will no longer be an option. Well, no unless you want to get the police called to come take you away by whomever lives there now. The wall where you marked how tall you were getting, the sliding glass door your sister once shattered accidentally, the orange tree. All of it about to fade into the distance like morning fog burning off. It's just something we are talking about, but it feels like this will most likely happen. And because I grew up in what is now called Silicon Valley, I think it could easily happen. We've had the house in a trust under all our names for over ten years now, ever since my mom passed away. And it's been more of a pain, in a lot of ways, than anything else. My mom had cancer, and it was the second time, and because this was before Obamacare, she had to pay quite a lot of money for her treatment. A lot. And so she had to take a second mortgage out on the house. As such, when she died, she left us all the house, which still had quite a bit of money owed on it. Over the years, my brother and sister both tried to make a go of it, but we are a family of theatre artists and teachers, and that means lots of joy, but not a lot of money. And charming as San Jose is, it is also very expensive. I think, one day, the real estate market will go away like the dodo, and people in the future will scratch their heads and think "what was the deal with that?".  But this is the world we live in. They both put a lot of time and effort into making it work. But somehow, probably in part due to the virus and how it's forced us all to take a longer look at our lives, where we are, where we are headed, and what is important, the time has come. I am both excited and sad. Excited because this is moving forward, letting of the past, and also a way to relieve a lot of debt for all of us. Sad because that house has my home. It's where I became me.

In one of those coincidences, I am currently writing a screenplay that takes place in that house. One of those autobiographical coming of age stories. So in my mind, I've been in that house everyday for the last few months. I can see it clearly. The art on the wall. The shag carpet in me and my brother's room. The backyard with it's rusty swing set. The cedar tree out front. And the magnolia. Of course, that house is no longer around anyway. And that house will never go away. I think, maybe, that all we do when we cling to the past is make it harder to see. So we must let it go. Move on, move forward. Move.

Anyhow. Strange and sad and scary as it is, I feel in my bones that this is the right thing to do. The healthy thing to do. Part of living in the moment. Of living. There is no past, no future, just now. I think of two songs today. One if from the musical Sunday in the Park with George. It's this song from Act One, where the artist Georges Seurat is paining the at the time new Eiffel Tower, while his mother watches, lamenting time gone by. It's lovely and bittersweet, and I remember playing this song for my mother in college. She cried.

All these moments will pass, in time, like tears in rain. 

Here's a song I loved when I was a boy. It's Fly Like an Eagle by Steve Miller.