A few days ago, I found an old bottle of my dead mother’s perfume. It was one of those vintage types, with the stopper in the top. The kind that you would just dab on your neck or behind your ear.

I opened it, and brought it up to my nose.

I breathed in.

For the first time in nearly 8 years, I was smelling my mother. She was there. Her scent enveloped me, and it was more than I could bare. My heart stopped, and I choked on the raw emotion of it. The bizarre juxtaposition of her unanticipated presence, and jarring reminder of her very real absence.

~

“I know they say you can’t go home again, I just had to come back one last time. Ma’am I know you don’t know me from Adam, but these handprints on the front steps are mine.”

~

That night I dreamt.

I dreamt of my childhood home.

It was one of those surreal dreams that are unnerving in their vividness.

I stood on the concrete porch. My dad had laid it. My name remained carved into it where I had drawn it with a twig. Right next to it were my tiny hand prints.

I looked up at the front door. It still had the stained glass window, at the top, that my mother and father had created. The landscape that she had painted on the adjacent wall was there, though faded by the Sun and time. My mind had accounted for time. I suppose that must have mattered to my subconscious, for some reason.

I could see the pommagranet tree that my father had planted, so many years ago. My mother’s favourite cat, Sasha, was buried under it. She was part Siamese, and had the silliest meow. We had to put Sasha to sleep after she developed breast cancer.  It was the kind thing to do, but my mother wept for days. It was my first lesson in not being able to console someone.

~

“Up those stairs in that little back bedroom, is where I did my homework and I learned to play guitar.  I bet you didn’t know under that live oak, my favorite dog is buried in the yard.”

~

Inside were the built-in bookshelves that my mother had designed, and my father had built. They stood there, imposing as ever. Floor to ceiling, and solid wood. My father was a skilled carpenter. I appreciate that much more now than I did then.

~

“I thought if I could touch this place or feel it, this brokenness inside me might start healing.
Out here it’s like I’m someone else, I thought that maybe I could find myself. If I could just come in I swear I’ll leave. Won’t take nothing but a memory, from the house that built me. You leave home and you move on and you do the best you can, I got lost in this old world and forgot who I am.”

~

I woke up confused about where I was. I struggled to get my bearings. I felt cold, and alone for a moment.

Mom’s gone.

The house is gone.

For a long time, I thought I was too.

But then I looked over, and saw my husband asleep. He is proof of my new life, and the new home I am building.

I smiled.

(Lyrics belong to “The House that Built Me: by Miranda Lambert”)