July 02, 2025
Last evening, with the "thunk" of the deadbolt, we left the house that we called home for the last eight years. On June 7, 2017, we arrived, fresh from the Houston metro area. I spent the night in the house with our three cats, sleeping on an air mattress and sitting in a folding camp chair. Laura and the kids spent the night in a hotel in Cuero. That night, I wrote one of my first blog posts saying that we were in a new house which had not yet become a home.
It did, very quickly, become that very thing: a home. Not just a parsonage - an old term for the chirch-provided dwelling for the pastor and family - but a home. It was comfortable, quiet, and country. We loved, laughed, cried, cussed. We yelled in anger and whooped with joy. Since we have been married, every home we lived in - apartment or house - we added to the family. It happened there, too: Reese, the Wonder Dog, the Goofball, Super Puppers, she became part of our family. Slightly less significant than a new baby - slightly - she added a new element to the home.
Last night, after almost 3000 nights, we said farewell to 12127 FM 236. The truck had left an hour or two earlier, loaded down with our stuff. Lord willing, it will be delivered as promised, one-time, to our new house-to-become-home in Enid, Oklahoma.
The house was, for all intents and purposes, emoty. The refrigerator was gone, unable to provide a lat night snack. Had Old Mother Hubbard shown up, she would have been right at home with bare cupboards. With neither a chair to sit in nor a bed to recline in, there wasn't a reason to delay. I turned the porch light off for the last time, not needing to show the kids that the door was open for a late night return.
I climbed into the car, loaded down so that Jed Clampett gave his seal of approval. It was so full we had to take turns breathing. I stopped at the end of the driveway, turned on my blinker, and drove away. I chose not to look back.
After all, Tom Bodett wasn't there to say he was leaving the lights on for us.
