Every now and then, someone will tell me that they drove past my old homeplace out on the Hampton/Locust Grove Road, east of the Towaliga bridge. They will give me a report on the sad state of affairs in regard to the yard, roof, and general condition of the place.

They will speak to me in hushed tones as if we are giving respect to the deceased.

“It just breaks my heart to see that place go downhill.”

It used to bother me to hear these reports. I mean, I was attached at the hip to that house. I was born there. I celebrated every Christmas through young adulthood there. There’s a line on the kitchen door post that marks how tall I was in 1965. It was my home.

And on top of that, the fella who bought the place promised me that he was gonna fix it up. In his oriental and gentle way, he said to me, “I will honor your family.” That gave me some peace, but it also hasn’t happened. That was almost 6 years ago.

The truth is that by the time I had my own family, the homeplace was already different than when I lived there. Nothing drastic. The casual passerby wouldn’t have noticed a thing from the road, except for the paved driveway.

It’s hard for me to remember exactly when all the changes began. Some of it started when I was in high school. Which is what happens. By the time the kids start driving, the house has some age on it. The kitchen is out of date. Color TV is a thing. And Mama wants a house that keeps up with the times.

We had a small porch on the back of the house. It was never built for sitting. It was more like what would be the utility room in a modern house. The washer and dryer were out there. An old Frigidaire sat in the corner next to the dryer. A massive chest freezer sat on the righthand side. The whole porch was barely big enough to hold it all.

It was a screen porch. Waist high brick wall all the way around. Screened panels above. A simple shed roof overhead. A screen door. On the ledge around the bottom of the screen, Mama would set jars with water in them for rooting her cuttings.

There was a small chair next to the freezer where Dad would take off his boots. A fire extinguisher was mounted on the wall above the chair next to the kitchen door. A single light bulb on the opposite side. A single coat hook below the light bulb. A meat saw for butchering a cow hung on a nail above the fridge.

In the summertime, it was hotter than Hades on that porch. A good thunderstorm could wet the floor if the wind blew hard enough. And in the wintertime, the water pump in the washing machine could freeze up.

My parents were people of the Great Depression. They were resolved to make do with what they had. But slowly they gave way to more modern conveniences.

Dad took down all the screens on the back porch and put up Plexiglas panels all the way around. Two windows opposite each other for cooling in the summertime. A small electric heater for the winter. And a proper glass storm door replaced the screened door.

It wasn’t long after that, they remodeled the kitchen. The old metal cabinets were replaced with wooden cabinets. The cast iron enamel sink gave way to a stainless-steel model. The black and yellow checkerboard tile floor was covered in a poured composite with chips of marble and colored granite flecks bound together in a smooth resin. The chrome dinner table was replaced by a wooden table. Corner dish cabinets were added.

Then, they had carpet installed. My word, what a change! My bare feet were used to the cold, hard feel of linoleum tile. The only warm spots in the winter were in front of the gas heater in the living room or in front of the gas furnace in the back hall.

The three really big changes came long after I was gone. They paved the driveway, which got rid of the mud where I used to build frog houses with my feet. They installed central heat and air, but they wouldn’t run the AC because it cost too much. Last, they moved a wall in the den to make the room bigger.

I wasn’t aware then of what I know now. A house is like a living organism that changes with time. If you’re lucky enough to have lived in one house most of your life, you know this.

When a family is young, the house is simple. It provides the basics. As needs change and the old wears out, the house is changed by those who have labored for it. Walls are moved. Kitchens are rearranged. Old bedrooms serve a new purpose.

You go back to visit, and the child in you remembers how it used to be more than how it is now.

Eventually, your life takes you so far away from that house that all you have are memories. Until one day, your parents are gone, and you find yourself going through that house for the last time. You “see” the bunk beds that used to be yours in a room that became your mama’s sewing room.

The house smells musty. You begin to notice flakes of paint coming off the wall. Stains from the smoke of the wood stove cover everything. A window is cracked. A porch post is rotted. And because you now own your own house, you know how much of a challenge it would be to save this one.

When I walked away from that house for the last time, I knew that I would never be able to go home again. I knew it would take a while to get over losing that part of me. It felt like my soul was bound up in that house, those fields, the old barn, and inside all the old memories.

And whenever someone would say to me, “Hey, I rode by your old homeplace yesterday,” it would tug at me. I would feel a sadness over my absence from it. Maybe even a hint of shame that I didn’t keep it and take care of it and honor its memory better.

I am the last of the ones who belonged to that house.

I am also at that age when I am beginning to think of what might happen to this house. The one that sits above Palmetto Creek in the middle of the woods. I have lived here longer than I lived in the other one.

It, too, has changed since the kids lived here. And one day it will be empty. Only the memories will be left.

Two houses have given me a piece of themselves. I have moved on from one. I will surely move on from the other.

That is how it should be. How it must be.

For there is only one Home that matters.