BlogSport

Thunderstruck

I just had an email from my mom with the very sad news that our old home in Harrisonburg suffered a major fire last night. An old neighbor called to tell my mom about it, and she passed on the details:

...[D]amage is total in the entry foyer, living room, upstairs front bedroom (our master) and attic in the front...the firemen broke about 1/2 the windows and stove in the porch.

Just to give you an idea, this house was a full 4-story Victorian (all wood, original siding) with a wrap-around porch and slate roof, built over a century ago with ten-foot ceilings downstairs and original tongue-and-groove hardwood floors. My mother in particular had spent several years in the mid-90s restoring and decorating the house to perfection and it truly was a gorgeous but welcoming home.

I lived there from age 8 to 18, and my parents lived there all through my years of college and graduate school. It was the last house my father ever lived in. It was, in every sense, my home, my roots, and a unique thing for me among my family because all the other kids were true Navy brats who moved every few years from base to base. I'm a little overwhelmed at how sad this has made me...it isn't my house anymore, had no likelihood of being ever again, and, thank God, no one was hurt in the blaze. But I'm still bowled over. Funny how something can be taken from you that you didn't even realize you felt you had.

posted by ADD @ 11:23