As I walked out the front door, I pulled my phone out and started searching for a song. I walked slowly down to the end of driveway looking through playlists. It was almost time to decide if I was going right or left. But really there was no choice to be made because when I got to the road and looked up from this tiny hypnosis device my eyes saw beautiful shades of pink and orange outlining clouds on the right. My feet automatically turned to the that way as if I was controlled by some outward source. I hit play on “lightening crashes” by Live. I know, a sad choice, but one that’s been stuck in the back of my mind for some reason. As it started playing through my earbuds, each step I picked up speed. I felt the urge to just run and wear myself out completely. It was then that I realized just how angry I felt. Angry that I almost didn’t see this beautiful sky and it was just by chance of deciding to take a walk that I did. What if I hadn’t stepped outside? What if I had gone back into the office to do more work?
I felt the anger churning in my belly and the feelings rising in my chest. Tears were coming. What the hell is happening? I don’t know if was the music transporting me to another era or what but then it dawned on me. I realized that I was feeling awe followed by anger because I keep letting these moments slip away most days. Sometimes I forget how much I need the natural world in my life. Being outside feels like home. It reminds me of a time when I never had to remember to see a sunset or even just remember to look.
My whole life changed after my dad died. They kicked us out and who could blame them? Well, we did, blame them that is, cause they were our grandparents. But maybe they weren’t anymore after he died. Either way, they didn’t approve of Rick, my mom’s new boyfriend and we had to move out of their rental. That’s when we moved to the lake house. Rick had the down payment money and my mom had the monthly social security money. A match made in hell.
I’ll never forget the first time I walked into the lake house. It had a huge picture window with a breathtaking view of our side of the lake. My world quite literally opened up with that view of the outside world. I would often find myself in the living room at sunset watching the sun disappear behind the trees during my angsty teen years. I felt everything at that age but understood very little of those feelings. Don’t let me influence you though cause this house was far from perfect. For years we had pots to catch the water that leaked through the ceiling before we got a blue roof and we all knew that you couldn’t touch the metal strip in the bathtub unless you had a death wish. I still feel bad that there were a few unlucky people I forgot to mention that detail to… although the memory of one ex boyfriend in particular accidentally getting the shit shocked out of him still makes me smile.
There is not a day that goes by that I don’t regret selling this house. Even though it was far from perfect and needed a ton of work, I loved living here and being so surrounded by nature. Regret taught me something important about myself, sure, but the home I had as a kid is gone. Remodeled and turned into someone else’s idea of a house.
The places you grow up shape you no matter how imperfectly. I grew up in a house with a beautiful view and parents that might throw a glass ashtray unexpectedly at another human being. The lake house provided so many opportunities to be outside that it wasn’t until I became an adult that I realized how much I relied on nature to help me regulate myself. It’s one of the reasons I love photography so much. It gets me outside and I always walk away feeling buzzed only without the substance abuse.
