As an Air Force family we have experienced more than our fair share of empty houses. The places have been an apartment, rentals, a home we purchased, base houses. Some, we have chosen; many have been chosen for us. No matter how many bedrooms or bathrooms or the state or age of the house, the empty house, upon arrival, holds our hopes and dreams for the next few months or years.
The empty house, at the beginning, is nothing more than a shell. It is not filled with our laughter and our memories, our conversations or growth, our arguments and forgiveness, our love. We have not experienced life here. Right now, it is just the place we will live. It is not "home".
We walk through the rooms and plan where we will place our furniture. We wonder where we will put the extra table and chairs or the big comfy chair Chris bought for me to read in--the one that fit perfectly in the house we first brought it home to, but has not fit perfectly anywhere else. Will the ceilings be high enough for the boys' loft beds? Will the kitchen fit all the paraphanalia I have collected over the years? Is there a wall for my favorite piece of art or Chris' awards? Where will we do school?
But, really, the important questions are: how much will the boys grow while we are here? Who will be our friends? What will the Lord teach us in this location? How will we grow and change and learn in this shell?
And then our household goods arrive and we fill the shell with the familiar and we begin life in this new location. The "house" becomes "home" and we fill it with laughter and love. We host family and friends, new and old, and introduce them to our new home and they become a part of this place. We watch our boys mature. We come and go as we go about our days. The house becomes a background, a stage, so to speak, for lives fully lived. We enjoy it and invest in it; we make it our own.
Until the orders arrive. Until we are told that we need to prepare to move. The movers arrive and unceremoniously pack all our belongings. Boxes fill all the empty spaces. The truck shows up and the boxes begin to disappear. And in that process, this shell that has become a home, begins to be a shell again. Only this time, it holds our memories and the fulfillment of our hopes and dreams as well as disappointments.
We walk through the house and remember when. We reflect on the months or years in that space, on the changes that have occurred in our family, in each of us as individuals, while we filled this shell and made it our home. Most often, we do not regret the good-bye to the shell. What we find difficult is the good-bye to all it has represented over the months or years we have been there. Good-bye to the boys' nurseries. Good-bye to the school room that held so much learning and laughter. Good-bye to the family room that hosted so many family movie and game nights. Good-bye to the porch where we shared our dreams for our future late at night.
The good-bye to the shell just represents a good-bye to the life we have fully lived in that season. A life we usually regret leaving behind. Regret......and yet......when we look back, we remember that this place was once new, this house was once a shell that held no memories and we look forward with hope because we can see how faithful God has been in filling not just the shell, but our lives here in this place that we came to call home. And we trust that God, in that same faithfulness, will help us fill a new shell once again until we can call that "home."
