The Dash

I once listened to a friend give a talk on “the dash”, meaning the part of your life that comes between birth and death: Heather Riggs, 1974-???. He talked about the dash being the important stuff—what would make up your dash? We are moving out of the family house. It has been a long, drawn-out, and rather painful process. I was not ready to go through my mom’s things. They were still too closely connected with her; clothes still had her smell, scraps of paper and the backs of envelopes were covered with her quickly jotted notes, treasures were still where she so lovingly place them. But I have been forced, by necessity, to do just what I didn’t want to—sort, stack, and carry THINGS. When they are taken out of their place, they become just that—things. They are not the person my mother was, they are not the memories that I have. Without the backdrop of home, they are different, foreign.
In the attic today, I read something, written in a child’s hand, in chalk on the steeply slanted ceiling. It reads “We love our house. The Riggs 1975-- …” and is signed by all four children. It was written probably 15 years ago. It isn’t the moving out of the house that is so difficult (although have you seen those trees???), it is the leaving of the backdrop to the Dash. The walls of the Yellow House have been the backdrop to 30 years in the life of our family—they have seen new babies born, first steps taken, childhood traumas solved, teenage angst suffered; holidays, game nights, the birth of almost 30 puppies, 2 horses, and one unexpected litter of pet rats all took place there. Its walls have echoed laughter, crying, expressions of love and anger, recently the wailing of truest sorrow. It has sheltered countless “homeless” friends in need of family, its kitchen has fed thousands, it roof and walls protected against the chest-deep snow of my childhood and the howling winds of 30 winters. We have sat in front of the hearth, bricks laid by my father’s hand, and been warmed. We have sought refuge from the world. The Dash, in this case, is the tale of a family—from marriage to death. It is the home that sent me away to live alone in a foreign land and which held in its image the vision of perfection. Its gabled roof has welcomed me home from countless adventures around the world. Its uniquely yellow exterior is the backdrop to golden summer memories and postcard winter scenes. The yard is the final resting place to beloved pets, one grave dug and closed as recently as June. It is where I first felt the pain of young love, and first learned about true loss. The Dash which opened with a new, young family ends now with a family scattered around the world, a family that has experienced loss, and a family that now, must find a new backdrop for the rest of the dash.