A House is not a home. Or at least that’s what my parents tell me. “A house is not a home. But the home is the family, and the family is the heart.” Or at least that’s what my parents tell me.

My only question is:

What if your home is like your family? Then wouldn’t the house be the home and the home is the heart? What if it all changed because you loved your house more then the air you breathe?!

What if I told you that I know every curve of the walls? That I’ve memorized every dent in the floors, every frame of every picture hanging, or every mark in our pavement porch? What if I told you that I know the scent of a Christmas in our living room, the warming of gingerbread and the smell of the forest green branches? What if I told you that I can see the kitchen table on Valentines Day with my eyes closed? (The warm brown table filled with mashed potatoes, corn, meat, and bread. And once we finish this, a cake awaiting us on the counter.) What if I told you that I could feel the plush bunny you gave me at Easter if I stand under that huge tree in our back yard and hug myself? What if I told you that I know the exact spots of where I buried letters from years ago in the moist dirt behind my playhouse?

What if I said that I’d miss each and every part of this house? Every part including its imperfections like the leaky roof and the play house whose paint is peeling off bit by bit.

If I told my parents all of this, I wonder if they’d consider thinking about this house as a home, and consider this home as my heart. I wonder if they’d still make me move into another house that I don’t know. That house where I won’t know every curve of the wall, or every individual blade of grass that I sat on when I was little, pretending to feed stuffed animals mud pies.

My parents told me “A house is not a home. A home is a family, and a family is the heart.” But they also told me that when we move it’ll be for the better. I wonder if they think its better that I leave my home behind, along with my heart.

Because in my mind: This house is my home, and this home is my heart.