Home is...sometimes tough to define.

Source

Sarge’s Saturday post was a little sad for me.  Several years ago, his father had his home pulled out from under him through redevelopment, which might have been legal and justified, but it doesn’t make it right.  I never met him, and don’t have much of a connection to him other than through The Chant, but I felt sorry for him all the same.  

I guess that’s some good writing, when a writer can put you in the moment and feel something, but I digress.  If you missed the post, a developer bought the land on which his father’s home stood and turned it into some nice modern residences, but four good families lost theirs.  I know of other similar situations involving trailer parks.  There’s one right on Mission Bay here in San Diego which is a ghost town now.  The 50 year lease expired several years ago, and after much litigation, hundreds of folks, many of them old, have had to find other places to live.  And in San Diego, that’s difficult to do.  But like most litigation, especially here in California, it’s costly, and so was the settlement.  The residents received the equivalent of four years rent, courtesy of the San Diego taxpayer.  Twenty-two million in all, which probably made them happier than Sarge’s dad.

DeAnza Cove Trailer Park in better days                                        Union Tribune

In a few more years, probably after more litigation, the now city-controlled land will become a wetland park.  But until that time, the city is allowing the nearby for-profit RV park to move in, which is making the former residents quite upset.  I guess that’s progress, that isn’t really progress.  Sure they got their settlement, and everything was legal and authorized, but that doesn’t mean it’s right. 

Now it wasn’t my intent to talk about supposed civic injustices, but it helps me make the point that Sarge essentially started last weekend- you can’t go home again. 

Like other Chanters- both writers and readers, my family moved quite a bit during my military service.  I describe it as over and back, up and down, then back and forth.  Atsugi Japan, Bremerton Washington, and Tampa Florida were the first of those prepositions, but always with San Diego on the return ticket.  We bought our home on that first return trip and fortunately, it’s always been here when we got back.  It was definitely a crushing burden of debt* when we first moved in, but we’ve pretty much crushed that debt, and we’ll be sans mortgage come winter.

We always held onto it because we knew SanDog would be our permanent home.  It helped that The Mighty War Hoover- aka the S-3B Viking, you know, the one up in the marquee that has no sharp edges- safe for kids!, was based here.  Even when the Navy sent us away, I could always find duty back here afterwards.  So my kids always had their home- a foundation for their PCS moves that helped center them as San Diegans I’d like to think.

Oregon's old border sign which most translated as "please don't stay."  Source

When I left Oregon 11 years after arriving, I never really looked back.  Mom sold the old homestead, and I don’t really feel the need to look back fondly on that place, nor do I reminisce sadly.  I enjoy visiting the town I grew up in, as long as there’s a half a decade or so between visits.  Ok, that’s not fair, my younger siblings still live there, and my wife has extended family there so we are still well connected, but it’s not home.  We’ve lived in San Diego far longer than I lived in Southern Oregon and my roots are deeper here. 

Someone else lives in our house now so there's no real connection to it now.  Don't get me wrong- I'm grateful to have grow up there, to have helped build it, but I can’t recreate the fun times I had with my friends there, I can only remember them.  It's the same thing now with my Squadron-mates- when we get together, we talk about those flights, the port visits, the other guys.  But we’re not flying again, we’re not young men again drinking (sometimes to excess) in an admin overseas, we are just remembering, not reliving.

Those displaced folks in that trailer park- they obviously can never go home again, but they were well compensated and that helps mitigate any loss, and their dwellings will be replaced.    

That house my family built and I grew up in is not home anymore, and I’m ok with that.  The town has changed a lot too.  Sure, it can be sad to see what progress looks like, but that doesn’t change the memories.  When it comes down to it, a house is just a dwelling, but a home is what you make of it.

Here's a clip from Gross Point Blank with John Cusak, one of my favorite movies and actors, which sums it up nicely.

   

Anyway, I’ve got a “new” home now and I don’t plan to leave.  Because of that, my kids will be able to go home again...although we are NOT letting them move back in! 

*Lex referred to his home here in San Diego as his Crushing Burden of Debt, which is only more apropos these days with a market that has eliminated "entry-level" homes here, and in most of California.