1104 Martinstein Avenue

You provided a whimsical childhood. Blanketed in reverie by high green hemlock hedges, vivid gardens, dove songs, two large dogs, the watchful eyes of my tall imposing father and affectionate gentle grandmother. You were my home, dependable and consistent. 

2022

Grandma died and Dad won’t be able to take care of the house.
1104 Martinstien, Long Island , NY, this is a love letter. 

In my efforts to preserve you, I began to document you. You were a place of security and stability for me for many years. We watched together as my grandmother aged and my father took responsibility for the property, just as his father once had. I write to you often. When I speak about you, I subconsciously address the property, house, yard, and this time of my life as You. But who am I speaking to? A house, a space, a collection of rooms, windows, and a lawn? Or is it a time and a person I am afraid I have left behind? Is it me, younger, more optimistic, cheerful, and blissfully naive?

Under the influence of my fantasy and history-absorbed father, I was often submerged in the world of Tolkien, 16th-century medieval Europe, and classic movies like The Last Unicorn, Legend, and Labyrinth. This was my preferred reality, giving me permission to believe in dragons, fairies, and true movie-style magic. To believe in you.

2024

You were sold to Daniel (also my father's name) and Martha, a lovely couple with two young daughters, Danielle (my middle name) and Donna. When I came to visit, I was greeted with your familiar creek from rusted hinges on the door and your linoleum beneath my feet, and the sweeping sound of carpet when I walked into the living room. But your smell was different. The aroma of freshly cooked dinner filled you instead of the cigarettes and scented powder that signified You as home. Salty breaded food filled the air. It was not an unpleasant smell, but it wasn’t you. It wasn’t grandma, or dad, or even me. You are no longer my house or my home, but it's ok. 

Daniel and Martha invited us to walk the backyard. Danielle cartwheeled and skipped across the lawn the way I had done when I was her age and Daniel handed me two freshly laid eggs from the chicken coup he built.  Before I left you, Daniel and Martha handed me every scrap of mail addressed to a Wisniski, along with the letter and photographs I had left hidden under your protection on the property two years earlier. Danielle had found them in a drawer in the shed and they kept them safe in my father’s old hutch, still standing in the dining room next to my grandmother's kitchen table, now their hutch and table. 

I am practicing loving you without ownership. I will continue to miss, think, love, and dream of you, but you are no longer mine.  The time I had with you is not forgotten, and it will never lose its significance, so I continue to think about my time growing up in a magical place, where I was loved and protected, and I feel thankful for how fortunate I was to have a home like you.

Here is to love and remembrance without ownership.