Jarret TT Camp

Archive for July, 2009

Is a house always a home? There answer is no, and it is very shocking to me that not everyone lives in a home. The difference between a house and a home may not always be obvious. You have to look closely.

House – A nice family lives in a building together. They get up in the morning. They get ready for work or school. They come, one by one, into the kitchen, grab something to eat, of course, it’s something they can eat on the run, because they are walking out the door. They go about their day, absorbed in their own lives, not really giving each other much thought. That afternoon, the youngest member of the family comes back to the house. She goes directly to her room, where she can feel comfortable, because she knows that if she were to relax anywhere else in the house, her mother would know. Not that she would make or leave a mess, but her mother needed everything in the house perfect. Her mother would notice if a pillow on the couch was moved. The other children that live in the house do the same thing as they get home, all at different times. The mother of the house doesn’t get back until eight o’clock. When she does, she puts the take out food she picked up on the way back to the house on the counter in the kitchen. She makes her plate and takes it to her home office, where she will spend the rest of the night working on her paperwork, trying to catch up. The children, who either heard their mother come in or smelled the take out food, wander from their rooms, make themselves a plate, while exchanging the only conversation they will have that day, most of which, are rude comments to each other, about weight, hair color, braces, or anything else on the very long list of insecurities that children have. Then the children take their plates back to their room and eat by themselves. At some point throughout the night, they will all bring their dishes back to the kitchen, rinse them, and put them in the dishwasher. If they need something from their parents, they go to the home office door, knock, wait for the same response they always get, “What do you need? I’m really busy right now.” The conversation between the two is very quick. “There is a field trip next week and I need you to sign a permission slip, and I need you to sign this test I took. The teacher says if we bring it back signed, she will give us extra points.” The mother signs both without question. The child leaves the room. The rest of the night goes very much the same.