NONFICTION - Second Place
There’s No Place like Here
Sarah Barnett
Olney
I wake in the middle of the night, unsure of where I am. Am I home? Home as in
I came to the beach for the flimsiest of reasons. My family—daughter, son-in-law, two grandchildren—needed a new Thanksgiving ritual. When my husband and I divorced and divided up the various facets of our lives, I got custody of the one holiday that we knew how to celebrate. We’re Jewish, so Christmas and Easter don’t really belong to us, but we identify with the food-equals-gratitude spirit of Thanksgiving. The celebration is a lot like those food-laden Jewish holiday feasts I remember from my not very religious childhood, the main theme of which is: “They tried to kill us. They didn’t succeed. Let’s eat.” That’s my kind of party.
The beach house has been our home away from home for two Thanksgivings and two summers now, and I find myself wanting to spend more of my time there and less “at home” in
What is it about a place that makes it feel like home? If home is where I pay the bills, go to the doctor, go to the movies on Friday night, help my grandchildren with their homework, then my home is Olney, Md. But if home means walks with the dog on the beach, “free writing” with the Rehoboth Beach Writers’ Guild and hosting weekend gatherings for friends and family, then home is Rehoboth Beach, De.
Owning two houses is complicated. Inevitably, when I’m in one place there is something I must have (waffle iron, pair of sandals, electric screwdriver) in the other. Minor inconveniences, I know, but I am tired of keeping two refrigerators filled, paying two cable TV bills, and being so generally disoriented that my indispensable belongings (books, camera, cell-phone charger, spare eyeglasses) live in a tote bag that stands near the front door, ready to be transported at a moment’s notice. Like a Border Collie guarding her domain, I like to have all my stuff in one place where I can keep an eye on it. My inner therapist keeps repeating that a two-house lifestyle is not for me. Does this mean I’m ready to move?
I know that this debate really is not about belongings and the hassle of transporting them. It is about finding a deeper connection to a place my heart wants to call “home.” By trying to live both here and there, I end up living nowhere. Perhaps I should hang a sign in each kitchen that reads “THERE’S NO PLACE LIKE HERE.” It seems that some declaration is called for.
Maybe it’s a cliché, but the beach is the place I go to for contemplation and renewal. Watching the waves, I see the process of giving and taking away. I watch each wave deposit shells and stones on the shore, then wash away some of what it just brought in. I walk the shoreline and observe my footprints, well defined at first, then fading and soon erased by the inevitable wave. Who wouldn’t find peace and contentment in such an environment?
Well, maybe I wouldn’t. As I roll into the beach house lugging provisions for a weekend visit—laptop, groceries, books, clothes—I feel like that ocean wave, dumping stuff on the shore and then repeating the washing away process when I leave the beach to return “home.”
My granddaughter Rachel and I have played a game in the sand ever since she was old enough to walk. I walk ahead, and she follows in my footsteps. I take giant steps and tiny steps; I hop and skip; I walk in circles. Always she is behind me, stepping in my footprints. I zig, I zag, then suddenly stop and take three steps backwards. “You’ll play this game with your children,” I tell her, “and you’ll say, ‘My grandmother taught me this.’”
Rachel is 11 now and loves spending time with me at the beach, but she views my proposed move as desertion of the worst sort. In Olney, I live a short distance from her and her brother, Andrew, 14. They can ride their bikes to my house and visit. I can run over to help with homework, take Rachel to dance class, or give Andrew a ride to basketball practice. As they get older, I know that the amount of time they will be willing to spend with me, or with any other adult for that matter, will be limited.
Yet, Rachel, in particular, seems to want assurance that she can follow in my footsteps in
Both my homes hold their share of happy memories. Staying in Olney for a summer weekend, I invite Andrew and Rachel to spend the night in the tiny spare bedroom of my condo. We eat dinner out; they make their favorite cake—a concoction of chocolate wafers and whipped cream. We watch TV from my bed. In the morning I make pancakes (the waffle iron is enjoying a restful weekend in my other kitchen), then take the children home so I can head to the beach for a few days.
I would miss the impromptu sleepovers. But then I consider that the time the whole family spends at the beach—Thanksgiving, Christmas, spring break, summer vacation—is one multi-generational slumber party with a legacy of priceless memories. Framed photos capturing some of these moments line my upstairs hallway—the whole family (dogs included) relaxing in bed, Rachel playing cards with her friends, Andrew overflowing his mother’s lap on a chair in the living room, the dining room table set for Thanksgiving dinner. Beach photos round out the collection—impressively deep holes dug in the sand, the kids climbing rocks and skipping stones into the ocean, a breezy November day on the Boardwalk. When friends come to visit, we challenge them to come up with a pose that will be “wall-worthy.”
Preparing for another weekend trek, I observe the zig and zag of my footsteps as I pack a cooler of refrigerated items and consider clothing choices. I catch myself saying to my dog, Nellie, “We’re going to the beach.” It’s not the fact of talking to a dog that’s remarkable—I do that all the time—but the language I choose that stands out. When we’re about to return to
I began writing this piece, sure that by the time I finished, I would recognize my true home. It would be written as plainly as my footsteps in wet sand. But the outline is still fuzzy. Do I establish a permanent foothold on the Atlantic shore? Or do I come and go like the tide, allowing my footprints to fade as I desert one place for the other? I eye my permanently packed tote bag by the door. With each trip, it gets heavier as I throw in a few more books, a sweater, another pair of shoes. What can I do to lighten the load?
I make a few decisions. I will make the beach house more “home-like” by moving more of my things there—my favorite dishes, a bookcase, a real desk where I can write and pay bills. My beach stays lengthen to a full week, and with fewer two-way trips, I’m doing better at feeling as if I actually live there. I have time to browse in the library, sit on the beach and read, prepare real meals. Nellie and I take long walks on the beach. We stroll around our neighborhood, meeting other dogs and their owners. I try to remember to send Rachel a daily e-mail.
I’m sitting on the boardwalk. It is nearing sunset, and I try to pinpoint the moment when the sky turns pink, muting the ocean’s blue to a shifting blend of silver, rose, lilac—color names so inadequate that I long for my camera. I’ll have to come back at this time of day, I think.
Thanksgiving is a few months away. In preparation, I’ve planted rosemary in the front yard. It survived the winter, and in one season progressed from gawky twig to thriving shrub. I imagine the delightful aromas that will fill the kitchen, and I know that I am establishing my home at the beach one footprint at a time.