I went away for a while and left no-one to tend my small apartment. I left it clean and in good order and expected to return to find it as I left it. It’s not much, but it’s my home, my little world.
Yet with no loving hand to tend it, it fell into disrepair.
The dust settled over the face of everything, the plants withered and died, the garbage (which I’m sure I had taken out) had rotted and left an unpleasant smell everywhere. The fridge was bare, the water in the taps had a strange colour from disuse and the power was off. Cut off due to unpaid bills.
There was no laughter, no music, no life in this place. Either dead or sleeping.
Everywhere I looked there were things to clean, repair, replace and in dire need of fresh air to blow away the stench.
The task seemed impossible and I wanted to give up and leave it to rot. But I could not.
It’s my home.
I cannot just turn my back on it and look away.
Where to start? Which place to tidy, clean or care for first? How to bring this dead world back to life?
I summoned all my energy and willpower, took a deep breath and started. It didn’t matter where. Anywhere. Just to feel I was doing something.
Turn on the taps and the stereo, clean the dust, remove the garbage, tend the plants, fill the cupboards with food once more.
At first the small touches seemed to have no impact on the emptiness, the mess and lack of life. But bit by bit, step by step it started to recover. Started to breathe again. What had seemed hopeless and beyond saving came back to life. Laughter returned. Music was heard once more, softly at first, so as not to disturb the silence. Two steps forward and one step back – I had to live in that place and with living comes disturbance and a certain chaos.
And now, it still gets a little unruly at times. The mess, a consequence of living in this small world of mine.
Next time I leave, I’ll find some careful tenants to look after it for me.
It’s the least I can do.
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Coming home after an absence–sometimes even a short one–can be jarring. You expect things to be as you left them, and for me that usually means hectic, and you come back and the place has settled into its own rhythm without you.
I like this post!
Hi Ian,
Hope home is feeling more like home now. As I read this I was thinking how it applies to our ’soul’ as well – when we lose touch with ourselves and finally come back and find we’re all a mess inside! Thanks for sharing.
Hi Ian,
This reminds me of the importance of taking baby steps forward, even if it doesn’t seem like we’re making progress. Little by little, we get there – and that’s a good lesson for me.
Hopefully you’re finding progress bringing you back to where you want to be…
My husband thinks it’s strange but I ALWAYS superclean the house before we leave on a trip. Even if we are spending the evening out, I’ll take extra time to make sure everything is picked up. I like coming home to HOME. But it’s pretty amazing that no matter how clean you clean, you can always tell on your return that it has lain empty.
So true! We have a small apartment attached to our house – we use it when the parents visit – but it’s empty most of the year and it does feel cold and dusty and uninviting. I have to put a lot of effort into it every time before we have visitors to make it feel more welcoming.
That is so true, you only come to appreciate your “space” when you are away from it for a while and then come back.
It’s like this with everything else in life, which is quite interesting and a bit of a mystery to me.
KIM … great to see you here! In my case I’m usually coming home to an empty apartment. So settling into its own rhythm basically means the dust settling. Where does it come from? It’s a mystery.
DAPHNE … thanks for noticing another level! I intended the piece to be more than face value … coming home to me when I’ve not been looking after myself, and also the state of the world as a whole and how much we’ve neglected it collectively.
LANCE … that was quite powerful for me. I knew it already, but seeing the importance and effect of those baby steps in something as mundane as cleaning up, was very powerful.
HAYDEN … any chance you could drop by my place before I leave for a trip and do the same? Then your husband will definitely think it’s strange!
VERED … yes, it’s impossible to create a ‘lived in’ feel without actually living in a place. Us humans seem to leave some energy behind us.
TOM … you don’t appreciate what you’ve got until it’s gone. An old cliche, but still very true.
Hi Ian – It’s discomforting to return to our home, usually a place of warmth and comfort, and find it to be the opposite of those things! But, like always, a little attention directed towards what needs it most livens things up again.
Thanks for the post.
Ian,
I can relate to your experience somewhat here, in that just last week, I returned home from a short trip to Thailand to a dirty, messy lifeless apartment.
The only difference between my experience and yours is that I fully anticipated the experience as I found my apartment exactly how I left it.
Getting tenants in might help, but this they can also make things a whole lot worse if they do not take appropriate care, or worse, behave irresponsibly and break things.
Just like with the economy, there’s no quick fix to it, we need to take baby steps. It does require a level head going in to tackle things such as this, but the reward in the long run is the fruits of your labor.
AMANDA – you’re right about attention. A little of that can bring almost anything back to life.
ANDREW – welcome! Your comment brought a smile to me! Often I forget how I left the apartment when I’m away and then it’s a shock to see it when I get back. I think my memory is very selective.
TREY – agree 100%. As the old cliche goes ‘every journey starts with the first step’. And the longer we leave stuff (economy, environment, my apartment) the more steps it’s going take to put it right again.