My childhood home #haibun #prose

I don’t remember much about the first house that I lived in. I remember my mum and dad dancing to records after drinking too much wine. Perhaps they had an argument too, or else why would I remember the wine? But I don’t remember the argument, I just remember them dancing to records. I remember sitting on the sofa crying when it was time to leave.

When I was three years old, we moved into the house which would become my home for the next 15 years. After that, I would keep trying to leave: at 18 (I lasted 3 days); at 19, when I went to university, but still kept coming back; even when I moved out and set up home with the man who would become my husband, we ended up living there together for 3 years.

Then finally we moved all the way to London. I was still attached to my childhood home. When I had my first son we moved back there once again. 6 months in that house with a newborn baby turned out to be a permanent cure for homesickness. We soon moved back to London, then on to Barcelona, Malaga, Slovenia…I couldn’t imagine going back to live there now, though there was once a time when I couldn’t imagine living anywhere else.

Winds of change howling
over the terraced rooftop
of my childhood home.

Written for dVerse

Lillian has asked us to delve into our most distant childhood memories and write a short prose piece based on this, followed by a traditional haiku. I have very vague memories of my first ever home, which I left when I was 3. The photo shows my youngest son in my childhood home, on his third birthday.

I have got used to moving house in recent years, but at times I get nostalgic. My poem, ‘No Homelike Place‘ which was based partially on these experiences.