Akron: One, Hudson: Zero
Moving can be a really drawn out process, as anyone who has done it knows. I've done it a lot, so I certainly know what to do. But I didn’t exactly plan anything this time, and loose ends were kind of dangling everywhere. It was the looming storage locker bill that motivated me to just wrap things up.
For the majority of my adult life I was closely associated with being “from Hudson.” For locals, there’s a certain gravitas to it. As communities go, Hudson is a special place; a place of high incomes, limited growth, good schools and rather libertarian attitudes. If you can afford to be there, you’re welcome. Who and what you are matters not.
Bob and I always felt welcome in Hudson. He worked hard to pay for and I worked hard to create a nice life for us, the two men who had more than a little in common with Ozzie and Harriet. More like Samantha and Darrin in Bewitched, now that I think of it. I even had a wild alter ego a la Serena. Remember her? Wild and free and always causing a scene.
The fact that we landed in Hudson and stayed 16 years or so is a testament to just how special Hudson is. Hudson was home. I sometimes regretted having to stray too far. I just always felt comfortable there, with Bob, in our home.
When Bob fell ill- how many times have I used that phrase in these blogs?- Everything changed. What worked so well for “us” felt as if it was collapsing on top of me like a house of cards. Not financially, per se, but our life was just too big for one person to live. I felt vulnerable and ridiculous- this little man in the huge house not really doing anything, just existing. Suddenly everything meant nothing. Bob’s illness became my whole world.
My ex-wife, Amy, who surprisingly knows me better than just about anyone, despite our being out of touch for 25 years or so, said something so smart to me on a recent visit. “You’ve never been very sentimental, its true. Except about Bob.” I could probably fill the olympic size pool in Hudson High School with the tears I’ve shed over Bob in the nearly 2 years since his stroke, but my fondness for Hudson is just a part of my past. Been there, done that. I actually got the shirt. I never wore it.
I don’t know quite how it happened, but I seem to really fit in the place I ended up, in a quaint workers cottage, circa 1946 (the year Bob was born) on a bluff overlooking a wooded valley, specifically Cascade Valley Metropark. It’s quiet here and I’ve always liked this area. My mother’s side of the family always lived near here so I feel somewhat connected to it. Oddly, most of my neighbors are also single older men, perhaps widowers, which I suspect has to do with the modest size of the houses here. Many are smaller than mine.
During my time with Bob, we always had amazing houses. Even the one-bedroom apartment I lived in last was gorgeous once I gave it my personal touch. And the place I live now? It’s not just a house. It hadn’t been altered since it was built so it has a sense of architecture to it. It really seems to fit my idea of what a home should be. Modest though it is, it is special. Special to me, anyway. Check back a year from now, and it’ll blow you away. Even half-done, it kicks ass. Let’s just state the obvious. I have the magic with houses.
I didn’t think I’d ever get the chance to be a homeowner again after Bob died. After all, he bankrolled every place we ever lived. But paring down has taken me back to my roots. In my 20s I lived in a super cheap house, made grand by building furniture and doing renovation by hand, with an eye to honoring the architecture and avoiding extravagance. It’s a formula that always works. Pair down, strip away any unnecessary excess, and build back up from the basics. I’m grateful to be able to perform this trick one more time. Grateful to Bob, who technically bankrolled even this project.
I just wish I could share my new life, in my new place, with him. I know he’d be impressed.
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