Fathers teach their children many things and in many ways. Sometimes they teach by example and sometimes by parable, but always fathers teach what they value…what matters most to them. My father taught me that home matters.
As a child everyone I was related to lived, with only rare exception, in the same town; the same five mile radius, actually. Those relatives who had ventured out of town were expected to come home at holidays. We did not go to them. It wasn’t even considered. Holidays at home mattered.
I grew up knowing the homes in town by the families who lived in them, most often having built them, and 
my family was no exception. Every family home had a pen and ink drawing of it hanging on the wall. Homes were the trademark of the family; the tangible evidence of belonging.
After my parents wed they moved in with my father’s mother until my father could build their marital home…next door. My folks moved into our new home when I was six months old and it is the home all three of us children were raised in until we left as adults. That home was planned down to the last tiny detail by my father, who oversaw its’ design and construction. Every room was planned around how his growing family would use it; a child’s bedroom near the master bedroom for the newest arrival, an upstairs bedroom large enough to serve as a playroom but with back stairs to the breakfast room, the better to call us to a meal in our pajamas. There was a library for study and games, a sunroom with the perfect place for a Christmas tree and a formal dining room large enough for dinners with extended family and guests.
Our home was filled with furnishings passed down from family through generations. Every piece had sentimental value and we children were taught the provenance of each. It mattered that we knew which great grandparent, which grandparent had owned each item, how they had procured it and where it had stood in their home.
I grew up watching my father care lovingly for our home. I knew what architectural features were his favorites and how they were constructed and maintained. I learned how to care for a home with the change of seasons and I watched him plant the garden and plan our future. Our home mattered because his family mattered.
When I bought my first home at the age of twenty-three, my parents immediately began to pass on family possessions to me in order to make my new house a home. I had just made my lifetime career choice. I was a newly minted real estate agent. What else would I have done? My father didn’t suggest I become a Realtor but what better choice of career is there for someone who was taught from birth how very important a home is to a family.
By my father’s loving words and patient example he handed me my family's history as well as my future. Home matters. I miss you Daddy, give Mother a big hug for me.
SarahGray...
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