Our tiny cramped “board” house (made mostly of wood and wooden shingles) sagged under the weight of two families – the one consisting of my mother and father and their (then) four children; the other, my aunt and her (then) four children. In time, my aunt and children moved into a small “board” house of their own, while my family gradually built a “wall” house, over and around the old wooden frame of our original house.
The decision to upgrade our house emerged from a tangle of reasons, the most practical of which was that a “wall” house, made mostly of concrete, was better able to withstand the fierce storms and hurricanes that threatened each year. But in truth, housing, by and large, was also a highly visible symbol of means, and status, and upward mobility.
In rural communities like ours, the poorest of the poor lived in “wattle and daub” (mud) huts; the most well-to-do lived in “wall” houses with indoor toilets and running water and the in-between lived in variations of “board” houses or more modest “wall” houses.
The economic status of our family was precarious and complicated, and the renovation process was long, and fraught with challenges and mistakes. In the end, the house passed out of our hands, blown away by the storms of alcohol, abuse, and divorce. And as with all that is torn down, dust and debris remain--windswept fragments swirling here and there through the currents of life.
But life’s storms cannot sweep away what is real, and true, and valuable. And over time, the walls of resilience and courage, hope, and perseverance slowly took shape around the battered boards of loss and struggle; chaos and confusion; unmooring and disorientation.
For my mother, strong in faith and unwavering in purpose, had been building another house–one that would outlast the crumbling constructs of human striving. Placing her faith in God, the Master Architect and Builder of the universe, she followed the blueprint provided in Psalm 127: Unless the Lord builds the house the builders labor in vain…
That project, too, had its share of challenges and mistakes. But ultimately when “the rain came down, the streams rose, and the winds blew and beat against that house; yet it did not fall, because it had its foundation on the rock.” (Matthew 7:25).
That is not to say the storms did not take their toll. Not everything had been battened down against the whipping, and the buffeting, and the ravaging; and the losses piled up and toppled over into the future.
Yet the very definition of future suggests renewal and replenishment. So even as I mourn the loss of irreplaceable treasures –tangible and intangible–from the past, I cannot overlook the things that withstood the storms–the structure of character and values, the buttresses of faith, family, and fortitude, and the foundation on the Solid Rock. And room by room, I still uncover the treasures that were preserved in the house that Mom built.
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