The Good Is Still Good

A few weeks ago, I was back in New Jersey for a visit and drove by my old house. We lived in a neighborhood called Sturbridge Woods – so named because of the woods, appropriately enough. The developers intentionally left as many of the big, beautiful trees as possible and built the houses around them. We had very little grass: a small patch in front and a small patch in back. Most of the yard was natural wooded area.

It was really beautiful, friends. Lovely shade in the summer. Lovely bird twitters in the spring. Lovely colors in the fall. The leaf clean-up every October was a pain in the butt (credit to the ex who took on the bulk of that duty). But ohhh, the beauty!

I loved this house. I loved living in this house, homeschooling in this house, having friends over in this house, hosting overnight guests in this house. It was a big place to clean – and yes, I experienced some really painful moments while we resided here. But I have fond memories of our life in Sturbridge Woods on Forrest Hills Drive.

So, to reiterate, I was back in Jersey a few weeks ago and drove by the old place to take a look and reminisce. I was a little startled when I first turned into the neighborhood, wondering about the upgrade that happened to all these homes. But no – they were always this big and nice. I’d just forgotten how nice the neighborhood really was. (Again, full credit to the ex for housing us well.)

I was more startled as I continued down the main drag and passed a house that looked a bloody mess. All sorts of work was being done to the front . . . I kind of wondered if a small fire or something had done damage to the place. But more than that, there were no trees in the front lawn. In Sturbridge Woods, people! Somebody took out every tree. What up with that? Who made that choice? I shook my head as I drove by.

And then I suddenly recognized the next house as my former neighbor’s. And I realized – that ugly place was my old house.

I turned around to park in front . . . and stared for a while. Every tree was gone. At least every original tree – they had planted a wimpy little new thing in the middle of the front yard that didn’t even fit in the surrounding forest on either side. There wasn’t even a real lawn in place of the trees – it was a spread of weeds, almost as bad as my current rental place.

Y’all. I almost cried.

Being a literature teacher and a Bible teacher, I tend to study the events of my life looking for deeper meanings . . . patterns . . . figurative images. And because I’m looking, I usually find them. This was a moment that felt symbolic to me. Everything that had made this home beautiful (at least from the outside) was now gone. And I realized that I’ve kind of felt that way about that part of my life as a whole.

I’ve avoided working on my scrapbooks for the last three years, and I’ve certainly avoided looking at my old scrapbooks. It’s sometimes hard viewing the past through the colored lenses I now wear. But I’m trying to remember that some – maybe most – of that past wasn’t affected by the knowledge I have now. My friendships were the same. The work I did at church and in my homeschool co-op was the same. The precious moments with my daughters were the same. All the good is still there. All the good is still good. Very good. I need to learn to let go of the bad without letting go of the good . . . or maybe I need to embrace both? Is that helpful? Is that possible? I don’t know yet.

But it was a good house. And a good life there. I’m grateful for it . . . and grateful to have moved on, too. God is good . . . all the time.