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[Furtherman]

Mom and Dad are buying a new house. The house I grew up in will be sold. I love that house. I love the neighborhood. I'll get to spend a couple more holidays there, which is nice, but then it'll be gone. Some people move around, maybe grew up in two or three houses. It was just one for me. So to see it go is really depressing. Damn me for not making my first million yet in order to buy it.

[bobsnin]

I've never really felt like I had a "Home" since I went to college. I still love my parents place and I like the places I've lived, but it always feels temporary.

[Drunky McBetidont]

i heard kevin smith talk about this on a smodcast. he said he wishes he had bought his parent's house and regrets not having done it now.

[LaBoob]

Damn Furtherman, I'm going through the same thing!! My mom's been talking about retiring in Virginia for a while now and she just put the "5 years" out there yesterday! The house I grew up in will be gone. I can't even fathom it. I'm tearing up just writing this.

An old friend of mine just went through the same thing too... I was upset I didn't get to say goodbye to her old house!

Whenever I'm at my mom's house, even though their leaving is so far away, I make it a point to look at all the rooms and think of the memories we had there, and really take a second to appreciate those walls and floors that mean so much to me.

There are two positive things I can think of in MY situation: 1) hopefully my parents will pick out a really nice place in Virginia that I can vacation in and eventually inherit, and 2) moving out of their house while they're still reasonably young (they'll be in their early 60s) will mean THEY have to clean out the majority of the junk and clutter in their house and handle that... I often look at the stuff they've packed their basement with (old car parts - my dad restored Corvettes but still has a TON of parts left and I wouldn't know what to do with them) and I'm overwhelmed by the idea that if anything happened to them I'd be left to deal with all of that and I wouldn't even know where to begin.

I guess the 3rd positive way to look at my parents situation is that they're just as flaky as I am and they say they're going to do something and never do it... hell, my dad promised me one of his Corvettes for when I turned 21 and that was quite a while ago, and it's still sitting in the garage with no engine or even seats.

But for you, be sure to enjoy the last few holidays you'll have there and take some time to walk around and breathe in the memories and the feeling of that space. Maybe even take a few pictures, or ask for some of the things that you loved the most. I recently asked for a few things my mom had up that were my grandmother's and was surprised that she gave them to me! Yay! And it pissed my sister off because she wanted them. Double yay!

[A.J.]

We moved several times during the first few years of my life. The only home I really loved was the one I lived in from ages 3-8. The house I lived in from then on (until I went to college) was a toilet -- and probably part of the reason I could wait to get the hell out of it and off to college.

When my parents sold it a little over 10 years ago they asked if I'd be upset if they sold it. I told them they should never have BOUGHT it.

[Alice S. Fuzzybutt]

My sister and I had to sell my dad's house after he died 20 years ago. It was WAAAY too much for us to take on (I was 21, she was 28. PLUS there was NO WAY IN HELL I would have survived living with that psycho bitch from HELL!!)

Anyway, I still dream about it often. I have gone back and I saw that the people who now own the house cut down my favorite tree in the backyard.

I've lived in my current apartment (18 years) almost as long as I lived in that house (if you take into consideration I "moved out" when I was 18 to attend college).

[underdog]

I was trying to get my parents to sell my childhood home for like 4 years, then the market crashed. The house doubled then tripled in value in less than 10 years.