The Homes That Built Me

By Hannah Vore

Growing up I had two homes. My house, and the cottage. They say home is where the heart is, and my heart belonged to that small cottage on the lake. Unfortunately, we don't own it anymore, but I still have my house and that also holds a special place in my heart. Both places have many memories engraved in their structures, yet have such different characteristics that make each one special. This is represented through the architecture, the landscape, and the atmosphere of each home.

Since one place is an actual house, and the other is a cottage, the architecture for both is very different. My house looks like your average home. There are two living rooms, a kitchen, dining area, three bedrooms, two bathrooms, and a basement. I love my bedroom, it's something I'm always reorganizing or rearranging. I have my vinyls hanging on the wall, my cart full of books, and my comfortable bed full of pillows and blankets. Connected to our back living room is a screened in porch, which my grandma who lived in Florida loves to call the "lanai”. We spend a lot of our summer evenings out there eating dinner and playing games. Our basement, beside the laundry room, is full of every old toy we played with as kids, from Barbies to squinkies, from nerf guns to princess dresses.

Whereas my house looks average, the cottage always stuck out on the lake with its unique design. It was an A frame with half a hexagon sticking out in the middle. It was built on a hill, so we had to walk about 25 steps to the main deck and an extra IO to the bottom deck. Inside it had a very small kitchen, a little dining area in the comer, a living room, one bedroom, a tiny bathroom, and the stairs to the basement. My parents slept in the bedroom, while my sister and I shared the pullout couch in the small living room. It wasn't bad though, I'd do anything to be laying on that old faded floral couch, watching cartoons again. The sliding glass door in the living room led out to the old deck. The chipped wood would burn your bare feet in the middle of the day when the sun was high in the sky. There was an old wooden picnic table in the corner of the deck where we ate pretty much every meal. The basement always scared me as a kid, with two very small guest bedrooms, and a toilet in the corner, which we called the prison bathroom. However, my dad tore down the wall and opened it up to store our stuff. The basement door led out to the bottom deck where there was a wooden swing and a small shed full of old fishing gear and tools. Everything about the place was old and small, but that's what I loved about it. It wouldn't seem like much to anyone else, but to me it was Heaven on Earth.

I have always loved spending time outside with nature. This love for the outdoors came from not only the places we traveled to and camped, but also from the two places where I grew up. At my house we have a good-sized yard with a field and woods behind it. In the back of the yard, we have a big tree house where I spent my days making paint out of chalk with my best friend and swinging on the swing set until I was sure I was high enough to hit the tree branches. There's an electric horse fence behind the barn that I was always terrified of going near. l grew up riding four wheelers through our trails in the woods and doing doughnuts in the field. In the winter we'd take our tubes and kneeboards and pull them in the snow behind the big four-wheeler. We live in a neighborhood, so we ride our bikes or take our dog for walks. We have lots of deer that eat our plants, bunnies that play in the yard, squirrels that run along the fence, and noisy birds. At the cottage, the landscape was a bit different. We had a small yard that led right to the shore of the lake. It wasn't nice and sandy like Lake Michigan. There was muck and seaweed that I was squeamish of as a kid. f grew up kayaking and paddle boarding along the shore, by the hundreds of lily pads, perfect for picking water lilies, and the tree limbs that the turtles sunbathed on. Instead of tearing up the field on the four wheelers we whipped around the jet ski on the water. Every morning, I would run down the rickety dock, snake grass to my left and our little water slide to the right, to dip my foot in the water to test the temperature. Every evening, we cruised on the pontoon and watched the beautiful sunset sink behind the trees. Halfway across the lake was what we called the sandbar, which was along the shoreline but instead of muck there was nice sand. There used to be a broken tree trunk that would hang over the water that we would sit on and wait for our parents to take a picture. My dad and I would explore the woods and one time came across a small shed that my dad claimed was the Hansel and Gretel house, I was terrified of ever going back. The wildlife consisted of lots of fish, turtles, water snakes (my mom's least favorite), a bat that once snuck into the cottage, the peacocks that never shut up, and the barn cat from down the road, that we named Jim Harbough.

Living in a house creates a certain atmosphere to the place. My house is where we live, year-round. And it shows. Our shoes piled up by the doorway, the mail on the counter, the pet hair all over, and the smell of all the wax melts my mom loves to buy. The decorations change every season, but the rest of the house remains the same. In the morning there is chaos trying to get ready, and arguments left and right because no one wants to be up. After school and work, we do our homework in our rooms, eat dinner at the table, and watch tv in the living room. This house is where we live life, and all the ups and downs that come with it. At the cottage, it was more of an escape from life. An oasis in the middle of chaos. It was like the rules at home didn't apply there. I could eat as many s'mores as I wanted, drink a bunch of pop, and watch tv all night. Out there I could be someone else. We only spent summer weekends there, so the rest of the year it sat there, untouched. During Memorial weekend we would gather the family to put the dock in and take all the covers off the furniture, getting it ready for summer. I would throw my overnight bag in the bedroom, put my suit on and jump in the water. We rarely spent any time inside; instead, we'd be out swimming, boating, tubing, and running around. The smell of the grill starting up would get our attention, and we'd all gather around the old picnic table on the deck waiting for our hotdogs and burgers. The cottage was an escape from reality, and it’s where I was my happiest. Whether I was reading in the hammock, swimming in the lake, or staring at the stars, I was never bored there.

Despite the differences in architecture, landscape, and atmosphere, both places were a true home to me. Both places had such different characteristics, but I know each like the back of my hand, from the worn furniture to the creaking floors. Whether I was spending time on the screened-in porch, or the deck, in the woods, or on the lake, I was always making memories. My house and the cottage are both the homes that built me.