Mine Old House

Occasionally, Sam wants to talk about his old house. Embarking on a lifestyle which will require frequent moves, Elise and I are especially conscientious of how this will affect our boys. Sam’s a smart kid. He knows when he says he wants to go back to his old house or just wants to talk about his old house, it immediately gets our attention. I’m convinced that he doesn’t so much want to go back to or talk about his old house as much as he just wants Elise or my undivided attention. He knows this is one way to get it.

Ironically, he doesn’t want to go back to his house in Florida. I think that’s the one that immediately springs to our mind. He remembers the small apartment we lived in for 8 months in Arlington, Virginia, a two-bedroom apartment on the 18-floor of a high-rise with a claustrophobic underground garage where police sirens howled at all hours of the night. He remembers the construction site we looked over and the revolving door at my old office there. It’s hard for us to believe that he would prefer that apartment to our house in Brazil.

When he tells me he wants to talk about his old house, I try to redirect the conversation to all the good things about our new house, our Brazil house. We talk about all the toys we have and the fun things to do. I tell him that Paulo (the gardener) and Zilda (our empregada) are at our new house, and we talk about going to the Parque da Cidade and playing at the playground at my new office. I’m hoping this still works if we ever find ourselves somewhere that’s not as wonderful as Brazil. I hope as long as he has our undivided attention, I can convince that his new house—wherever that may be—is better than his old house—all of them—because it is the house that we’re all in.