When a Home Becomes a Memory

“Thank you, God, for this good life and forgive us if we do not love it enough.” – Garrison Keillor

How many homes did you live in while growing up? As far as I can remember I lived in 6 different houses while living in the same area. A few we lived in for a short time, and others we stayed for a while. There are two houses that I lived in while rowing up that stuck out the most to me. I always named them based off the street we lived on. I remember living on John’s Road. The main memory I have of that house was it was so cold in the winter. It didn’t have central heat, just a floor furnace. The windows were not too good in it either. When the wind blew outside, the curtains moved on the inside with the windows closed. I remember we put a kerosene heater in the fireplace. This helped to warm the house up a little more. We did this before we went to bed at night. The other house I have most memories of was the one on End Street. The name of the street sounds like it was worse than the house on John’s Road. It was actually a pretty good house. It was a small town home that had just been built recently. It had plenty of space, and it had central heat. The only thing that made End Street sound bad was the name. My family no longer lives in these houses, but the memories I have of them lives on.

Something that is a common sight in Charlotte is older homes being torn down. When someone buys property in Charlotte, they usually are not after the house. They want the land the house sits on top of. Many single-home properties end up being subdivided into 2 or more homes on the same lot. Homes and buildings are being torn down all over the city. I captured these photos last July. A home across the street from us was torn down. This moment frozen in time in this photo shows the devastating part of change. We see people’s homes being torn down, and the structure that helps memories is lost. Change is good, but don’t forget what change costs. I captured these photos as a reminder of what was there before. Photography is not only you capturing good memories, but also bad ones as well.