This opinion piece reflects the views of John Hazlehurst only and are not endorsed by the Pikes Peak Bulletin.
Do we shape our homes, or do our homes shape our lives? After 85 years of living in many types of dwellings in various parts of the world, I know the places we call home have a powerful effect.
Born in Colorado Springs, I spent the first 14 years of my life in a turn-of-the-century three-story house in the 1500 block of North Tejon. It was comfortable and familiar, but gloomy. Every window had curtains and window shades and my parents closed them all in the evening, as did most of their neighbors. They didn’t want to look at the Twomblys to the north or the Eges to the south, let alone any random pedestrians.
Yet ours were fascinating neighbors, since the Twomblys ran a boarding house, and Manitou Ege and his sister Jean Dummer were kind to the lonely boy next door – 80 years later, I am still thankful to them.
In the ninth grade, my parents enrolled me as a boarding student at Fountain Valley, and I was condemned to a couple of years of residence in a dilapidated dormitory. I lived for summer – my own bedroom, my own neighborhood, my friends from childhood and sunlight streaming through the windows. But all of that ended when my father died in 1956, I got kicked out of Fountain Valley a few months later, and my mother moved to a smaller house on West Monroe.
Right now, this is home.
I then had a basement apartment that I loved, went to Colorado Springs High School and had a wonderful year. I could sneak girls downstairs, drink wine and make out. Then it was time for college in Connecticut, more wretched dormitories, and then years of adventuring.
I sailed around the world, lived aboard my boat in the West Indies and finally settled down for a while in New York. My then-girlfriend and I shared a fabulous rent-controlled apartment on Washington Square North, and an even more fabulous one at 17 E. 97th Street. But I was restless, energetic and permanently dissatisfied, so I headed south and hopscotched through Florida, Grenada, the Grenadines and finally back to Colorado Springs.
I was glad to be back in boring old Colorado Springs and quickly bought a house on Waco Court in Rockrimmon. At 41, it was the first house I owned, and the first place that really felt like home. We had cats, dogs and a secure and happy place for our kids. The house was relatively new, flooded with sunlight and surrounded by similar dwellings with similar owners. Those were happy times, as were the years in a splendid house in the 700 block of North Cascade. At the turn of the century, it was time to move to the Westside and enjoy a then-affordable three-story house on West Bijou. Twenty-five years later, we’re still here with three young dogs and plenty of room for visiting children, grandchildren and their kids (for a few days, anyway!).
My wife, Karen, insists that the beautiful old wreck is now too big, impractical and expensive to maintain, and that we ought to sell it. But right now, this is home. It may once have been a gloomy Victorian, but the shades and curtains are gone, the interior is light and sunny and we’re ready for summer. I love this house, and would prefer to stay forever, but who knows? We may find a young family to buy, update and love this 126-year-old beauty, and we’ll hopefully stumble on a one-story house with a big yard for the dogs and an unobstructed view of the Peak.
How will we transition from this home to the next? I guess we’ll start with an enormous yard sale …
