A Letter To Emma

Dear Emma,

Not too long ago on a warm sunny day, my husband and I were walking our little dog down your street, and as we passed your house, we saw you sitting in a plastic chair in the driveway.  You seemed like you were looking for someone and when you spotted us approaching, you sat up straighter, leaned forward and began to smile and wave.  We smiled and waved back, and I felt a very strange feeling come over me - a premonition as it turns out, now.  I remember feeling that perhaps you were giving us a sign, and on that day I wondered what it would be like if we lived in that house.

You see, we have walked by that house thousands of times over the past three decades.  We’ve lived just a short distance away for the past thirty one years.  We have been renting the second floor of a two family home all that time, because we could never afford a home of our own.  My husband is a self-employed carpenter and roofer, and I am an office worker.  We started our lives together with nothing but each other, because that seemed like enough.

Oh, we looked at a few houses back in the eighties.  But even the relatively small down-payments back then before the housing explosion seemed like such a lot of money for us; a very young couple just starting out without a nickel to spare.  Then came the children, and our oldest was born with a condition that required years of expensive, weekly medical appointments that were not covered by our poor health insurance.  Soon it was time to help the kids with their educations which we were happy to do, but it was drain on our finances, and we just couldn’t save anything up.

We have grown almost old together, and although we have worked hard all our lives, we despaired of ever being able to own a place of our own, until we saw that your house was for sale.  At first, I was only mildly interested when we saw the sign.  We didn’t have much cash to spare, and I thought the house would be snapped up before we could scrape something together.  But the weeks ticked by and when the sign stayed and the price dropped, we knew that we had to do something.  From that moment on, everything has fallen into place perfectly, with amazing synchronicity.

Right away, my husband will fix the roof, shore up the floor joists, replace the ceilings and woodwork, and put up new sheetrock on the walls.  We will paint each room.  Over the next few years, we will landscape and groom the yard.  We love birds and I am already designing a beautiful feeder system and flower garden to bring them in.  I grew up with a swimming pool at my childhood home and have always dreamed of having one, so eventually we will get yours up and running again, and when we do, I plan on swimming every single day each summer.  It will be like heaven to me.

By God's Grace we are finally realizing our dream.  We waited on Him and He did not forsake us.  Different people we spoke with were amazed that the home stayed on the market for so long.  I tell them that no one else bought it because it's our house, meant for only us.  I know that it has been predestined that we should live there, and I want you to know that we will cherish and care for that little house.  I want to thank you Emma, for helping us to finally make the dream of our lives come true.   After today we will be going home...at long last.