Ghost story

My house is haunted.

We should have figured it out before we ever moved in considering how much time we spent here remodeling before we unloaded our U-Haul. Instead, we'd been here a couple of days before my oldest son called out from inside our closet, "Mom? You gotta see this."

And unlike those shady ghost hunter shows on TV, I have real, discernible photographic evidence: 

Ghosts. A dozen of them. More, even. Ghosts of hopes, dreams, and worries. I never met the previous owners of our house. I know very little about them. I don't think everything went well for them because we bought this house from the bank after a foreclosure. The house was in decent condition when we took over, but there were a few clues left behind. Like I know they had kids. I can tell by the height of the scuff marks on the walls. We repainted everything, but in two years' time, I already have exact same scuff marks in the same place from my own kids. At about three feet up from the floor, there's a six inch grime strip running down every wall in my house. 

We removed a bunch of sparkly puffy stickers from one bedroom closet door. And they had a spicy red kitchen.

Those were the only things I knew before I moved in. But here's what I know now: A father lived here. He wrote these. He hoped for things. He worried about things. He counted his blessings. 

 Money. Some people have less or none.

And he definitely had the right priorities. Look at the very top of the list:

Jesus. His grace. 2nd chances.

 Some of it didn't work out because I live in his house now. Look at this picture again:

See the missing spaces where Post-Its should be? I wonder what happened. Maybe he gave up and took those affirmations down. Maybe they came true and he didn't need them anymore. Maybe they just fell off. 

These are still here, and we've been in the house two years. I guess I should take them down. But I don't want to. They seem like friendly ghosts. Or maybe just wistful ones. But living in Orange County, in a city that's only 25 years old, it's nice to find a hint of history in any kind of house here, even if it's the Post-It kind.

Yeah, I  know. Most of you think it's weird. *Shrugs* I can't even defend myself. But they're staying. I don't want to take away his prayers.

There's a review and a giveaway of SMART MOVE over on Mary's blog, The Sweet Bookshelf today. What are you waiting for? Go on.