I had my dream again last night — the one where I’m in my childhood house. The circumstances change from dream to dream, but invariably whenever I dream about being at home (even if I’m home in present day with my husband and children), in my dream, we live in my childhood home — 606.
That’s the number of the house that I grew up in and I’m not quite sure what that means.
Four years ago, after years of scrimping and saving while raising our growing family, my husband and I finally purchased a one-story home in a more rural part of Brooklyn. Both my husband and I grew up in Windsor Terrace, and we both would have loved to stay there, but once the influx of out-of-towners inundated the place a few seconds after the neighborhood was deemed trendy, the prices of homes became literally insane. So we found a cozy, one-family in a neighborhood where children, families, and home life was abound and alive. It was a solid, mindful, and good decision.
And yet there is something in me that achingly longs for that childhood neighborhood of mine, and it has nothing to do with the restaurants, venues, coffee shops, or schools in Windsor Terrace or Park Slope. You see, when I grew up there, the neighborhood was anything but desirable. There was graffiti on the Key Food supermarket and the F train, more litter on the streets, and no fancy restaurants, but there was a bunch of families struggling to make ends meet and kids who lined the streets each day playing made-up games. Everything was closed on Sunday evenings because family dinners were important. It was as small town America as you could get in New York City. You better believe that if you misbehaved, someone’s mother would scream at you through the window and then tell your mother, and you’d get punished at least twice. Most of us kids grew up having very little — except a lot of fun.
I often wonder if my recurring dream in which I am always living in that house is a longing for a simpler life, but I tend to think that it has more to do with wanting to recapture my childhood. It was a simple upbringing. My sister and I lived on our single mother’s modest income and we did without brand-name labels and luxuries, but our lives were very filled with love and laughs. It’s ironic how crazy we get as parents today, trying to make sure that our kids have everything they need and want. As children, most of us didn’t, but we were settled, stable, taught to do the right thing, stick up for ourselves, and go after what we want.
Will the kids today — who are simply handed everything — have the same strengths growing up? And is their childhood any better because they have iPods, iPads, cellphones, an app for everything, and anything else they want? I fear it’s the opposite.
I’m willing to bet that if you recall your favorite childhood memory, it has nothing to do with an expensive item, but rather has something to do with a special memory involving people you cared deeply about.
My kids often tell me they would have loved to grow up on the ’80s when things were simpler. I wish they could have, too. So I tell them stories about how my childhood was and try my best to recreate special family memories for them.
And every now and then, I dream about 606.
Danielle Sullivan, a mom of three, has worked as a writer and editor in the parenting world for more than 10 years. Sullivan also writes about pets and parenting for Disney’s Babble.com. Find her on Facebook and Twitter @DanniSullWriter, or on her blog, Just Write Mom.
