Five Houses

I live here, we say, this is my house, my home. We settle, dwell, adorn. A house feels permanent. But this illusion of security can end in a minute. When the illusion is shattered in childhood, as it was for me, you can spend decades harbouring a longing for that lost house, that place that seemed safe. Others, like my mother, who left her childhood home in Germany in the 1930s, somehow learn to forget. She lost her identity, her nationality, and a large fortune. In her, the shock has engendered pragmatism rather than nostalgia.