Home Is the Place
From the Archive
In her essay “The Good End of Pleasant Street,” which appears in our June issue, Heather Lanier and her family move into an apartment that’s part dream, part unfortunate reality. Their new place is in a beautiful Vermont town and has affordable rent. However, it’s also got lead paint, loud neighbors, and proximity to the town’s heroin crisis. All of this leaves the author continually wondering whether she’s living at what local residents call the “good end” or the “bad end” of Pleasant Street.
As Heather’s essay explores, home is always a complicated concept—it can be a sanctuary, a stressor, a responsibility, or our most treasured memory. Below you’ll find links to a few interpretations that have appeared in The Sun over the years.
Take care and read well,
Nancy Holochwost, Associate Editor
My Parents’ Furniture
May 1996For many of us the house we grew up in will always be home. Jake Gaskins’s childhood home is “nothing extraordinary,” as he says—except for the memories attached to everything inside it. As he empties the house after his mother moves to a nursing home, each item connects him to a moment in his past.
Since You Left
August 1989In beautifully vibrant language, Cedar Koons writes about rearranging her home after her partner has left, a poignant comment on how the inhabitants of a house make it what it is.
Mr. Handyperson
August 1994We don’t often print advice in The Sun, but we made an exception in the 1990s for Mr. HandyPerson (a.k.a. Mark A. Hetts) when we published excerpts from his home-repair newsletter. Even if you have no interest in house projects, this piece is worth reading for the author’s philosophical and funny musings on technology, excessive packaging, and the waste of perfectly fixable vacuum cleaners.
Inmates
October 2022Moving into a duplex whose other resident is your ex-wife may not sound like a good idea, but in this understated, thoughtful short story by Daniel DiStefano, living in the same building is the couple’s first step toward reconnecting after a terrible loss.
The Smaller House
November 2020A new home, no matter how wonderful it is, can still leave us longing for the place we lived before. Mark Irwin’s expertly crafted poem recalls just such a desire to return to his “simple life” in a house with only his books and dreams for company.
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