My Brother Jack: The House That Remembered

Our family home in Queens, as I remember it in the 1970s. The house where Jack and I grew up, where laughter filled the rooms, and where memories were made that would last a lifetime.

There’s an old saying that you can never go home again.

Whoever came up with that little gem obviously never met my nephew Danny.

But I’m getting ahead of myself.

This story begins many years ago, in a house in Queens, New York, where my younger brother Jack and I grew up. From the outside, it was an ordinary family home, probably not much different from the other houses on the block. But inside those walls were enough memories, laughter, tears, and assorted acts of lunacy to fill several books.

And one particular memory that, even after all these years, still brings a lump to my throat.

THE FIRST SMILE

After my father died, my mother was lost. They had been devoted to one another, and his death left an emptiness in her life that nothing seemed capable of filling. At first, she was inconsolable. Eventually, she resumed the ordinary routines of living, but something was missing.

Her smile.

I remember how she would sit alone in the kitchen each evening, in the very place where she and Dad had spent so many nights talking, laughing, and cuddling. Now there was only one person sitting there.

It was heartbreaking to watch.

Then, one afternoon, something happened that I’ve never forgotten. I was hurrying upstairs when my mother, who was folding some freshly washed clothes, called my name. “Jimmy, come here. I have something to tell you.”

Uh-oh.

Like most young fellows summoned by their mothers, I immediately assumed I’d done something wrong. I couldn’t remember what it was, but I figured she’d be more than happy to remind me.

Instead, she had news.

“Your brother just told me he fell in love with a girl who lives around the corner. Imagine that? Isn’t that nice?”

And then she smiled.

It wasn’t a particularly dramatic moment. There were no trumpets, no swelling violins, no great declarations. Just my mother standing there with a handful of laundry, smiling at the thought of her younger son falling in love.

But it stopped me in my tracks.

Because it was the first time I’d seen her smile since my father died.

I felt a lump forming in my throat. My eyes began filling with tears, and I knew that if I stood there another moment, she’d see me crying.

So I did what any self-respecting young fellow would do under the circumstances.

I bolted upstairs.

I don’t know whether my mother ever realized what that little smile meant to me. But I’ve carried the memory of it all my life.

And the girl who had brought that smile to her face?

Her name was Joanne.

She would eventually become Jack’s wife, the mother of their son Danny, and an important part of our family.

Looking back, I realize that before Joanne ever moved into our house, she had already brought something wonderful into it.

For one brief, unforgettable moment, she had brought back my mother’s smile.

TWO BACHELORS AND A HOUSE

Eventually, my mother passed away, too.

Jack and I found ourselves living alone in the family home. I was twenty-four, and Jack was twenty. Neither of us was particularly experienced at running a household, but we were determined to keep the place going.

And we did.

In fact, we made a few improvements.

Well, perhaps improvements isn’t quite the right word. Let’s just say we introduced the house to the 1970s, whether it wanted to meet them or not.

First came a massive music system. Not merely a stereo, mind you, but the sort of equipment that suggested we were preparing to open a nightclub. If there was one thing our house wasn’t going to suffer from, it was insufficient volume.

Then we turned our parents’ former bedroom into a bachelor pad. And what a bachelor pad it was! Plush white carpeting covered the floor. We installed sectional furniture arranged in an arc, added an impressive wall mural, and made certain the music system could provide the appropriate atmosphere.

Looking back, I suppose the room was a monument to everything two young bachelors considered sophisticated in the 1970s.

Today, an interior decorator might describe it as a crime scene.

But we loved it.

Eventually, Jack and Joanne married. I suggested that Joanne move into the house with us and that we convert our magnificent bachelor pad into their bedroom.

Jack agreed, Joanne moved in, and our little household acquired something it had been missing for quite some time.

A woman with considerably more common sense than either of us.

THE HOUSE THAT HALLOWEEN BUILT

And then came the parties.

Oh, those parties!

Jack, Joanne, and I began hosting costume parties, particularly around Halloween. What started as gatherings of friends eventually became something of a local institution. People came dressed in elaborate costumes, music filled the house, and laughter seemed to find its way into every room.

Apparently, our parties made quite an impression.

Recently, Susan Anderson Morrell Fleury, who shared a two-week double honeymoon with Jack and Joanne in August 1979, reminded me of those days.

Recalling the honeymoon, she wrote:

“Of course, I laughed at the memory while I was typing it, like it happened 10 min ago instead of August 1979 while we double honeymooned. Best 2 weeks of my life! Have so many funny memories, loved Jack very much and of course his better half Joanne!”

Then she added another recollection: “And of course the amazing Halloween parties!”

Her comment was accompanied by a generous helping of laughing emojis.

Nearly half a century later, those parties were still making someone laugh.

I suppose that’s a pretty good indication that we were doing something right.

AN EXPENSIVE EDUCATION

Unfortunately, while Jack and I had become reasonably proficient at entertaining guests, there was one aspect of homeownership that had completely escaped my attention.

Property taxes.

You see, our house had no mortgage. It was fully paid for, and I operated under the mistaken assumption that once a house belonged to you, it belonged to you.

Period.

Apparently, the New York City Department of Finance had neglected to consult me on the matter.

I had no idea that property taxes continued indefinitely, whether you owed money on the house or not.

And because I didn’t know, I didn’t pay them.

For years.

By the time I discovered my mistake, the unpaid taxes had accumulated into a serious problem. Eventually, the house was placed in foreclosure.

I wasn’t working at the time, and things went from bad to worse. The electricity was shut off. The heating oil ran out. Without either, the house became virtually uninhabitable.

Jack and Joanne had to move out.

I stayed.

Alone.

In the cold.

I knew that my ignorance had contributed to the loss of the home our parents had left us. It wasn’t something I could laugh about then, and even today, the memory carries a certain sadness.

But something wonderful happened during that difficult period.

Joanne’s mother lived just around the corner. When Jack and Joanne needed somewhere to go, she welcomed them into her home. And although I wasn’t her son, she treated me as though I were.

She fed me on many occasions and showed me a kindness I have never forgotten.

Some people enter your life and leave behind memories. Others leave behind gratitude that lasts a lifetime.

She was one of those people.

Eventually, our family home passed into other hands. The music stopped, the parties ended, and the rooms that had once echoed with laughter became somebody else’s rooms.

Life moved on.

Or so I thought.

THE HOUSE THAT REMEMBERED

Years passed. Jack and Joanne raised their son, Danny, who grew into a young man with friends of his own.

Then, one day, something happened that I still find difficult to believe.

Danny had a friend who lived in the old neighborhood. One afternoon, his friend invited him over to his house.

An ordinary invitation.

An ordinary afternoon.

An ordinary house.

Except it wasn’t.

It was our house.

The very same house where Jack and I had grown up.

The house where we’d installed our enormous music system, created our bachelor pad, welcomed Joanne into the family, and hosted Halloween parties that people were still talking about decades later.

Of all the houses in Queens, Danny’s friend happened to live in that one.

But the coincidence didn’t end there.

Danny went downstairs into the basement.

And there, almost as though time had decided to take a little vacation, he discovered that much of it remained unchanged.

Including the pool table.

The very same pool table his father had told him about.

Think about that for a moment.

A young man walks into a friend’s house, goes downstairs, and finds himself standing in a room from his father’s past. A room he knew through stories.

And there it was. Real. Waiting.

I sometimes wonder how many people have lived in that house since we left. How many families have celebrated birthdays there, argued over dinner, watched television, or gathered around the kitchen table?

Did any of them know about the two brothers who once lived there?

Did they know about the Halloween parties?

Did they know that the basement pool table had become part of the family stories passed from father to son?

Probably not.

And that’s perfectly all right.

Because a house doesn’t have to remember the people who lived in it.

The people remember the house.

THE STORIES NEVER REALLY END

When I recently wrote about Jack, I was astonished by the response. The article received more views and reactions than anything I’d previously published on my website.

But the response that meant the most came from Jack’s son, Danny.

He called it “awesome and perfect.”

Three words.

Coming from Jack’s son, they meant more to me than any number of views.

I started writing these stories because I wanted people to remember my younger brother as I remembered him: intelligent, inventive, funny, and capable of turning an ordinary day into something worth talking about years later.

Jack wasn’t merely my brother.

He was my best friend.

And although he’s no longer here to add his own version of events—which, knowing Jack, would probably be considerably funnier than mine—I’m discovering that his stories haven’t stopped being told.

Susan remembers the honeymoon and those Halloween parties.

Danny remembers the house.

And I remember the young fellow who shared it with me, back when we thought a wall mural, plush white carpeting, and a stereo loud enough to wake the dead were the very height of sophistication.

We lost that house many years ago.

But in a funny sort of way, it never really left us.

And thanks to Danny, I now know something else.

Sometimes you really can go home again.

You just have to wait for your nephew’s friend to invite him over.

— J. Paddy Spaight