Pulling into the driveway I park behind a black BMW. Opening my car door I feel transported back in time to my childhood. The well-worn stone steps leading to the front porch show the results of a couple centuries of wear. The kitchen door is open and I knock on the screen door. It's so quiet I can hear a clock tick-ticking but no one appears. I knock again and lean my head on the screen.

I see the empty kitchen and while the dark green shades are pulled down to keep out the hot sun, I notice the beautiful dark flooring, even in the dim light. Someone has ripped up the layers of linoleum my grandmother laid, then stripped and polished the floorboards to a deep chestnut brown. This unexpected change makes me realize it isn't home to me anymore. It's somehow swanky now. Rich folks live here. Gramma wouldn't have the time to keep wood floors gleaming like this.

Gram would lay a new sheet of linoleum when the old one developed spots that wore down enough to be a hazard. Shiny flooring that made wonderful sock skating competitions for my brother and me. We would run and slide as far as possible in the long farmhouse kitchen. I don't think she considered bare floors because they would be very cold. The cellar wasn't insulated and cold air and wide old floorboards would have added a needless chill, so the beauty was covered out of necessity.

The new owners have probably put in modern heating after they bought the place because the woodstove's not there. It dominated the kitchen, gleaming from the application of black stove polish, a teakettle of water simmering on the back. That's where our meals were cooked and bread and pastries were baked. On especially cold mornings I would sit between the stove and the wall to get warmed up. It's been replaced by a modern white stove that's been designed to look old-fashioned. It fails to impress me.
The round kitchen table is also gone. It's been replaced by a wooden table and benches, looking as if they thought that's what country looked like. Our old table had leaves that were put in to make room for company. We ate meals and played card games, did homework and wrote letters at that table. People drank coffee as they visited. Life lessons were discussed at that round table. We even used it as a piggy bank. Gram had nailed a piece of tin to the hollow center bottom, and my brother and I loved to hear the pennies drop down and clink on the metal. At Christmas time my brother and I would "dump the table" upside down and divide the change to buy presents for everyone.

Still, no one answers and I must assume they aren't at home. They may be on a picnic or swimming or picking berries. I don't know them, and I don't dare to open the screen and step inside. I'm a stranger to these people. So I turn and go back to my car.

The old house that used to be the color of rust is now a deep brown, probably close to the original paint color of 1750. The double woodshed and two porches have been shaved off and it looks like a chocolate box, devoid of the characteristics of my farmhouse. This really isn't my home anymore. Hasn't been home for decades. But that old and worn Vermont farmhouse with lilacs at the side porch and hollyhocks growing by the living room windows... that will always be my home. I will always have those cold mornings, hot humid evenings and the sound of spring peepers to remember growing up in Vermont.