There was never such a lonely place as the one that sat squarely on that Michigan plot. Applegate is what they told us was its name, but to me, it didn't look like such a befitting title. Sure, it was red like an apple with rusty bricks on the outside, reaching to the two-story top of the building. Then, rustic shingles of varying conditions sloppily layered themselves to form the angled sides of the roof. But the sad-look of the house as we stood before it deviated from its friendly description.

My mother rested her hands on her hips as she took it all in. We'd just gone through a twelve-hour, nonstop drive from Virginia to get here. To be quite honest, I hadn't a clue why we had left our home in Stafford to come here of all places. I was only six years old at the time and you never asked questions if it didn't interest you. I would find out much later the reason why, but that's another story.

So we, my mother, my sister and I, stood there all lined up in the gravel lot of a driveway, peering up at the spectacle before us. For one thing, it wasn't a regular house; it was shaped like a school and I later discovered it had been much earlier. There still were remnants of the school's innards including two separate, similar apartments on the main floor titled “A” and “B,” and two larger rooms downstairs endearingly labeled “C” and “D” for our convenience, left behind by those before.

My sister and I looked to each other, both preadolescent girls unimpressed while my mother held our hands and guided us towards the front door. Inside revealed a painful mixture of spackled walls and carpet you'd find at a daycare; dark, strangely colored, and impressive at hiding messes. I remember running my hands along those textured walls and thinking of eggshells embedded in the drywall, like some freak accident had mutilated those poor surfaces.

That was just the foyer. We'd come to learn of many other oddities in our new home. I'd wake up one winter morning to the tiny sounds of a shrew scampering across the hardwood floors, and that wouldn't be the last one I spotted either. I'd get bitten by a snake twice before I learned my lesson about  wrangling them from the pebble-filled pits in front of the basement windows.

But after a year, we would finally settle into our new home. Shabby as it was in some respects, it did have its perks. I have some wonderful memories of that place. Like the time my sister and I discovered the hillside by the swamp, riddled with objects of interest. We'd find sets of silverware and bottles to bring back to our secret hideout in a thicket around a large oak tree in the middle of the backyard. After a month, we'd made the place as inviting as home and we'd spend hours in that thicket, strewing silverware on lines of strings, stacking antique, chipped plates, and lining bottles where we claimed they belonged in the glaring heat of summer.
And when the winter finally came, our neighbors would greet us with holiday joy and we'd hook up our sled to the back of the four-wheeler and go sledding in the field behind our house. My mother wasn't too enthusiastic about it, but she never stopped us.

  It doesn't take much for something to become home. That's something Applegate taught me. I once spent an entire day in an igloo I fashioned. It hadn't been difficult. The snow was already so deep, you just have to tunnel your way into it and make a cavern. It stormed that day. The air was sharp, crisp, and static. My eyes watched wide as gray and purple clouds rolled in and flashed with streaks of light. I knew it was wrong to stay outside, but I did it anyway and watched the whole storm from inside my igloo until the magnificence passed. Then I left my little burrow and went back home for some warm, butternut squash.