Chris WiegmanSince moving to Chicago we often spend the weekends, at least once or twice a month anyway, at my Dad’s house up near the Wisconsin border.
My parents moved into that house in 2016 when the went from a desire to “downsize and move somewhere warm” to nearly quadrupling the size of their house (616 square feet to ~2500 square feet) 50 miles further North than the house I grew up in in the city of Chicago.
To say I found it weird at the time would be an understatement, especially after decades of them wanting to get away from Winter but… it’s worked.
After my mom passed in 2023 we moved back to Chicago and started our regular visits and now I see just how wonderful that house has been, both for my parents when my Mom was with us and now for my Dad.
There’s always activities for him to do and the HOA takes care of everything outside. He’s also a short drive on quiet roads from everything he needs in Kenosha. It’s really pretty impressive.
Which brings me back to our regular visits. When I was a kid we would go to visit my grandmother once or twice a week for an hour or two at a time. With Dad he’s just far enough away that doing so would be hard so instead we usually go out there on Saturday morning and spend the night.
It’s company for Dad and a peaceful weekend for Joy and I.
They say life eventually comes full-circle and I see our visits to my Dad’s house as just that. They might not be under the circumstances we would’ve wanted but they make all our lives just a little bit better and for that I am very grateful.