Tanner Manor: “The House that Built Me”

The front of Tanner Manor as I remember it

It’s almost too big, too grand a topic to tackle. Much like the structure itself, the story of Tanner Manor, my childhood home, sometimes looms larger than life. For years, I’ve been trying to wrap my mind around the magnitude of that place and articulate the role it played in shaping my life.
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Though just another house in town, our home was commonly known and referred to as “Tanner Manor” by friends and strangers alike. Perched atop a hill on nearly an acre of land at the intersection of Fremont Avenue and Buena Vista Street in South Pasadena, California, the almost-9000-square-foot edifice still stands as an icon, I’m told. Schoolmates I haven’t seen in years, including people I didn’t even know well, now connect with me on Facebook and mention my home by its nickname.

Holding on and letting go

"You cannot always be torn in two." Frodo Baggins

It’s New Year’s Eve, and I’m thinking again about what my goals should be and what my life will be like in 2011. Change is imminent for many people close to me whose life changes will affect mine. 

In three days, my two college boys will leave for school; in the same week my dear friend of over 20 years will move to Southern California; six weeks later my daughter will leave for her 18-month mission in New Zealand. Other changes, though not quite as clearly marked, have been ongoing and will also affect next year. My mother-in-law, once the lively hub of our extended Perry family, has had a series of strokes and is now content to be waited on almost entirely. Her husband, once the quiet, independent patriarch who now shoulders all the caregiving, accepts with alacrity any offer of help.

Leaving something behind

We write to change the world

Not long ago I listened to an audiobook called Sweet and Low, the story of the Brooklyn-based family that created the artificial sweetener by the same name. These family members, unfortunately, through time, allowed selfishness and greed to destroy generations of love and family ties. Author Rich Cohen, the inventor’s grandson whose own family was cut off from inheriting any money, realizes as he writes the memoir that his inheritance was not in the millions of dollars but in the story itself. Words and stories alone can be a legacy bequeathed.

You can't take it with you

Relationships matter above all else

A few days ago I went jogging and stopped in front of my parents’ former home in Holladay, Utah. This was their residence long after I left home for college, so I have relatively few memories attached to that place compared to those I have of Tanner Manor, my childhood home in Southern California. My children, however, remember it as their grandparents’ home. It’s the last place we saw my father alive. So, I stopped in front of the house for a brief moment to feel a little sad about good times never to be recaptured.