We weren’t planning to take it with us. The house was sold. Every room emptied. The boxes were packed, the final closing documents waiting to be signed. And yet, when I saw that closet door one last time, something inside me broke.
“Kyle,” I said to my husband, my voice trembling, “we have to take the door. We have to. We can’t leave it behind.”
It was a cheap, hollow door, the kind with fake wood veneer on the front. Worthless to anyone else. But to me… it was priceless.
Because the inside of that closet door held our daughters’ growth. Pencil marks etched over the years, recording every inch of their height as they grew. Memories layered upon memories.
Our oldest was four when we moved into that house, her sister just two. Babies. Tiny humans with wobbly steps and endless giggles. That closet door was the only place they had ever called home. The thought of leaving that tangible history behind felt unbearable.
Kyle, being the wonderful man he is, called the realtor. He explained our obsession, offered cash we didn’t really have to replace it, and hoped for understanding. The buyers agreed. They took the extra money. We took the door.
It traveled with us to our second home, hanging in the entryway for eight years. A constant, chaotic mosaic of marks. Not just the girls’ heights anymore—now there were little drawings, names of pets, reminders of the cat, stuffed animals, and even a new baby brother at six years old. Dates, small sketches, memories of seasons gone by.
It was crowded, messy, imperfect. And I loved it that way.
This door didn’t match the décor of any home. But it didn’t need to. It told the story of our children. Their first steps. Their first words. The small milestones of childhood that pass so quickly, almost without notice. First days of school, first friends, first heartbreaks—each moment recorded, quietly etched into wood.
When we moved last summer, the door came with us. It now hangs in our forever home. Its final resting place. Here, it will witness the rest of their childhoods, the final chapters of their growing-up years. One day, the pencil marks will stop. One day, the growth will be complete, and no new lines will appear.
But I will keep this door. Always.
And maybe, years from now, when my grown children come home to visit, they will walk over, see those old marks, and measure their own children against them. The story will continue. Our family, our memories, our love—penciled into the wood of a simple, hollow door that became priceless.
