At least a bunch of Nazi's didn't just shoot my dad in the stomach

You'd think that after becoming a parent all other major steps in life would seem insignificant. I mean, parenthood changes your whole life and turns your point of view upside down - you've created a new life which you are solely responsible for, taken on a huge financial burden, been given the chance to experience the most incredible feelings of love and happiness possible, and have become officially old and uncool - all in one fell swoop.

Which is why I've been really taken aback about what an emotionally intense experience buying a house has been. Sure, I've watched HGTV and seen people cry and talk about how emotional it is to buy a house. But honestly, I just thought they were freaky weirdo losers. And while I still think that most of those people are freaky weirdo losers, I now realize that buying a house is more than cool bathrooms, backyards for BBQs (good patio furniture store name??) and back splashes. Its tied to all of the most basic things that make up people's emotional landscape - safety, security, family, finances, friends and identity. Also, because its a major time commitment to one place, especially in this financial environment, it means making a commitment to the place that will become the backdrop of your passage into middle age, and your decline into someone even more uncool than you're parental status has already rendered you. Its also the place that will shape your child and become the memories that will help to define "home" for the rest of their lives. And its the one place on the planet that you can claim for yourself and do with as you please (as long as it falls within the bylaws of your HOA). And of course, like most things in today's world, you have so many choices on where to live, so many forks in the road. Yet with all of the choice available today most of us are not much wiser about which path is the right one to choose.

All of this keeps making me think of that scene in Indiana Jones (I think it was The Last Crusade) where Indy has to take a leap of faith by stepping off of that cliff to get to the cave where the Grail is hidden. In the movie, the awesome 1989 special effects show you that there is actually a stone bridge connecting the two cliffs. Fingers crossed that that stone bridge is out there for us too.