The house I grew up in was about 700 square feet. It was on the wrong side of the tracks and the kitchen was so small that you could sit at the round table and open the refrigerator. My sister and I shared a room until she went to college, and it's the house where I administered my mother's cancer medicine to her via an IV when I was 16.
The house I grew up in made me feel mostly ashamed and embarrassed. I never had a friend over, never had a sleepover, never had anyone pick me up on a date. The first boy I let see my childhood home was a guy I was dating at the age of 22. My mom made him homemade tortillas, beans and rice, and when I left the room, she brought out all of my school pictures - kindergarten through twelfth grade.
The house I grew up in sits in a town that I will never visit again. When my mother moved off of Margaret Street into a custom built house my sister bought for her, she left behind the structure that had shamed me so. When my mother died this past May, we packed up her house and all the memories, sold it within three days, locked the door and drove off blinded by tears of grief and rage.
The house I grew up in doesn't match the life I live now, but to a small family of three, it was indeed a home.
No comments:
Post a Comment