Aurora Magazine 2017

their most loved humans were housed there. This little girl’s dad had built their home from simply a concrete slab garage sort of a deal. However, it served as a warm and loving, secure place to the two parents, four children, two grandparents, and several grandchildren (not to mention a few neighbor kids and relatives along the way) who inhabited it. This building was not just a living room, kitchen, two bathrooms, three bedrooms, and a family/television room. It had been everything to her...her entire childhood. The floors creaked. It was drafty. There were many times it was cramped beyond comprehension (and possibly fire code). The house had witnessed its fair share of tears, laughter, babies, kisses, fights and all the life that makes family interesting, maddening, and amazing. Dorothy had it right when she said those famous words “There’s no place like home”. Growing up, she had the great advantage of giving two places that title. Today, she looks around her house with its kitchen, living room, two bathrooms, three bedrooms, and family/TV room with the realization that she had attempted to recreate some magic of the house on Bixler Road in the physical sense. However, this home has not witnessed her family yet. It is just a baby itself. There is a quiet, not in a bad way, but in an introspective, rest-while-you-can capacity. Sometimes it is deafening and scary to her, as loud was always the normal. Once a month or so, she does try to return to the house where the frogs still croak and it continues to feel like a home, but not quite hers anymore. Even there, it is quieter. But on holidays or maybe a Sunday brunch everyone is there and all the crazy, ruckus madness returns. But then people go back to their adult homes with their own children, making new home memories. At the end of the day she returns to the quiet of her current address. As she climbs into bed with her husband and her miniature pinscher, it occurs to her that this is home and the memories are on their way.

17