Homecomings
Home. House. Kitchen. Room. Growing up. Home?
I come home, but can't find the kitchen. The kitchen is missing: the white metal cabinets that don't quite close; the tupperware drawer filled with containers that have no lids; the cereal cabinet full of entirely too many different types of cereal, most of which will become stale before they are eaten; the square oak table, heavy—it too is missing; the stainless steal cabinets—“Hey, did you know that the family that lived in this house before the family before us owned a restaurant??” “No, but when I was 12, we let the sink water fill up and flood the stainless steal cabinet. That’s why the cabinets have a high ledge anyway, right?”
I used to sit on top of the cabinet, by the stove. I used to eat junk food out of that same corner; splatter chocolate chip pancake batter all over the floor beneath it; watch Perry Mason on the tiny, fuzzy TV, commanded by a cheap fork, from across the room. I used to cry while baking brownies with my mother; laugh while I scooped out avocados with my grandmother; hit my brother in the chest while I tried (always unsuccessfully) to steal the last cookie; drive my father absolutely nuts by not putting the lid back onto the margarine container.
I come home. Where’s the kitchen? Where are the stains, the spots, the crooked cabinets? Where’d that goddamn fuzzy TV go? And the cereal? What am I supposed to eat for breakfast? I can’t find the forks, the knifes, the plates, the canned foods.
Granite, hickory and hard wood floors replace childhood.
And what the hell happened to my room?
My childhood room had exposed brick, painted a shiny lavender until I grew up, turned 13 and toned it down. The now cream-colored windowsills are stained forever with crayon daisies. There are prescription label warnings forever littering the full-length mirror: take with food; take as directed by physician; do not stray from the path. Bumper stickers scraps remain steadily glued to the windows; portraits of the Beatles stuck above the doorway; a million tiny thumbtack holes littering the walls: leftovers.
Now a cross hangs from sateen off-white bricks. Yes, a cross (as in Jesus). And, what’s worse? Computers, calculators, calendars, clock radios; file cabinets, fax machines, phone lines; sterile desk lamps. All immediately crush the ghost of adolencsent attempts of self-realization.
I can still see a candle wax stain on the bookshelf. I remember hours of angsty survival. And now? I see my old typewriter, relegated to the corner, and want to cry.
Home. There's nothing quite like it.
I come home, but can't find the kitchen. The kitchen is missing: the white metal cabinets that don't quite close; the tupperware drawer filled with containers that have no lids; the cereal cabinet full of entirely too many different types of cereal, most of which will become stale before they are eaten; the square oak table, heavy—it too is missing; the stainless steal cabinets—“Hey, did you know that the family that lived in this house before the family before us owned a restaurant??” “No, but when I was 12, we let the sink water fill up and flood the stainless steal cabinet. That’s why the cabinets have a high ledge anyway, right?”
I used to sit on top of the cabinet, by the stove. I used to eat junk food out of that same corner; splatter chocolate chip pancake batter all over the floor beneath it; watch Perry Mason on the tiny, fuzzy TV, commanded by a cheap fork, from across the room. I used to cry while baking brownies with my mother; laugh while I scooped out avocados with my grandmother; hit my brother in the chest while I tried (always unsuccessfully) to steal the last cookie; drive my father absolutely nuts by not putting the lid back onto the margarine container.
I come home. Where’s the kitchen? Where are the stains, the spots, the crooked cabinets? Where’d that goddamn fuzzy TV go? And the cereal? What am I supposed to eat for breakfast? I can’t find the forks, the knifes, the plates, the canned foods.
Granite, hickory and hard wood floors replace childhood.
And what the hell happened to my room?
My childhood room had exposed brick, painted a shiny lavender until I grew up, turned 13 and toned it down. The now cream-colored windowsills are stained forever with crayon daisies. There are prescription label warnings forever littering the full-length mirror: take with food; take as directed by physician; do not stray from the path. Bumper stickers scraps remain steadily glued to the windows; portraits of the Beatles stuck above the doorway; a million tiny thumbtack holes littering the walls: leftovers.
Now a cross hangs from sateen off-white bricks. Yes, a cross (as in Jesus). And, what’s worse? Computers, calculators, calendars, clock radios; file cabinets, fax machines, phone lines; sterile desk lamps. All immediately crush the ghost of adolencsent attempts of self-realization.
I can still see a candle wax stain on the bookshelf. I remember hours of angsty survival. And now? I see my old typewriter, relegated to the corner, and want to cry.
Home. There's nothing quite like it.
posted by katharine at 11:40 PM
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