My Fondest Childhood Home

A father with one daughter and two sons; a mother with four daughters of her own - They came together years ago and bought what would become my fondest childhood home. A sharply inclined driveway much too narrow for all of us to pile out of our car without becoming crammed beside the house led to a small garage set back quite far. The house, blue-grey, two-story, had a porch we children rarely used, but still Mom swept it all the time, for she was such a clean freak, and though our house was old, it was well-kept! Set on a downward slope, there was a woods behind the back yard, steep and filled with trees. In winter, we’d do sledding and could skate upon its little pond when it would freeze. In summer, we played war where brush and weeds grew wild, or we’d play kickball down the street. Badminton we would play in our back yard or hose each other in the summer heat. All over our small city we’d ride bikes, play at the park or buy treats at the store. Then late at night, with Mom and Dad asleep, we’d eat our snacks behind our bedroom door. We loved to stay up late to joke and talk upstairs where we shared bedrooms not too big, Dad yelling up the stairs at us to stop. We’d giggle, for we didn’t give a fig! Downstairs and at the front of that old house, our parents slept next to the living room, which led behind a side door to the cellar with parts of it as creepy as a tomb! A ping pong table Dad set up down there, a game that gave us hours and hours of fun. A make-shift shower too, Dad put down there. It was the thing that most of us would shun! Each night would find us in the living room, where we would gather as a family. But when our dad put on his boring shows, we’d cram inside our brothers’ room for TV! The dining room next to the living room had mirrors and a table where we went to play monopoly or have nice dinners, but for suppers, to the kitchen we were sent. Our kitchen was the back room of the house. So small it was. The bathroom was right next to it, and ten of us were forced to share it! That house design still leaves us so perplexed! The best thing for me happened in that kitchen when late at night, my mom or Dale and I would simply talk. My stepbrother, so sweet, would be the first of all of us to die. We’d scattered, leaving home for school, and he was taken from us all those years ago. Our step dad passed away two decades later. Mom sold the house; new owners let it go. That poor house of my childhood and my teens is now in disrepair; so says my mother. But in the cemetery down the street there rests in peace nearby it - my dear brother. Written 9/17/2015