My Home

I went to my living room to ask my mom a question, to see she wasn’t there. I asked my brother “where’s mom?” and he replied with “shes at the hospital, grandpa got burnt.” I would never have expected “grandpa got burnt” to be as severe as it was. I remember my mom coming home around two in the morning. I got up and out of bed to ask some questions. She said “I don’t wanna talk about it right now. Pack some stuff up, we’re going to Waterloo tomorrow.” So I listened and packed up a bag.

My parents had packed everything. EVERYTHING. There was bareness on the walls and there was around us except piles and piles of boxes. I looked around the house one last time as cold salty tears streaked down my face. I was covered in tears from the waist up. The feeling of leaving everyone made me empty inside. I felt hollow. Finally my dad said, “Let’s go!” I pleaded with him to let us stay, but I got the same usual answer, “You’ll be fine.” I wasn’t.

The last thing I wanted to do was start over, nevertheless I didn’t have a choice. I knew if I moved again, there was a chance I wouldn’t make it. Not long after, I found out my friend had died. Her brother murdered the rest of his family along with her. She made my move easier when I was there. I would miss her, but she made me realize how truly messed up the world can be. I missed home, so much that if I couldn’t be there, then I didn’t want to be in the world at all. As much as I wanted to, I couldn’t go back home, that chapter has closed, and it was time to open a new one. It was pivotal that I burn down the stage, throw away the costume, and figure out who I am. The pain will always be there, but I am stronger for

I jumped out of my bed like a missile and looked out the window so fast that I almost hit my head in the window. I watched all the cars that was passing by. My uncle came to my room and asked me “what is happing here?” he looked at my calendar it was Saturday the day that my dad comes back. “Jonny, I have to talk to you” I looked at him and walked on my bed towers him. He sat on my bed and explained to me that my dad had lied to me that he’ll come back because that sound that I heard at night was your dad fighting with your mom for me, she herds that my dad was mad at me just for a slice of bread so my parents divorced. I looked at my uncle’s eyes, my heart almost stopped, tears slide down my face. I was in my room crying for my dad to come back for 2 hours. Nothing was the same without my dad. When I came back home from school, I cried “I’m here dad … oh” I was alone with my uncle. All the paintings that me and dad were on my wall, I used my step stole to take down the pictures and put it in a shoebox. I could not believe that he abandon me…by a

Once he left the room, I gently sat on the edge of the bed, it creaked and was hard like a rock and there was only one sheet and it was thin, like a piece of paper. As I sat there I couldn't hold in my emotions, I bursted into tears. How could my life get any worse I thought. The next morning was the first day at my new school. As soon as I walked in a girl, maybe 15, walked up to me,

I was filled with wonder as I went to school on a Thursday morning in May knowing that when I was to come home my best friend of 7 years would be there waiting in order to take me to Colorado. Brenna is my best friend that had moved from Belle Plaine, KS to Monument, Colorado over winter break. So the school day went by tremendously slow, it had been the slowest day of the year for me. Every 30 minutes I’d look at the clock counting the minutes and hours till 3:25 in the afternoon. Although when the time did reach 3:25 pm It was like holding a dog back after tossing a treat, I leaped with joy out of my seat, out the school doors, and ran home.

As I sit here, on the hood of my car looking out into the vast field I think to myself, why this place? Out of all the places that mean so much to me, why does this place stand out the most? Everyone has that one spot that is special to him or her for various reasons whether it be a memory, experience, how it makes them feel, etc. For me, my favorite place encompasses all my senses bringing them to an all time high filling me with an overwhelming indescribable feeling. It’s my sanctuary, a safe place, but above all a place to clear my mind and getaway from reality. There aren’t enough captivating words to describe the beauty of this place. In the winter, the vast field covered in a blanket of untouched glimmering snow surrounded by bare

 My eyes opened very early that morning. I looked out of window and saw beautiful weather outside.  It was cold wind.  The flowers in my garden were smiling at me.  All of a sudden my eyes got watery.  I remembered that this was my last day in California.  I was going to America early the next day morning with my parents and family.  The day was Saturday, 20th December.  Tears were running down my face.  I went downstairs; everybody in the house was sleeping.  They had been packing until late night and I didn't want to them wake them up.  Therefore, I went back upstairs.  I just started thinking about how I was going to leave my house, my friends, my relatives, and my

I didn’t feel like I could find friends here like I had in Arkansas. I didn’t want to start over again, to me it was like the ground beneath me was crumbling and the longer I stayed in Texas the more it would fall apart. It wasn’t until just a few weeks before school started that it truly did. One late morning I woke up to the sounds of muffled voices coming from the inside of my shared closet. I dragged my heavy body off the hard mattress that laid on the floor, still hazy from effects of sleep. Walking to the bathroom I heard the quieted voices of my both my sisters, they were crying. I overheard a part of their conversation, they were talking about my oldest brother Alec. He had passed away the night before. Tears started to rain down my cheeks and a lump formed in my throat as the thought of my big brother no longer being able to protect me from the world started to seep into my mind. It hurt so much, I had always thought that he would always be there for me. I was used to people who had only been in my life for a couple of years to leave me, but he was there for me since I could even remember.

As a child I would get out of our black Envoy in a rush to greet him at the door. The gravel underneath my feet kicking as I screamed out grandma and grandpa. He always had this strong stature to him giving me the biggest and warmest hug imaginable. Now this time I was walking to the door. A door that loomed out in front of me. I didn’t want to walk in this time. I knew the time had come to let go. These past few months of 2015 had been anything but fun. The month is October and summer has come and gone and all that is left are the brown leaves scattered all around the graveled drive way. I had driven myself to his house with the car he helped me purchase.

It was a warm sunny day on May 10th, and I decided to have a few of my favorite people to surround me and make my day a lot brighter. I had invited some amazing people over, Marilyn Monroe, Gwen Stefani, Nicki Minaj, Alicia Keys and Demi Lovato. I heard the doorbell ring, I then got up excitedly and welcomed the first guest into my rather small house. I gave Marilyn a hug, looking at her smooth and pale complexion. The outfit she had on was stunning; it was a long white dress with ruffles at the bottom as her top-half was low cut showing off her assets.

New York- home- a place where I was free to be myself. Sure, there was crime and it was no place for a little baby, but it was home for me. It always gave me a sense of comfort when I needed it; everything I've ever known was back in New York. Tennessee- a place of longing and nostalgia. It was the year 2008, and on a cold winter day we got ready to board the plane. Little baby me had thought we were just going on vacation. But little did I know that was the last time I'd be in my real home. All of my family gone, just like that, and I couldn't even do anything to stop it. I mean who would even consider listening to a four- year- old about moving. I had cried almost the whole plane ride, considering I was leaving the only home I had ever known.

The final day was filled with sadness that I had to leave but a sense of relief that I could return to my new home at Hope College. The few days I had with my parents were amazing but I knew it had to come to and end. This wasn’t a permanent homecoming and in the back of my head I always had the thought that I had to go back to college. By the end of the weekend I knew it was time to go back, I had made a new home at college with a new routine that I needed to return to. Packing up my car and saying goodbye to my parents was tough and was even sadder with my mom crying as I drove off. I waved goodbye as she teared with hiding it behind my dog but I still saw. My eyes starting getting watery but after picking up my friend to drive back my mood was lifted. After returning to campus I reorganized all stuff that I had brought home to clean. I hadn’t even thought about it but my mom had done all my laundry without me asking. This brought back me missing my parents because I knew how much they cared for me.

The same pictures have lined the hallway of my childhood home for as long as I can remember. There is the heavily contrasted photograph of my grandparents, my mother, her two brothers and baby sister in front of St. John’s Catholic Church in Many, Louisiana. My grandmother is wearing a burnt orange dress which screams 1970 something and my mother, about thirteen in the photo, is wearing a lime green box-like dress with her straight as a board hair parted down the middle in direct contrast to the curly black mass atop my grandmother’s head. The next picture is my mother at sixteen. This one is a headshot of the same deathly straight dark hair and that perfect middle part. When I was eight, I asked my mother why her hair was so straight while Grandma Rita’s and Aunt Janie’s had always been so curly. “I have straightened my hair since I was thirteen,” she said. She then went on to tell me how growing up, she had been given so many perms that she had developed an aversion to eating eggs, as the smell of the perm mixture was oddly similar to that of rotten eggs.

“What! We’re moving? We can’t be moving! This is absolutely ridiculous!” Were included in the many words, thoughts and feelings I had when I was informed by my parents in seventh grade that they were building a new house and that we would be moving. I found that as the house came together, my new life in Little Falls did too. With each new improvement made to the house I matured and learned how to confront and solve the issues that I was facing.