Home

See it? No? Well, it's there.

I’m home! It’s only for a couple weeks before I ship off to Korea, but it feels great. Home is familiarity; it’s existing without effort. Home is knowing everything is in place. Home is knowing where the refrigerator door handle is without looking. Home is the Westville Dairy Queen drive through and knowing my dad wants to order a Blue Raspberry Freeze like he used to: “extra thick. Paaainfully thick.”

Home is more cornfields than houses. Home is “The Open Flame” sign whose restaurant burned to the ground years ago. Home is knowing the radio stations. Home is our trotting beagle keeping the kitchen floor cleaner with her insatiable appetite than a horde of cleaning ladies (or gentlemen) with mops ever could. Home is that plant in mom’s front garden that looks like an elephant’s hiding beneath it.

Home is highway six and highway forty-nine and Interstate 94 and the corner of 400 and 950 where I almost killed Chris Brahos when racing home from orchestra rehearsal. Home is a speed limit of 40 on C.R. 1050? Puh-lease. Way too low to get me to school by 7:40.

Home is yellow siding and green doors and
a beagle. But what's this? A new
doorbell?!?

Home is George’s burgers—I’m salivating just thinking about them—and The Port right next door: that ugly orange throwback where the girls wear really short black shorts. Home is the once neighborhood weed-patch (a.k.a. stomping grounds), now someone’s backyard. Home is Liberty Bible Church, all three services, each with their own distinct flavor. Home is Dogwood park—mysteriously 15 degrees colder than everywhere else.

Home is the fourteen steps to the second floor, the six electrical sockets in my room, and that one towel rack that can’t bear any weight since Libby or I broke it back in high school. Huh, nevermind: looks like dad fixed it.

Well, that's scuppered.

Home is Judging Amy marathons with my mom.
Dad is very supportive.