In some ways, I was much cooler in high school than I am now, which hasn't occurred to me until this year. (That may be another terrible thing about turning 30 - the inability to keep perspective about adulthood.) Anyway, I used to be a much better reader, for one thing, and I subscribed for years to House Beautiful partly because I was learning to love modern design but mostly because of the essay piece at the beginning of the magazine, "Thoughts of Home." Lots of really terrific writers mused on places they had lived and I loved to think about houses and how people felt about them.
I didn't really know then that this day would feel so awful, that I would spontaneously burst into tears in the chips aisle of the grocery store (and many more times since) on this, the final day that the Muellecks call 1441 West Alluvial home. I thought I had said all my goodbyes at Christmas, but it feels more sad today than it ever has, and I literally can't imagine my life without that house.
Not unlike when someone passes away and you mull over your regrets, I am regretting the times in high school when I really wasn’t cool and brought tension into that house. I wish I had gone swimming more, that I had spent time with Mom in the flower beds growing petunias and begonias and sprinkling Corry’s with her every day. I wish I had brought in love and compassion for my siblings instead of sucking it out with my anger. I wish I hadn’t slammed my bedroom door or mocked the HVAC or made fun of the cheesebox and the cat litter-y garage.
But there is always sweet with the bitter, and for great family barbeques in the backyard with the Turners, for the huge flowering pear who fell that one freak day (may she rest in peace), for the flourishing honeysuckle I planted on the pool fence, for that familiar squeak signaling the garage door opening, and for the many pink azaleas that bloom each spring, I am blessed. To the living room where no one sat, to the one wall of shiny wallpaper in the dining room that made Dad almost swear, to the drafty paned window in my bedroom, and to the old black wetbar, please don’t forget us. We loved you.
