Home

There is heat and sun and stifling air, and then the wind from the ocean picks up and lightening and thunder take over the sky. Little is scared but daddy picks her up and they sit on the front step to watch the sky and listen and she likes the color of the lightening and the sounds of it.

Rain hits in spurts and drenches for a few seconds but leaves all still thirsty, still hot, and trapped beneath the gray.

But after dinner the sky lights up with orange and pink streaks over the back fence, drawing us to gaze.

Children run laughing through a maze of boxes and furnishings, still lacking a permanent location. Their giggles trail from front door to back and around and around the house again.

Two little girls snuggle together in a queen size bed that dwarfs them and reach out to find each other in the night, comforted.

The Boy hides in his cave creating with legos, asks already why it needs to be clean if it’s “his room”.

The sounds in this house are all our own. The walls don’t creak with the movements of neighbors that share walls. Little feet thud across hardwood floors.

Peaches drop down from the laden tree out front. We eat them every day, though the birds and beetles get their fair share ahead of us. Giant green shield beetles that it thrills the girl to try and catch. She has a butterfly net now. She takes it every where. She tries to trap a bird with a nest made of a feather boa wrapped around a bowl full of water at the front gate. A passing dog drinks the water instead.

We light a fire in the outdoor fireplace on a cloudy day. They dance around watching it burn, shrieking with excitement.

They ask every day when I will drive them to the beach.

My arms ache from painting thrifted furniture to match and hanging curtains. Flies dance in the center of the rooms where there are still no screens on the windows.

The Boy will make lemonade from the lemon tree out front and try to sell it to the new neighbors. He is figuring out how to play with a boy who only speaks Spanish.

I have already baked a cake in my new oven. I have 2!

When it is cool, and we are all unpacked, we will light a fire in the living room fireplace and play board games together one night. Maybe it will become a weekly tradition.

Our spare little bedroom gets the best breeze floating in through the open sash windows along with the occasional snatches of the neighbor on his accordion.

We are home.