This is where I grew up.
Neighbors would come and go, but for about 18 years we stayed in this house during the weekday nights & mornings and long weekend days.
This house held our rituals:
Wednesday Top Ramen “noodle night,” Friday “pizza night,” Sunday bagel mornings with dad
Hindu ceremonies at the closet altar and at the backyard Shiva Lingam
Our backyard was wild and grassy until my dad took it upon all of us to implement a regime of black landscaper fabric, pebbles, and a eucalyptus that overgrew its space.
In our front yard we had a small, non-fruiting pomegranate tree.
We usually had two cats, sometimes an aquarium of fish, hamsters, and other assorted pets that did not linger for long.
My sister and I shared a messy room, which we were to have tidied before mealtime.
My parents shared a dark-themed room, with a portrait of a sexualized woman straddling a dragon in an ornate frame at the head of the bed.
We were a conflicted family. Arguments raged frequently so we kept to ourselves.
Yet, with dinner-time rituals we congregated on the couch to appreciate a fundamental family bond.
