I am from roller skates with worn down stoppers from sugar cereal and abandoned gravel lots.
I am from the green house on the corner, average and paint's peeling. We can see our school from here. The yard in back is bigger when I'm smaller.
I am from the acorn pressed flat into the Pennsylvania mud the wide brown mushroom, daffodils with drooping heads, wet with thawing, early spring dew.
I am from a restaurant on Christmas Eve and small hands, from mom quietly praying and Dad in a sagging chair with ripped upholstery.
I am from silence and desperation and fingers worked raw and lazy arrogance on Sunday.
From God is love, God is jealous, God is angry and these are the end of days.
I am from anointed foreheads and babbling spirit languages in the dark, hands pressed on flesh, hands that could heal and make the blind to see.
I'm from a nowhere town populated by young people who are only passing through, bulk bin cookies with white icing and spongy angel food cake with sugared strawberries.
From the birthday where dad got mad and left us in the car, pulled out into the road. My brothers and sisters laughing through their tears at a puppet show that hurt my heart, my grandmother had eighteen siblings.
I am from a box tucked into the entertainment center, images yellowing and curling around the edges. In fourth grade I wore giant glasses that slid off of my nose. The lenses were tinted purple so that the colors of the world weren't quite right.
Where are you from? Use this template to tell us.
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Here's where I'm from:
ReplyDeleteI am from kitchen chairs, from guitar strings and potting soil.
I am from the house with the steep driveway, stone, serene, smell of dog piss that finally went away when we got rid of those awful green rugs.
I am from the cherry tree, the dying rose bush.
I am from the huge dinner and heated political discussion, from Marie and Robert and Shelly.
I am from laughter and disorganized travel.
From off-task behavior not to be taken seriously and you’re going to bed after “Laverne and Shirley.”
I am from my grandfather leading holiday prayers at the dining room table in oddly pronounced, sing-song Hebrew. Lost and only semi-interested, smell of old people in suits.
I am from a small big city, brisket and mun cookies.
From my grandmother losing her ring finger in an old laundry machine, the door-to-door pants-pissing incident and the time my dad punched a teacher in high school.
I am from a table in my parents’ living room, an obscure drawer somewhere, the coffee table. Somewhere between completely forgotten and priceless.
love this. LOVE.
ReplyDeleteThanks for the view of you. I did it too, and liked Erik's idea of sharing it here (as well as on my little blog).
ReplyDeleteHere's where I'm from:
I am from tea cups and saucers and coloured sugar, from shredded wheat and public radio.
I am from the hills high above a peat bog, the squishy sponge dirt filled with stinky ponds, wet-land vegetation, beasts and bugs, and long since conquered by miles of blacktop and fast-moving metal dinosaurs.
I am from a pile of boulders and a transplanted California redwood that grew so fast its tip touched the heavens, far above.
I am from small family feasts and a pathological need for non-exposure, from Brenda and Anita and Carmen.
I am from righteousness and sincerity.
From gifted and undeserving.
I am from the Catholic Church, a place that is so far behind me it is gone.
I'm from a short but very teary stint in Ottawa, Ontario and a blood so mixed nobody knows its provenance; perfect pies and overcooked bitter greens.
From a man who, at 80, is still mourning the death of his father some 70 years previous and a woman who has felt completely isolated since birth, despite having created a large and devoted family. From an exclusive club of a sisterhood full of acceptance, cooperation and support, despite all odds.
I am from a collection of family slides, carelessly or deliberately lost in divorce by one bitter side or the other. My personal pictures are instead stored in my mind's eye, but have been newly relocated in a bin of slides taken by my long-dead grandmother, recently spirited from a garage and digitised to create a new story of my family's collective past for our children.
Erik and Karen, you're so awesome. THANK YOU for sharing yours. They're beautiful.
ReplyDeletePS. Erik, I love and miss your gorgeous family. I hope everybody is happy and healthy. ;)
Hey Amanda...
ReplyDeleteWe love you, too.
Delicious.
ReplyDeleteHere's where I'm from, as posted on my blog, with a link back to where you're from:
ReplyDeleteI am from fields with cows and pigs in pens, from Eight O'Clock coffee and SkinSoSoft and small country churches.
I am from the fields that have become subdivisions and malls, Walker Hill as it was once unofficially known, with large yards that had to be mowed every week and hayfields where we baled hay to get the cows through the winter, from gardens that smelled like Mother Earth herself when we plowed them for spring planting, the whole property ringed by honeysuckle vines that smelled so sweet under the hot Georgia sun, from blackberry bushes that magically became the most delicious cobbler when Grandmother got her hands on the berrys.
I am from the magnolia blossoms with their waxy leaves and velvety petals and persimmon trees with their fruits lying on the ground all soft and over-ripe.
I am from Sunday dinners and family softball games after church and large chests and small butts, from Demetra and Jimmy and Aunt Mary (pronounced Mayree).
I am from the faith that God will provide and honesty that doesn't speak in shades of grey and working hard for what we have.
From "your face will get stuck like that" and "you can do anything you set your mind to" (mom) and "can't never did do nothing and never will" (dad).
I am from southern Baptists who now just identify as Christians, where all people deserve to be treated with dignity and respect, where "it is what it is" and we soldier on no matter what "it" may be, from a place that recognizes we humans are powerless and that only something greater empowers us. I'm from full immersion baptism yet believe that true baptism comes when we are "tried by fire" in our everyday lives and you better be careful what you pray for because you just might get it. I'm from an angry and vengeful god who is better left behind because he is sending us all to hell.
I'm from somewhere in Atlanta Georgia and adopted by the only mom and dad I've ever known, good humble people on both sides, rural families, a firefighter dad and a full time mom, with lots of aunts and uncles and cousins with some Native blood in there somewhere;
I'm from black-eyed-peas&cornbread and biscuits and fried chicken.
From the father who caught the baby that was falling out of a stranger's grocery cart in the produce aisle, the mother who stuck out her tongue when she was deep in concentration and the Poppa who chased down Willie the runaway donkey to save me and my cousin off its back.
I am from a closet full of photo albums in my mother's guest bedroom, uniform brass from Fulton County Fire Department in my jewelry box, mom's birthstone and wedding band in the same jewelry box, none of it worth much money (not on a fireman's salary) but priceless just the same because they are from a marriage that is no more because the firefighter himself is no more.
Lovely.
ReplyDeleteI take it you kept the glasses? In the box? That made a wonderful image.
I enjoyed reading your meme. I posted mine on my own blog. What a beautiful and poignant exercise.
ReplyDeletethanks for sharing this -- so, so great!
ReplyDeleteThis is lovely.
ReplyDeleteThis prompt totally stressed me out ... but now I kinda wish I'd chosen it. Naaaahhh .... still too stressful! :)
ReplyDeleteVisiting from Mama Kat's :)
Love this prompt and enjoyed reading yours.
ReplyDeleteOh my this is wonderful! You revealed so very much with so few words! So well done!
ReplyDelete