Where I'm from...

I've been reading "Where I'm From"'s, starting with OwlHaven's, and tracing it back through lots of other bloggers out there. It's a neat idea of getting to know people through the sacred and the ordinary from their childhood. It's also an enchanting trip down memory lane that anyone, brought up rural, urban, or suburbs, US, or anywhere else, can do. There's a little outline for it here if you're interested in posting your own. It's based on a poem by George Ella Lyons. So here's mine...

Where I'm From

I am from orange juice mornings and swimming pool days, from Campbell's tomato soup, Cabbage Patch kids, Eggos and Legos.

I am from the cozy, brick ranch at the bottom of the hill with catfish swimming upstream in the gutter when it rains, from Eye of the Tiger on the record player and walking to church to play pool on sticky summer days.

I am from warm summer showers from cloudless skies, thunderstorms rolling in over the field in the afternoon with lightning that illuminates the whole world, the scent of orange blossoms in January, from "the fort" - that jungle of bending, twisting oak trees, once owned by the neighborhood kids, now replaced by a blue two-story stucco.

I am from road trips to soccer tournaments and if you can't say something nice don't say anything at all, from Tu and Gomps, from Rob and Lil and Bob, from the occasional treat of 3 days in summer at the Abbey with its big red barn, honeybees and buffet style dinners with all 30 of us crammed around a couple wooden picnic tables.

I am from make do or do without, chin up, and put on a happy face.

From don't be late for dinner and go-put-some-makeup-on-because-you-look-tired.

I am from hymns and padded wooden pews, monthly communion and behave in church, be on all the service committees we can but don't dare say the J-word (though the F-word and other expletives will be just fine), from God Bless America and the Bible is full of interesting stories.

I am from lots of places for a little while, but mostly from Florida, from billboard-studded trips up and down I-75, from European heritage though no one knows just where or how. From lasagna always made from scratch and brownies always from a box.

I am from Gomp's shock when he asked someone to pass the bread and Rob threw it like a football, from mom singing to Joan Baez while doing the chores and from dad telling nonsense stories to make the kids laugh.

I am from photos packed into the bottom of the wooden roll-top secretary desk and albums yellowed with age and filled with pictures - some carefully placed and others stashed haphazard between pages. I am from humid memories of playing outside, the smell of rain and the sound of a canonball in the deep end.