Let me tell you about my living room. It wasn’t just four walls with a ceiling and some furniture. I swear to you that it was something more. This room breathes in memories and traps them insides its walls as if to hide it from the forgetful world. So instead of telling you a story, let me tell you about my living room seeing that it holds more stories than my careless mind could ever hold. I was on my way to bed when my parents called me, It was almost 10 o’clock and I was heading upstairs. What did I do? What did I forget to do this time? I walked over and sat in the little red chair my parents got for me when I was five. It came with a matching yellow chair and a blue square table. I remember the day they got it for me. Underneath the table is written, “To our dearest, Love Amma and Acha”. It was on that table that I would create Play Doh figurines of little people, hearts, snails, turkeys, whatever my little mind and hands could make. My mother would dry my little figurines and display in the showcase. I remember the days I would sit on that table and do my kindergarten homework (whatever it was that they gave kindergartners to do those days.) That blue square table. But that table is gone now. Its soft royal blue table top ripped off and replaced with a slab of wood that my dad polished in an effort to make it look “nicer”. That blue square table, I wonder how many extra hours my parents had worked to get it for me. My little red chair was right next to the round wooden coffee table that my dad’s friend gave us when our old one broke and we couldn’t afford a new one. I wonder how many nights I spent sitting at this table doing my homework with my parents. I wonder how many bills my parents unwillingly opened and paid here. How many times did my father prop up his tired legs on this table. Resting his aching calves after a day of cutting grass because that was the only work he could find. I wonder how bad those days actually were. I would say that I remember the tired look he had in his eye when he came home, or the little beads of sweat outlining the top of his head where he wore his cap. I would say I remember the hot summer sun under which my dad had worked, but I was too young and blind to notice those things. I didn’t notice his sore arms or aching back as I begged to be carried and hugged. I didn’t notice his exhausted face as I babbled on not letting him rest trying to tell him about the book I just read. No, I didn’t remember those things, yet somehow my bizarre human brain managed to remember that table and from that table comes these memories. My living room was home to the soft purple corduroy chair whose arms I fit perfectly into and spent countless afternoons in. The chair in which adventure after adventure took place with the help of my imaginations and some books. I sat next to this purple chair where my dad would sit to tie his shoes, the worn-out sneakers he wore for his odd end jobs or the cheap black leather shoes he wore to his office. That stupid office that he worked at that refused to pay him because they knew they could get away with it. He was not the type to complain, a job was better than no job I guess. Besides, who would he complain to anyway. That purple chair is here now. Its cushions worn out and sunken, almost like my hopes of things ever getting better. I no longer fit perfectly into its arms and no adventures take place there for me today. That poor purple chair who has done everything a chair can possibly do. Its cushion has been thoroughly used and no longer provides the comfort and support it used to. It sits in a corner of my living room today like a broken old man who has been crushed by the weight of the burdens in this world. I sat next to a green sofa, the sofa on which my parents often told me to study hard so I could have a good life. It was the couch on which my mother would sit as she talked to her family on the phone. The family back home that she had left behind in hopes for a brighter future in America. How many times did we take a photos on that chair. How many times did I sit with my brothers on that chair, reading stories and playing games? Was it really that long ago that I sat on that sofa for hours refusing to let anyone else hold my newborn baby brother? It feels as if it was just yesterday my brothers and I were taking all the cushions off the couch to build a giant fort. We would stack up all the cushions and sit on the wobbling pile until one of us fell off and was sprawled across the floor laughing. That green sofa. It had some pretty good memories, but they were crushed. Literally. We brought the couch to New York thinking that we could use it in our new house but it refused to fit through the two oddly placed doors in our small second floor apartment. We twisted and turned and even took the door off its hinges, trying to bring it inside. But it was stubborn. It refused to step foot into this new house, our new life. So the green sofa was left on the front lawn for the Thursday garbage pickup. And when Thursday came about, three large men picked up my couch and hurled it into their garbage truck, whose mouth teared and crunched away at the poor thing until all that was left of my sofa was bits of green fabric and pieces of wood. Memories, gone, eaten by the savage garbage truck. My living room had this bookshelf. It was about 6 feet tall and had 3 shelves and a cupboard. The second shelf of this held the medical encyclopedia series that my dad and I found at a garage sale. I was little, its enormous words made no sense to me, but its gruesome pictures was enough to get my attention. At one point, I used to randomly chose a book and stare long and hard at its pages, trying to make sense of the monstrous text hoping one day in the future its words would make sense to me. I told myself that one day I would become a doctor and would be able to fix every problem found in one of these books. But I was so little thinking I had my future planned out, but life happens. I will never know if am able to make sense of those books. Just as they were given to me at someone’s moving away sale, I had to give them away too. Have you ever had the pleasure of sitting by a bay window? Pressing your face into its glass as you peered into the world outside? Feeling as if the arc of the glass panels and wooden frames was enough to keep you from falling onto the sticky summer grass. On the hot 4th of July nights we would sit near the window and watch our neighbors launch firework rockets, lighting up the night sky. The red, white and blue sparks splattered across the sky dancing with the stars before they fall back to earth in their lifeless smoldered state. I used to sit by the window on those illuminated July nights, staying up until the last firework returned to earth. I used to sit by the bay window as I waited for the kids in the neighborhood to come ring the doorbell asking for me to come out and play, the minute I saw them walking up the street I would run outside and join them. I miss those days when we would sit in I used to sit by that window so often that my dad promised to build me a window seat for it on my 13th birthday. But we abandoned it and moved right after I turned 12. I was on my way to bed when my parents called me. “We need to talk to you. We are moving to New York. Our visa is expired and there isn’t any work down here. We are undocumented, illegal but that shouldn’t stop us”. I am from the moment when my father told me that he stayed for his children’s future. I’m from the moment that I was told that all their struggles would be worth it if I could go to college and become a Somebody. I want you to know that I'm from this living room, this moment; the moment I found out I was committing a crime by trying to pursue a dream. I want you to know about my living room. I want you to know that this is where I’m from. I’m from the room whose walls have heard the most joyous of laughs and the most deepest of cries. I’m from the room whose carpet is stained with the tears from my mother’s eyes and the sweat from my father’s brow. I’m from the room where my father hid his worries from me. So when I told you about this living room, I was telling you about me. When I walked to my living room that night, I wish I took the time to really be there, to take back the memories I was soon to leave behind. I know I’m supposed to tell you a story about me, but instead, let me tell you about my living room. Anonymous - Spring 2017 Issue
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