I Just Wanna Go Home!

So I am.
Home to momma. And daddy, sister, brother-in-law, niece and grandma.

It used to be: "When are you coming to see me, my girl?" Now it's, "When are are you bringing our girl of to see me?"

I don't mind.

Really I don't.

Sorta.

After a week of hurry, scurry and complicated color jobs, (there was another yesterday that I "worked in" in 4 hours. Yeah.) makeup parties and everyday business, I find myself reminiscing for my simplistic childhood a little bit.

I grew up in a small town in the middle of sandy Florida. I'm sure the word "Florida" immediately brings to mind idyllic sandy shores and oceans, and a pool in every back yard. I, however, was in the heart of Florida, land locked on every side. The closest access to water was the river down the road a piece. My dad grew up swimming in that river, but by the time I grew up, he said it was a place druggies hung out, so I rarely saw the river.

We lived on a slight rise in the otherwise flat land. A sand hill with a few pine trees and a huge oak tree with branches that bowed to the ground in places reaching out her arms to me inviting me to climb. There were pastures on two sides and a big sandy area on one side of the house that my sister and I played in constantly. It was the biggest sand box EVER!

We lived in a concrete block house. A small, very humble affair but some of my first and favorite memories are there. There was a huge hibiscus bush outside my parent's window. The curtains framing their window were two beach towels with old cars like Model T's on them. I loved the colors and loved looking at them. My window (right by my bed) looked out to a few pine trees and the neighbor's down the hill. I remember the bathroom tub having studs exposed around it (which wasn't weird to me at the time, as I knew no difference) and occasionally a spider would make an appearance on the side of the tub. A big spider with long legs. Daddy responded to our shrieks with, "Aaww, that's just Charlie, he's probably thirsty and wants a drink." Do you know, we would put drops of water in the corner of the tub and sometimes he drank it?! Daddy appealed to our curiousity and played down our fears and to this day I am fascinated with nature and science. Come to think of it, daddy was too, I remember thumbing through his Popular Mechanic magazines.

My daddy was a printer, a mechanic and a tinkerer. Which means he was always tinkering with something. My daddy is an overcomer. He was born with some joint deformities and as a result is just under 5 feet tall and has always walked with a pronouced rocking gait. He needed hip replacement at one point and the doctor told him he would never ride a bike or walk stairs. After he healed, he rode a bike to work everyday to his print shop in town (a ten minute drive by car).

Momma is...momma. She is not the stereotypical mom. She really has no hobbies except reading. She cooked basic meals to feed us. She took care of her parents and her in-laws. Of course, they took care of us as well. Later, I found out grandma kept me in shoes for school over the years. Mom's very matter of fact. If we were out shopping and I wanted something and began asking for it, usually she would say no, when I whined why? I want it!, she would calmly respond "we can't afford it." End of discussion.

In discipline, she and daddy were consistent. They meant what they said. There's a lot of momma in me. If I say no, I mean no. But I think I'm less rigid with my expectations of my girl as I try to allow her natural personality to express itself. I try not to squelch that while at the same time grooming good behavior. My physical expression of love is similar too. My parents have always been affectionate to me; daddy letting me sit on his lap long after I outgrew it and momma's "love paddlings" (that's where during the course of a hug, she reaches down and swats my bottom two or three times.) I give my girl love paddlings now. I can't help it.

Sometimes I look at my sister and myself and wonder if our parents are wondering if they indeed birthed these two slightly offbeat girls. My sister had her walk on the wild side for awhile getting into all sorts of stuff that included the tattooing and piercings. We are both artists and love to express ourselves creatively on canvas, in hair and all sorts of other ways. I have always been the "safe, conservative" one. You wouldn't know it to look at me now because my style (and I) has(have) evolved over the years. I've reached a bohemian-rock-hippy point now with crazy hair that has bright crayola red on top with a darker brown red on bottom. I think of it as a punk Joan Jett.

I'm not really sure what exactly makes me who I am, but it's fun learning myself as the years crawl/fly by. It seems there is a new (to me) facet of myself that I uncover every now and again. Becoming more confident in myself and expressing that.

It's a good life I've lived.
Simple.
Loved.

What more could a girl ask for?