to be in my backyard

diary entry #2 silly summer thoughts

last year i drove past the street i grew up on: a cul-de-sac i have no memory of besides when it would show up in my nightmares as i sat backseat in a driverless car, circling the cul-de-sac over and over again until i woke up in a coldsweat. i thought about the wall decorated in chalk in the basement, featuring a portrait of piglet behind layers of paint and my heart hurt. i don’t remember much of the house but i do remember my first time saying goodbye.

i don’t resent my childhood, but i often wonder how life would look had we stayed on that cul-de-sac. a scooter-ride away from the gas station, retro and shady like they’re out of a netflix original set in the 80s, boasting beer and fireworks in preparation for the holiday. next door are children my age who wanted to have playdates and make mudslides and stay out until the sun dipped behind our houses and then stay out even longer. picking each other's bug bites and picking each other dandelions. running away from bugs or maybe making friends with them. watching the older kids sneak out of their houses and begging them to take us with them. what would that have been like?

we introduced my black cat, jinx, to the great outdoors. well into his teens but just as small as a toddler, he acts as if he got a summer house on the cape—a mesh tent that sits on our back deck over my dog’s yard. the otherwise mute housecat will sing your ear off until you let him outside. once he’s outside, he’ll beg and plead to be released into the yard, chasing baby bunnies and basking along the roots of an apple tree. when you give a mouse a cookie, he’ll ask for a glass of milk.

watching my thirteen-year-old cat discover a world beyond our saltbox house is like witnessing childlike innocence and exploration all over again. his little black tail tap tap taps on the wooden deck as he watches the dog take a shit or bugs and birds that land on the railing. he often gets his claws stuck between the mesh and you will have to climb in the tent to free him, and then he will do it again ten minutes later. he always wants more and i don’t blame him—it’s in our nature.

it’s a sunny day and the moon paid an early visit so i am frolicking around my yard yearning for the sun to leave an impression on the bridge of my nose, if only in my dreams. i am barefoot skipping about dandelions and whatever those flowers (author’s note: white clover) are called that i used to fish out along the side of the public pool and collect into bouquets. the pollen is suffocating until a bumble bee finds solace in the rhododendron plant my mom had planted years ago and my eyes seemingly cease to itch. a monarch butterfly skirts across the deck and i am content.

there is something beautiful about running outside barefoot, when the excitement and intrigue makes no time for socks and laces and straightening of tongues. when bristly grass and squishy pads of mud are a comfort rather than consequence. i long to measure a good day not by the sharpness of my tan lines but by the rosiness of my shoulders and cheekbones.