Home Is More Than A House It's Experiences In Life

I grew up in a rare and wonderful place in the United States. My home was in Billings, Montana. My mom and dad just got married, so first in order was finding the right house for their new family. They settled on lime green house with forest green shutters, and it was the largest house on the block. The house we lived in was just a house. What experiences I got out of living there are the most important to me. I was more of an adventurous outdoor kid; so being inside was like doing jail time.

Home to me was more about open farmlands, gravel pits, and the forested river bottoms near my house. These were places to play and explore. I made friends with my neighbor, Randy Baker because he was the same age as me. We walked to Bitterroot Elementary School together everyday, and we were always getting in trouble because of our adventurous minds.

One time, Randy and I built a raft together with the wood we had stolen from a housing construction site. We pretended to be sailors on a ship, so Randy was the captain, and I was the first mate. We made our maiden voyage in the gravel pits icy waters in back of the grade school. It was a success at first, but when I moved to the side of the raft to start paddling. I accidentally tipped the raft over. We both screamed because the water was just above freezing. We swam to the shore freezing off our butts. That was a very cold walk home because the wind picked up and it started to snow. My mom grounded me to the house for a month because the gravel pits behind my grade school was off limits.

Home reminds me of taking responsibility for my actions. Randy Baker and I caught a Gardener snake out of the irrigation ditch next to the garage, and put it in the window well of my mom’s basement bedroom. We covered the window well up with a piece of plywood and went to lunch. When we got back to the window well after lunch, the snake had disappeared. A few days later, mom being nine months pregnant was walking down stairs with a laundry basket of folded cloths. She accidentally stepped on the Gardener snake, and the snake bit her in the leg. This scared her to death. Mom went in to labor with my young sister Nicole. At the hospital mom threaten me; she said she was going to put the snake in my bed while I was asleep! I was so gullible. I believed her. I had nightmares for months after that incident.

Home was about education. Learning the essentials of life such as gravity. My neighbor, Randy, just got a brand new trampoline for his birthday, so he invited me over to play. I thought of a great idea to make our jumps on the trampoline higher. We moved the trampoline over to the side of the house a few feet from the eves under the peak of the roof. Then we got the ladder out of his garage and climbed up on the roof. Randy jumped off the roof first. He did the best back flip I had ever seen landing perfectly on his feet. When I jumped off the roof and was about to land, I realized I had jumped too far out and my legs were going to go though the springs. I crawled home in great pain and agony, for this gave new meaning to the words Blue Balls! Mom just laughed at me. She told me, “Eventually you’ll learn, even if it’s the hard way.”

In closing, I spent two weeks at my mom and dad’s house in Montana last June. Things have really changed; the gravel pits I use to play in are now apartments. The ditch I caught my first water snake was covered up with dirt, and all the farms are now streets and houses. My home was a happy home. I had loving parents that tried to give me everything that I need in life. I didn’t always listen to my parents, but how many children do? I got a lot of spankings and spent a lot of time being grounded to that cell that I called my bedroom. As an adult, I look back and see that their disciplinary actions were done in love.