Paperlife.

"Cornelia"

The sunlight drips over the blues hues of the sky and cotton ivory clouds like watercolors in the summer. The smooth hum of the tires rushing over the onyx asphalt calms me. I gently kick my innocent tiny feet and legs in subtle excitement, looking out the window at the beautiful evergreen trees zooming by. I knew where we we're going. At such a young age, I knew these roads and these surroundings all too well. We make a right turn, such a well known right turn, and pull up to a white house with blue window seals. It sat ever so gracefully near chicken coops and a wooden man-made gazebo car port; with steel and iron hanging tools clanking like annoying cousins of wind chimes. I step out and so do my parents, breathing in the fresh country air, it smelled like family and values that I treasure so near and dear to my heart. As the front wooden door opens with a slight creak, we enter and my father calls out our signature greeting "hello hello hello" in his deep tone. Quickly, my grandparents both simultaneously say it back ..."hello hello hello" in their older, wiser voices and layered thick Mexican accents. We knew we were welcomed...always. And we sat in their mid sized living room dressed with rooster living ornaments, floral prints, and dusty antiquities topped with doilies. The house was old but charming, but oh how I hated that every corner of the house had a cob web with at least one dangling daddy long leg spider. There was a fresh tortilla aroma permeating the home, my grandma was prepping our evening dinner. Frijoles con arroz, a standard platter, but nobody made it better. My youthful jubilance shines brighter here because there was nothing better than walking out of the house and playing in the vast country acres that were my grandparents front and back yards. My lovely mother heard chit chatting for hours with my beautiful grandma through the thin windows, and my father was working near the wooden car port on whatever new task my ageless grandpa needed to finish. Curiosity consumed me, and I'd always find myself leaving my play sessions in my imaginary world to go help and get involved with whatever the two strongest men I ever knew were doing... I exhale heavily, in modern day, and open my eyes at 19...staring at the picture of the King and Queen of my family at their doily dressed round oak wood table holding each other and smiling in everlasting timeless love. I miss them dearly, every day. I set the photo and its frame back on the shelf, breathing in nostalgic air, as they rest in the paradises of my heart...lavishing in my Cornelia dreams. Never forgetting those precious evenings and afternoons at that house on Cornelia road...