November

It never feels like November. It always feels like June or July. Yet I always am reminded its here. It creeps in through the sun and the palms and my subconscious knows. Try as I might to fight the effect it has on me. The memories of fall and winter growing up are so faded but still so strong. What the cold nights felt like and the warmth of the fireplace and my moms hands. The tree lit up and the house perfectly calm and tormented all at once.
November creeps in and reminds me of what I miss. Where my heart belongs and the memories that were left in that house. Our house. The nails poking up out of the floor boards and that one spot I cut my foot. The floors that my feet grew up on, now covered with new memory deprived faux wood. The walls we measured ourselves on and searched for ghosts through painted over. The walls we pressed our ears to,
hoping to make sense of the arguments, are sanded down. The basement stairs that led the bold kid to ice-cream in the deep freezer, that my sister and I laughed and fought on, and that my first love was led down are now torn and demolished. That old roof that needed fixing dripped rain melodically, lulling me to sleep. The ant hill, the bees nest, the front door the "crazy" kicked in. Moms bed where she rubbed our hair off our foreheads. Moms bed, the safe spot. The living room I learned my dad was in intensive care, and that same living room I learned he was moving out.
The first place I brought my newborn baby to from the hospital. Even though I owned a place of my own.
November.
Thank you for bringing my memories to me.
Thank you for reminding me just how beautiful and crazy life is.