The Po Show

Home Birthday

As I write this, it’s my birthday (don’t know when I’ll get around to actually publishing this post). 38, gack. I’m not going to dwell on the “I haven’t accomplished so much I thought I would by this point in my life!” for now, though.

What strikes me is that I am home for this birthday. It’s been a long time since that happened. Home for me is Oxnard, in the house where I grew up. I moved into this house when I was one year old, so it was the only home I knew growing up (though I do say I was the original Valley Girl, since that’s where I was born ;-)). I lived in this house with my parents until I was 18 years old and left for college. In the 20 years (did I mention gack?) since then, I’ve moved FIFTEEN times. I’m in the middle of the sixteenth as we speak. So this house is really the only structural constant I’ve ever had.

I hated Oxnard while I was growing up. It seemed excruciatingly boring. The only mall was this tiny stretch of not very fashionable shops wedged between Sears and May Co. There was not a lot of stuff for teenagers to do, other than going to the beach, which we did every day during the summer (as the sun damage on my face will attest). We loved driving to L.A. and going to real malls and seeing the hustle and bustle of urban life.

I love Oxnard now, in small doses. My family is here, and I love them dearly. I love seeing the fields and groves that remain despite the ever-expanding development of housing tracts. I love the beaches. The kids and I went to my favorite beach yesterday and I realized that I had forgotten how velvety smooth the sand is here. The CA coastline is magnificent.

I wonder how much longer I’ll be allowed this luxury, of having a home to come back to again and again. My mother is going to be 77 next month. She’s in good health, but someday she will be gone, and the house probably be sold. She is really the heart of the home, too, the main reason I keep coming back. I love the rest of my family, particularly my sisters, but my mom is my true link to this place. I come back, and bring my children, because of her.

On my children’s birthdays, I spend the day thinking about all the events that led up to their births. I think “Oh, about this time I started pushing” and the like. I wonder how my mother felt about me being home on my birthday. Of course she doesn’t remember the specifics of my birth day, but I wonder if she thought to herself that it was special that I was with her, 38 years after I was born.

I miss Ross and am sorry that I wasn’t with him today, but I’m glad that I was home for my birthday.