Six months ago, my mother had to move in with my youngest brother because my other brother moved on and had a beautiful little girl named Cheyanne.
However the tragic part of this story was that in essence something much more profound was lost lost for the rest of us five other siblings, which was a maternal home to return to. As a child, especially after my father died, with the uncertainty of Reagan's inflation, income limitations placed on earnings from Social Security and low wage employment, housing was always a perilious experience. So we end up in Lennox in the worst neighborhood according to my liking and we felt trapped there for 15 years. Even after college it seemed we could never get of of there.
Apart from some crazy neighbors at first and a few slap sessions, things calmed and we became friends with some of the neighbors but much more my brothers because they were younger and attended the same elementary and then junior high schools. When we moved there I was 15 versus 9, 8, or 6 hence as had become my experience after elementary school, my mom uprooted us from the Inglewood area I grew up in 95th and Arbor Vitae, across the street from the 405 freeway. Living a life as gypsy had become a way of life and my friendships were lost in that part of Inglewood. Lennox was just too far to walk to though my friend Scott would visit when he could. Even though he moved to to Gardena not long after I had moved.
In the subsequent years, the house in Lennox was home but never felt like home because the neighborhood was dirty, crowded, ugly, rat infested and just plain hideous. Even the devil would not create hell in this manner. But we stayed because that was all we could afford and felt like the song Hotel California, "you may check out but you may never leave". I checked out from Lennox but I never really left and so did my mother and nobody could really help. We were on our own.
When we left, it was as an individual for me but I felt I abandoned my siblings, then my brother left to live with his girlfriend, the other two to play college football and finally we moved my mother to Hawthorne which was suppose to be better but the apartment was a fraud; the second bedroom was a converted something, prostitutes roamed El Segundo Blvd. and it just did not feel like home even though my aunt lived in the floor below. Even though I have never admitted it, there was a lose with the neighbors from Lennox, somewhat still continues.
But by now the reality had kicked in that my mother would now live with us because she had never never been able to purchase a home because because, she was not permitted to. And it would make a difference which is why we moved around alot prior to remaining in Lennox for 10 years. When we moved to Whittier, it was to create that home base and independence but it never quite worked out for all kinds of reasons from financial to uncooperation from each sibling head and in the end, when my brother had the baby and moved back to the homeland of Inglewood and the increased mortgage and non refinancing of the house what was once dreamed of ended. Eventually she moved in with my younger brother where she lives comfortably but ultimately it's his house not hers, hence it's not a neutral home were we can all go peacefully.
When its moms home even though she might be messy and lacked better hygiene kitchen habits. it was still that home you felt you grew up in. Instead of complaining about the dishes or the grease on the wall, I would clean my part up. In her home, she had pictures of us as kids, high school graduates, now the grand kids and trinjunklets collected throughout the years even if dusty or not sliding to the side. The hanging towels of my mothers scent aromatizing the house and the television that is permanently fixed on the Spanish channels for the novelas that always have the great looking chiks. That is now gone because my mother was never allowed to build a nest and neither were we because we haven't really been successful apart for survival purposes. I know what its like to return to that nest, I spent time with my paternal grandmother in El Centro, California were no one sibling controlled the others. Pulling up to that driveway felt like home. My maternal grandmother also had a neutral home in Mexicali, Baja California and only when everybody was there did I feel crowded but not at home. One could sit under the mesquite tree and even sleep if it felt too crowded or just sit and enjoy the stars and the occasional ghost visiting us, we have quite a few. I know whats that like but I don't have it anymore and neither do my children. Not that my brother is not welcoming, he is but it's his home and his soon to be wife. We can't be too comfortable. At my moms house, I wouldn't ask to use the restroom, would sleep on the couch and roamed as if I was a home because I was. This I have no more
And even my other brother Alberto mentioned the same thing, though the only solution would be a home 100 miles away and that's not an option. But as he stated, "We need a home base, sometimes we need a break from everything" or just the feeling of returning to a place we called home. If we get separated there is a place to go to, fired from work (which happens quite frequently) or just want pure love without the nagging and responsibilty of adulthood. Its not there anymore!
