by Cristina Olvera

Created on: April 12, 2010

My Grandparent’s house was just a plain orange and red brick house from the outside, but on the inside, it was full of so much love and warmth.  My Meema sat in her brown rocker recliner and rocked slightly as she watched her favorite Soap Opera on their old console television.  Every now and then, her eyes would flicker and her head would fall to the side.  Her sleepiness was a sure sign that lunchtime was near.

My Peepa sat in his matching brown recliner next to Meema in his dirty, white coveralls.  If he was in his chair, he was usually asleep.  I was always quite sure that he was half bear, but I couldn’t prove it. 

It wasn’t long before the smells of fried pork chops, mashed potatoes; corn and green beans came pouring out of the kitchen.  Meema’s house was the place to be at lunchtime, and I made sure I was always there.  Peepa and I gathered at the white kitchen table while Meema put our feast on the table.  Meema joined us at the table and before we took a bite, we bowed our heads to pray.

We finished our lunch and then it was naptime.  I despised naptime, but I could never tell Meema that.  We settled into the living room and I lay down on the blue fluffy couch and pretended to sleep.  Sometimes I would fall asleep by accident, and other times I would just lay their hoping Meema would hurry and open her eyes.  Peepa and Meema went off to dream land and the room filled with loud snoring.  Although Meema’s snoring was light and dainty and Peepa’s was more of a rough growl, they seemed to harmonize with each other.

Finally, the dreaded naptime was over and the fun at Meema’s began again.  It was cookie time.  I lived for reaching my hand into that Cookie Monster cookie jar more than anything else.  I sat down with my milk and cookies in front of the television with Bugs Bunny and Daffy Duck.  I was in heaven.

I had an old stool that I loved to play with.  It was very small and short like me.  I sat on it and stood on it and I was yelled at because of it.  Meema was always terrified that I would fall off it and hurt myself.  It was just a stool, but it kept me busy for hours.  When I wasn’t playing with the stool, I was hard at work on my rubber band ball.

Meema collected little red rubber bands that came on the newspaper and I decided to make a rubber band ball.  I sat for what seemed to be forever and wrapped rubber bands around each other one after another.  I finally got it big enough and I threw it down on the floor, expecting it to bounce right back into my hand.  It didn’t bounce.  It just laid there.  I assumed that it would be just like a rubber ball.  After all, it was made of RUBBER bands!  I threw it back into the jar with the rest of the rubber bands and never looked at it again until many years later.  I found my creation still dwelling where I left it so long ago.  As I held it up and looked at it, I realized that it wasn’t so useless after all, because intertwined in all those rubber bands were all the memories of my childhood.

Everything has changed now.  Meema and Peepa have passed on, but every time I look at my rubber band ball that will never bounce and my little stool that I did fall off of many, many times, I see them and I remember everything as if it were only yesterday.  When it comes down to it, the little things are those that we will not only remember, but we will cherish always.

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