Grandma's house. It was a safe place. I remember waking up to the smell of my grandma cooking pancakes in the kitchen; chocolate chips in my pancakes, and plain pancakes for my cousin but with chocolate milk. I remember going to summer camp right across the way every summer. Taking night swims in the back pool and building forts out of every single sheet in the house. Getting lost in the cornfields, playing on the train tracks (retrospect, possibly not a good idea). Walking to the video store and visiting my grandpa at the courthouse (where he served as a judge for most of his life). Making "Sloppy Doughs," as we called them and eating until we got sick. Playing endless board games, fashion dress up, Barbie make-believe. My grandma teaching me piano; playing board games out on the back porch. Monical's pizza on the way back from a day filled with fun at the amusement park just a few miles west. Catching frogs. Watching the basketball games from grandpa's alma mater (the same university I attend now). The smell of his pipe. Going on long drives and pretending that I could run as fast as the cars on the highway so I might fly away. I have memories that were better and more fun and much more recent that easily surpass those days in happiness, but they all have a hint of plastic to them, like I needed those days to make up for all the horrible days that came before, but Grandma's house was all good all the time, a safe place and a retreat, and it was there before I ever really had any problems, as we all do, and so looking back on those memories just feels more natural and right to me.
