Right in the middle of the neighborhood. That's where my house is and it is the only place I've ever lived. Here, there is a good sized yard (only because we live on the corner) and a huge tree in the back yard. I love that my house is in the middle of the neighborhood because I get to see everything that goes on around me. Just by looking out the window I can see the bayou, my best friend Patty's house, the cute boy John's house, along with most of the rest of the neighborhood. My parents first bought the house when my older brother, Steve, was only two years old. They decided to move here because the first house they lived in was small and only had two bedrooms (my cousins now live in that house). I guess they knew that my other brother, Gerald, and I were going to come along someday. At least that's what I think. The house we live in now has four bedrooms, but that's only because we made the garage into another bedroom. It was the neatest thing to all of a sudden have a new bedroom, in fact I can't even remember what the garage looked like. I just remember how nice the new bedroom looked. I love this house with its great trees, its cold air condition in the summer , its small but cozy kitchen, its smell of our home, and most of all the way it makes everything seem so comfortable.

As I said before, I don't remember what the garage looked like but I do remember how the garage had an effect on my parents. The way that my mom always complained about how dirty the garage was and how my father needed to clean it. I thought a garage was suppose to be dirty. I think my father feels the same way, but he just never says anything when my mom asks him to do something. He doesn't like to talk much. He doesn't like to argue even more. My mom likes to talk, she isn't like my father in that way. She also likes things neat and clean, so most of the time it's cleaning that she usually talks about. I don't like to clean, but that's according to my mom. According to my friends I'm pretty neat. I guess it just all depends on who you ask. Nothing you can ever do is as good as the way my mom can do it. I guess this is the excuse that I use for not doing some of things she asks me to do. Why do it if she is going to do it all over again (because according to her it wasn't done right)? One great thing about my mom is that me and her talk a lot. Not like me and my father. Don't get me wrong I love my father, but we just don't have a lot to say. Though sports is one great thing to talk about with my dad. Now me and my mom, we talk all the time though sometimes it leads to arguments. We like to play around a lot, she is silly that way. Sometimes my dad joins in but that's only sometimes. Other times he gets frustrated with us because we're so loud.

Along with my parents, I have two brothers. My brother Steve doesn't stay at home much but Gerald is always here, or at least it seems. Gerald has a good imagination and doesn't have to go places to find things to do. When Gerald was younger ( I was super little then) he could sit all day in his room with his Star Wars figures playing. My older brother is more like my father. He is kind of serious. But, sometimes I think he is only that way when he is around me and my parents because I've seen him around my brother and his friends and he acts very silly. I do know that Steve is more responsible than any of us because he never loses things and he always makes sure that me and Gerald eat and stuff. I just think he tries to be too cool sometimes. Both my brothers have lots of friends in the neighborhood. Like when they play basketball on our driveway the whole neighborhood seems to be at my house. The best thing was when they use to breakdance on the driveway with the a sheet of linoleum. This attracted everyone in the neighborhood. I'm surprised that my parents never really said anything about all those people in our driveway and in our yard. All I ever heard was my mom saying that my brothers needed to stop doing it so much because the grass was beginning to die. Of course, my dad never said much. He doesn't like to bother with stuff like that.

As far as outside my family I don't really know what I do with all my free time. I know that I like to play with Patty Villarreal, who lives right across the street. I go to her house all the time. Her family is different from mine. She can speak Spanish so fast I think even my mom would be amazed. I always wished I could speak Spanish half as good as Patty. At least I learned a little from hanging around her house so much. It is fun going to Patty's because her mom is so crazy. On Sundays you could hear cumbia and salsa blasting from the open windows and doors. My mom use to tell me that was what people from Mexico listened to. At my house all you heard was soft Tejano music in the morning. Patty's mom said she didn't like that music because you couldn't have as much fun dancing to it. I always thought Patty's mom liked the way she looked when she was dancing around the house (and where ever she goes to dance) in her super high heels. Patty's mom is sexy in that way. Patty looks exactly like her mother and boy can she walk good in super high heels. She wears them all around the house, but I really don't know why.

Patty's father, who is a little man, is like my father because he never really says much either. When he does say something it's usually "NO!". He gets on my nerves a lot. My mom says that he is the way he is because he is old fashioned and he acts the way men act who are from Mexico. She says they're more strict with the women in their lives. All I know is that I just can't stand it when Patty wants to do something and her father always says "NO!". What makes me so mad is that he doesn't even explain himself and Patty never asks him to. She just does exactly what he says. My father might not talk much, but at least he doesn't say "NO!" like it's my name or something.

One thing that me and Patty have in common is that like me, she is the baby of the family. So her parents spoil her a lot. I guess mine do to, just in different ways. She always gets told that she is the most beautiful thing in the world and that no one is more beautiful. And heaven forbid that Patty falls and scrapes a knee, because there goes Mami with her super high heel shoes dragging her to the emergency room. I even remember a time when her mom got her a wheel chair because she cut her big toe. I didn't mind though, because the entire time she had it, me and Patty got to race it down Markwood St. It was great watching Patty's mom yell out of the window because she thought her "baby" was going to kill herself. Patty knows her mom babies her. She likes it. My parents act totally opposite about things like that. If I fall, I better get up and not cry because it means that you're weak and still a baby. My father's motto was "Stitches...who needs um!". But, then again my dad is my dad and Patty's dad is her Papi. There is a difference. Now my mom is entirely different from Patty's mom. Mom doesn't wear super high heels, she doesn't dye her hair red to black to brown with highlights, she doesn't take cleaning lightly and she doesn't speak Spanish one hundred miles an hour. She says our family has been here for many, many generations and that is what makes us so different from the Villarreals. Though sometimes, I wonder if she makes things up. Like when my mom said that Patty's family painted the house bright royal blue and white because that's the way things are in Mexico. Or when she said that Patty's dad got the BIG BRIGHT ORANGE VAN WITH THE LANDSCAPES ON THE SIDES for the same reason. The whole neighborhood made fun of that van and pretty soon Patty realized how strange the van was too. But even then she admired her Papi and thought it was cute. Whatever!! I would have killed my father for spending so much money on something so ugly!

Although my mom says Patty's family and our family are very different I think that me and Patty are a lot alike. We know exactly what each other is thinking without even saying anything and we understand that our families don't always do the same kind of stuff. We don't care about all that stuff. We just like to have fun. We like to act like we're actresses and act out movies like Grease. We like to play store and fight over who worked the cash register. We like to talk about the cute boy named John who lives down the street. We even like to argue about who he likes. We like to spend the night over each other's house. We also like to ride bikes, roller skate and play in the bayou. Everything we do is a blast and no differences can change that. As you can see my family and my friends are who make me happy and the place where it all happens is on the corner of Markwood and Campdenhill. My house on the corner where my family lives and my friends are near.

Return to Syllabus