Growing up, I’ve lived in two different houses, one of which I don’t even remember that well.

The first one was in Oak Ridge. It was a few doors down from my paternal grandmother’s. I really don’t remember the inside well, however, I do know that the carport connected onto the upper floor. There was a copious amount of bamboo growing in the backyard. My dad used to hurt his back a lot trying to clear it out, an endeavor he never quite succeeded in. In fact, the main thing I know about the house is why we ultimately moved out.

You see, in Knoxville, my maternal grandmother was having some health issues. So, my mom and dad decided to look for a new house closer to where she was. Luckily, they were able to find one, and started to move in around the time I was three and a half years old. This fact is especially lucky when you consider that the old house, the one in Oak Ridge, had flooded some. This was mainly in the downstairs area, but from what I’ve been told, it hurt some family photos and other things. Eventually, even with the water damage and bamboo, we were able to sell the place to a different family.

By the time we sold the old house, we were already fairly settled in to the newer one. This house was on a hill, so harder to flood. Also, even though it had two stories like the other one, the first story was where you entered from. My bedroom was on the same side as the garage, and my parents took the master, which was on the other side of the house. It had a sizable living room and kitchen area, with a half wall separating both sides. There was also a screened porch out the back door, but it would be rendered useless by my cousin later on. That’s another story.

Like most houses, this new one gradually got more worn down the longer we lived in it. The carpet under doors became minimal due to cats wanting out of rooms. A certain corner next to the back door had some of its paint rubbed off because of dogs and cats being silly. Not to mention how dirty the back door became simply because of dogs jumping up onto it from either side, stained with permanently light brown streaks on the bottom of both sides.

In addition, this next piece of furniture wasn’t part of the house itself, but in the living room we had a faux-leather couch. You might be able to tell where this bit is going. I forget how we ultimately got it, but I feel like it might have been the prize for a contest or something. But anyway, we’ve had it for a while. In addition, please note that we’re the type of family to allow the dogs on top of the furniture, but since they really are only allowed (for the most part, there are exceptions) in the living room, foyer, study, kitchen, and dining room, this allowance is limited really only to the living room chair and couches.

So, as you might be imagining by now, the dogs love to lay on these giant, soft blocks. Over time, their claws basically ripped off all the faux leather on the seating bit, but it doesn’t really bother me. The texture of the covered couch wasn’t really to my liking anyway. Under the stripped leather, the couch is actually fairly soft and comphy so in some ways I like how it was destroyed by them.

Another bit I might want to talk about is a certain cabinet corner in the kitchen. See, our cabinets (on the sides where the drawers don’t come out) is decorated by stuck-on wood panels. On a seemingly inrelated subject, which will be related soon enough, please also note the fact that our ten-year-old senior cat, Snowball, REALLY ENJOYS his milk. Now, if you happen to be an animal lover, and know that it really isn’t the best thing to give cats, please allow me to explain why he is given some on occasion. Before we knew that milk shouldn’t be supplied to grown cats, we game him some fairly regularly, and he decided that he really liked the liquid for some strange reason, actively requesting it whenever he saw us get milk out of the fridge. How these two facts are related, the wooden board to decorate the cabinets and Snowball loving milk, is a connection I shall reveal in the next paragraph.

These two facts are related because the bowls are stored over the particular corner snowball likes to lean on and scratch against when he wants milk. Over time, his big bulk (he’s a bit overweight) must have pushed down on that particular area of the cabinet often enough to cause it to sink in as compared to the other side.

Another bit is really part of the house’s exterior. On the outside, around where the roof meets the walls, a metal liner of sorts goes around the building. For the past few years, lively due to weather, the white paint from that and the gutters has been gradually flaking off.

Also on the outside of the house, but in the backyard, we used to have an old wooden fence. But, after we’d lived in the house for over ten years, the unmaintained wooden one had really started to rot. It had even gotten to such a point where I had accidently kicked through a bit, and it was then that my parents decided to replace it, as well as slightly extend where it boxed our yard in.

Going back to the screened porch, the decline mostly started when I once invited my cousin over. I won’t name her, but I will simply refer to her as Cassidy. When Cassidy came over, she was usually nice, if not a bit shut down. This particular incident that I’m referring to happened when we were in the back porch, and she wanted to try this easy roller thingy. Long story short, she ended up riding it through the screened door, and a hole was created that bugs could go in and out through.

Since then, we haven’t replaced the door because of money, but it really functions as a movable wall now. In addition, the screens themselves have started to come loose from the metal frame, so even if a bug comes in, which happens often, it’s usually able to escape as well.

I suppose I’m not sure how to end this account. A summary would be that these are the two houses I’ve lived in.