Writing 101, Day Eleven: Size Matters

Today, tell us about the home you lived in when you were twelve. For your twist, pay attention to — and vary — your sentence lengths.

Dad in front of our house

My Home

A line of sliding doors divided a large Japanese house into two. We lived on one side and our neighbor, Deng’s family, lived on the other. We didn’t have TV in our house; they did. My sister and I often opened the sliding door and climbed over the big sofa in their living room to watch TV there. When little league baseball game was playing, one of Deng’s kids would sneak to my bedroom waking me up (The game played at 2 AM at our time) so we could watch the game together.

We had two bed rooms. Karin and I shared one. In the room, there was a bunk bed: She slept on the lower bed; I upper. One night we had an earthquake. Mom shouted for us to get out of the house. I didn’t see Karin move. I thought I should wake her up. “Karin, Mom wants us to get out,” I said loudly.

“We’ll be OK,” Karin said. So, we both went back to sleep. Mom wasn’t too happy that day.

We have a rectangle-shape front yard. Dad planted a lot of flowers along the house. Still, we have plenty of room to play badminton. Once in a while, Dad would join us, but I think my brother Chris was the best player in the family.

We also had a good size side-yard. A walkway in the middle divided the yard into two. Dad planted some flower trees and a guava tree on one side. And wild grass took over the other. I loved playing in the grass field; I loved catching dragonflies.

That was the home I lived in when I was twelve. Three years ago, the house was demolished. I can only find it in my heart now.