Mourning Doves

-unedited

My heart yearns for the mourning doves that bring me nostalgia. The mourning doves should be called morning doves since they used to wake me up in the morning. The sounds of their sweet melodious voices brought consolation to a younger me who was saddened to wake up so early to go to school.

There were times when they persuaded me to stay in bed just because of how toasty I felt while being wrapped in a cocoon of blankets. Then there were moments when they would encourage me to get out of bed. Those times happened more frequently when it was summer and school was out.

I knew it was going to be a good day filled with endless activities both inside and outside. When it came to summer break, I was allowed to go play inside, and when I would play outside with my neighborhood friends, I would go in the pool, ride my bike, and make concoctions of whatever nature had to offer, or sometimes I would jump on the trampoline with my siblings. Then when I wanted to wind down and relax, I would head inside for something to eat.

My mom would make me a turkey and cheese sandwich and give me a small bag of chips that came in those packs at BJs or Stop and Shop that had a variety to choose from. To finish off my lunch, I drank a Capri-Sun or Fruit Barrel. Sometimes, I would come in and out of the house, which my mom did not like because her air was being wasted. It was always "If you come inside one more time, you're staying in for the rest of the time."

Now, who would say this to a child, when they are having fun? My mom would, and looking back now I can understand her frustration. However, I didn't appreciate being forced to stay inside when all my friends could proceed with their summer days and play outside. I remember sitting in the living room, looking at them in disdain as jealousy started brewing up in me. But, then I was reminded that no one was using the family computer downstairs. My sister was always in her room, doing her own thing and my brother was always playing on his PlayStation.

I would go downstairs and see my mom in the kitchen running back and forth from the counter to the kitchen to the stove, hurrying to make dinner for her family. Most dinners in the summer were delivery pizza or hamburgers and hotdogs on a grill or whatever my mom was in the mood for making as long as it didn't require too much labor or sweating.

Since there were five people in my family, every member had their own account and our passwords were always handwritten by mom on the pullout keyboard table. I would log in on mine and play a variety of games for hours until I bored of the other. I played mostly Disney Channel games or other websites that required Adobe Acrobat Reader, which sadly no longer exists. The games I remember playing on the computer were Diner Dash, Cooking Academy, and Big City Adventure. Between Cooking Academy and Big City Adventure, you could not convince me to get off the desktop.

After a while, I would grow tired of these PC games and shut down the computer just to walk into the kitchen and ask my mom when dinner would be ready. She would always respond with, "In a little while. Just sit down and watch TV for now." And I would listen, I plop myself down on the couch and watch Spongebob Squarepants or My Life as a Teenage Robot. When it got a little darker, my sister and brother would come downstairs and change the channel. We would all fight over the remote and our mom would yell, "If you all can't find something to watch together, you're more than welcome to read a book or help in the kitchen."

Everyone would grow quiet because we knew that neither of those things was happening. No one wanted to spend their summer with their nose stuck in a book and we definitely didn't want to be in the same room as our mom, critiquing every little thing we did. Eventually, one of my siblings would channel surf and throw on something funny like America's Funniest Home Videos.

While us, kids were laughing our heads, our dad would walk through the front door with beads of sweat on his forehead and an unbuttoned shirt with oil stains everywhere. He would hug and kiss every one of us and head to the kitchen to greet our mom. We knew that around the time he came home, dinner was ready. We were always right because a few minutes would go by and our mom would call us to the table and we would eat dinner.

And when dinner was finished, fruit and ice pops were always served. I always thought it was the perfect way to cool everyone down and prepare them for bed. I was always the first to go to bed since I was the youngest and my mom never allowed me to stay up late. So, sometimes I would fall asleep on the couch and then I would wake up in my bed with the covers pulled over me as the air conditioner ran in the background.

It would be dark with the only source of light coming from the fish aquarium lamp that rotated around as if the fish were actually moving. It would put me to sleep in a heartbeat and I was grateful for that because nowadays I find myself revenge procrastinating. Insomnia has kept me up at all hours. Sometimes, I wished she would just quiet down and go to sleep herself.

If you stuck around for this long, thank you for that because now I get to explain why I may or may not have wasted your time reading me going down memory lane. For some reason, I couldn't help but do so because these doves remind me of a time when I was a carefree soul. Occasionally, I wonder where have all the mourning doves gone. I don't hear them anymore, and ever since they stopped singing to me, reality has given me a check. I used to wish that I was grown up to do all the things I wanted to and didn't get to do when I was younger. Now that I can, I regret rushing the years because I want them back, but the truth is they're never going to come back.

As I mourn the loss of my childhood, I'm sure these doves probably mourn the lives they had when they were younger too. I only hoped they had an adventurous childhood as I had.

Although they can't help me bring back my childhood, I hope they bring nostalgia and joyous memories to children who were my age once upon a time.

(this was all over the place but thank you for tuning in.)