The refrigerator in my kitchen is a coffin of memories. It juts out from where it is lodged between the bit of granite countertop at the end of the sink and the vacant negative space of the avocado-green wall where my mother once tried to hang Tuscan-themed wall decor she bought from an internet antique store.
The avocado wall—unsightly, my mother had told my father when he had painted it — could not bear anything placed upon it. Unsightly. A wall in a home of a family of seven, and it never carried any evidence that anyone had lived there. Instead, the refrigerator — scarred by its years of loyal service — was pockmarked with magnetic dots and squares that fastened onto it the moments of my family’s life like medals on a general’s lapel. Every visit to the refrigerator was a visit to the altar of my childhood — and then some.
Pic: Copyright © Jessai Flores
