My father passed away several months ago, and today strangers, all waiting for a bargain, invade our house. At the public auction, they fill spaces where I formed some of my favorite memories.

In our living room, people are huddled together to bid on the antique glassware my sisters and I always hated to dust. The auctioneer holds up a Roseville vase and banters price by price. Will someone else's dust cloth clean my great-grandmother's beautiful heirloom?

A man with plenty of chin and no obvious butt stands where our old black and white television used to sit. The very T.V. on which I watched the Beatles on The Ed Sullivan Show and clips of the first man on the moon.

The same room forty years from then would serve as my mother's rehabilitation area as she recuperated from a stroke. The couch to be sold today became her bed before she was transferred to the assisted living facility, never to return home.

The crowd moves to the kitchen. In its history, mother taught me to cook and iron. I can remember the yesterdays when Dad would pop corn nearly every Sunday night. We each had our own colorful Fiesta bowl filled with the treat. 

To this day, popcorn remains my favorite snack food.

A mother and daughter team break away from the others to explore artifacts and furniture in my former bedroom. Why do I still feel they are infringing on my territory? My privacy? My sanctuary?

After all, this was the base where I danced alone to 45 rpm records, the doctor made his house calls to treat my ills, and where I snuck out the window to meet my prohibitive boyfriend as my parents slept down the hall. 

The room where I lost my virginity.

"Who'll give ten dollars?" I hear the auctioneer ask the group now centered around our upright player piano in the den. A woman with a hit-and-miss look nods her confirmation.

"Fifteen dollars?" 

The no-butt man taps his left index finger against his pockmarked cheek.

How could these people know that I taught myself how to play the piano many years ago? Researched which key was which? How could they realize I embrace the priceless memory of my maternal grandmother playing it as we all gathered round to sing Christmas carols?

"Who'll give twenty?" The auctioneer scans the sprinkling of faces for any takers.

The final bid comes in at fifty dollars. With a few minor repairs, will the idle piano give as much joy to the next owner as I've known?

Outside, in the garage, folks (mostly men) grapple at dad's tools, instruments he used to build and create. Will the highest bidder manage them as diligently and skillfully?

Right now, I'd give almost anything to hand dad the tools he used to request when I helped him with his projects. The few dollars they are sold for today are worth a million to me.

As the house and yard empties of the strangers and their new possessions, I take one last look around at the only home I'll ever know.

I step into my parents' bedroom now silent of their snores and readying for work. I recall being very young and asking my mother's permission to slip under their covers during lightning storms.

She never said no.

As I pass the bathroom, I can almost see mom set her hair in curlers, and hear dad call from the shower he is ready for her to wash his back.

Oh, to have those days again.

At this point, I'm left with grieving rights I pray will never make an encore.

Before I close the front door behind me for the final time, I pause to reflect. This part of my life is over and nobody can take away the memories. Nor will they betray me.

No matter how old I become or where I choose to live, I'll never replicate the love and security I felt here in my parents' home.

Author's Biography

Radio commercial advertising in the Hoosier state of Indiana is Laurel's paying profession, but personal writing is her passion. 

She has been a contributing author in e-zines, The Sidewalk's End, Long Story Short: A Women's Writer's Showcase, Apollo's Lyre, Seeker Magazine, and an upcoming issue of The Sink. 

Laurel's motto: "When all the words have slipped away, nothing will remain." 

E-mail Laurel.

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