May 26, 2025Ginel OpleWhat Remains True after the Golden Anniversary

This morning’s argument was because I insisted the house you grew up in had a porch: a lovely, off-white deck your father built after Korea, where on Friday evenings, I would show up with my bicycle and two bottles of Coke stolen from my auntie’s store. I could feel the pine step hard against my buttocks, the warm static of our Catholic arms brushing while we watched my bike twisted on the grass, whispering ways we could fit all that we had on its tiny frame and leave everything behind.

You said most of it was true except you never had a porch. You came back from the bedroom holding a tin of old pictures, and I knew then I was about to be proven wrong. In a yellowed photograph taken on a morning before church, you were standing on the slab that led to the front door of your house surrounded by woods. Cardigan over a polka dot dress, you were smiling, the world around you turning to a different shade. I couldn’t believe you put up with me all these years.