Anywhere but There

I shared a room
with two brothers -
a bed with one of them
until I was 16-
so I learned not to expect
too much privacy.

My earliest memories
were sitting with my brothers
on the couch that my father
reupholstered himself,
(partly
because he could reupholster
and partly
because we
couldn't afford new furniture)
watching Warner Brothers cartoons,
memorizing the voices
and the jokes,
on the color TV
that occasionally died
and my father would
resurrect with his vast
collection of glass vacuum tubes
he kept in a shoe box,
again,
because he knew how
and because
we couldn't afford
a new TV.  

The kitchen
had a breakfast nook
upholstered in pleather
(again, my father)
that made our thighs
stick as we slid in
wearing shorts
on hot summer days,
and my mom would concoct
things that only now
I have the words
to describe:
her go-to meal was collect
all the leftovers
and throw them in a skillet,
bind them all together
with egg
and serve it up in a tortilla.

My favorite place,
my only sanctuary,
was the spot on the floor
in front of the "stereo"
where I would
plug in my Pop's
over-the-ear
gray and black
plastic headphones
and listen to the FM radio,
or albums I borrowed
from the library,

and I would
escape from my world
of patched-up furniture,
hand-me-down clothes
leftover recipes
and my unspoken
Mexican inferiority complex

and I would dream
I was in a New York high rise,
or a Los Angeles bachelor pad,
or a Chicago recording studio,
anywhere but there.

Decades later,
I still consider it
home.