Home

When I was young, I was dissatisfied with my home. This is a bit embarrassing to admit, because my mom did try to invite my friends over on birthdays, and she liked to throw parties for our Indian friends. I usually helped her clean the house while she prepared all sorts of Indian foods and snacks. Papadum, lentil fritters, pakora, puris (appetizers); rasamalai, carrot halva, gulab jamun (desserts); rasams, kooras of ALL sorts (main dishes). It's amazing that I can recall this because my memory is so hazy from those days. But the smells and flavors from those dishes bring back many memories. I also thought that when mom cooked, the house just plain smelled. And by that I mean, not in a good way. Man, was I ungrateful.

As a teen, I didn't understand why we never had American friends to dinner. I only invited a couple of people of my age over, and when we did, we mainly watched movies and played on my Atari 2600. When we had Indian parties, the men would stay in one room, and the women would stay in another. There were political and sports discussions in the men's area, and there were family and children discussions in the women's area (and maybe some gossip). I know, this is extremely stereotypical, but that's the way the parties occurred with the Indians in Montgomery, Alabama. The kids usually needed a different room to cavort around in, and cavort we did. We played games, played outside if we could, and we also...fought. We would try to have a sort of a wrestling match, usually girls against guys (if our parents caught us at this, we'd sometimes get in trouble). I was the head of the girls, usually; big surprise, right?. We had a timed effort where we would just pound on each other. I feel stupid even typing this. I will admit that this stopped around the time we were around fourteen. Thank goodness.

Once I had my own kids, I've had different people over to my house. Not often, but I have. Usually, it's the girls' friends. We've had birthday parties for the girls, of course, but I'd try to have their friends over to spend the night, and I'd try to take them out places sometimes sinceI don't have a ton of activities at my house, either. More than my parents, for sure, but no pool or large activity room. Which I think is fine.

I've realized as my girls are older that home is more than a place. It's a feeling, too. It's a sense of welcome. It's a desire for real friendship, not fake or surface fellowship. It's a hope that you can be real in front of others, instead of having "company" manners or habits. I would hope that if my house is a bit cluttered, my real friends wouldn't judge. My main struggle on having friends over is that I have a hard time letting go of the "tasks" that need to be done. I would like to not worry about doing things right. I'm getting better at it. If the bread burns, I usually just shrug my shoulders. If I don't have exactly what's needed for serving tea, it's okay. If I don't have dessert, I'll make the best of it.

I love this post by Tim Challies on having people over. I hope I continue to do this even as my children grow up and move away. Don't even like to think about it, but it's happening as we speak.