Canary yellow wallpaper and plastic and mini hot dogs in the oven. A bird singing in the corner brings life to stale air like a deflated balloon slowly blowing up to real size. A den dark and dusty filled with couches we were allowed to sit on and a firm rust carpet smelling clean but not fresh. All the other couches are reserved for Adults, covered in plastic because in my seven year-old mind, they are always moving. Butterscotch candies and those strawberry ones that had a filling nobody liked. Two movies to choose from: Ratoutoille - the singing cartoon mouse - or Fantasia - the one that scared me with the dancing brooms. Dimly lit lamps so fragile because they are made of seashells and quilted blankets pulled tight over mounds of pillows. My Grandma Audrey in an oversized moo moo, blotting sweat off her forehead before it falls between large plastic glasses frames. My Grandpa is excited to see us, but not the kind of excited that makes you feel that if you wanted to you could stay forever.

This is my memory of Grandma and Grandpa's growing up. I don't have very many more because they lived in California for half the year. This was the first time I learned the existence of California. I pictured sun and golf and old people.

I had no idea I would live here. I had no idea Palm Springs, where my Grandma and Grandpa spent those six winter months, would be a frequented getaway spot for me and my friends. I had no idea I would get married here or raise a child here. I had no idea I would have a home here. Sometimes life tricks you in that way. You have an idea of a place you never considered living because you think you're headed in a particular direction, then you're displaced and off kilter and end up in the land that only existed in your imagination; materialized in front of you it feels different than your thoughts so much so that you're convinced it is a different place than the one you first heard about when you were seven.

And you love it with a love that you didn't know you could have for another place from which you did not originate. A piece of your heart loves it; perhaps not your whole heart. But still, you feel connected. Maybe because of the seven year old picture or maybe because you have made it Home. There is something inherently beautiful here that gives you an imagined memory of your Grandparents laughing by the pool, drinking Chardonnay by the stars, and strolling in the cool desert evening. A piece of you feels like you might have existed here before you knew it. That it's not an off-course journey traveled, but the one you were on from the beginning. Starting with those wallpapered walls and mini kitchen TV and the tiny bird chirping in the corner.