The Yellow Door Life

At the very beginning. 

The first house I ever knew was on a street called Welton Ave. 

We had a neighbor with a dalmatian named Sparky.

We had another neighbor with a chow-chow mix named Spud who walked over to greet us every day when we got home. 

There was nothing fancy about this house. It had brown carpet, flower-patterned linoleum tile in the kitchen, and a giant window on the second floor that gave warm light to the living room and overlooked that street below. 

It had two stories with a landing in between that had access to the front door and the garage. 

The backyard was huge and I had an amazing jungle gym and trampoline. 

I remember having birthday parties and busting open pinatas on the back porch. 

My room was full of stuffed animals, a Barbie dreamhouse, and books. It was a sanctuary. Until I had my first nightmare after watching parts of Dracula with my dad. Then I couldn’t close my eyes in that room for days. 

This was all in a town called Walsenburg. A small town in the very southern part of Colorado, not too far from the border with New Mexico. 

I spent the first 7.5 years of my life in this place. I grew up with the sound of train whistles in the background and figured the rest of the world must have been just like this. 

We went to St. Mary’s Catholic Church and I met my best friend there. We both went to St. Mary’s Catholic School and grew up together watching Power Rangers and playing at each other’s houses. 

When I think back to this time in my life, I always felt safe. Things were not perfect, but they felt like they were as close as you could get. 

Then, as most stories go, there was a plot twist. The first of several plot twists that would forever change my life. 

My school was shut down for various reasons, but one of which being the belief that it was haunted. Which, in fact, it was.

It was one of the only places in my life where I have genuinely felt the presence of something paranormal, and not the friendly, Casper variety.

My mom used to work in the library and we were alone in the building one Saturday morning when a series of strange things kept happening.

We kept hearing knocking at the library door. But there was no one there.

I ended up being in the hallway alone at one point and watched a hooded, black figure float along the ceiling.

Some might say I was young and just imagining things, but I know what I saw, and felt.

Not long after that, the school was closed, and we all went to the public school just down the street.

The second plot twist came halfway through my second grade year. My parents decided to move us out of Walsenburg, so my dad could take a job in Colorado Springs.

We had visited Colorado Springs a couple times and it seemed exciting, but I was devastated to leave my house, and the people that were my home.

That plot twist forever changed the course of my life.

I’ll speak to this more later, but I was taken from a place where I felt loved, safe, and accepted to a place where I suddenly felt the need to question my own worth.

That move, I believe, is where all my trauma really began.

…

I never went back to Walsenburg.

We played Trinidad in sports in high school, so on every trip up and down that interstate, I gazed at that abandoned school building from our bus.

I wondered what my life would have been like if I had never left.
I wondered where everyone I had loved so much was now and if they were happy.

When I try to rationalize the fact that I lost contact with my best friend and other people I cared about, I have always chalked it up to the fact that I was a kid and I had no choice about where I went.

The truth is, in my heart, I felt that those people had moved on because I was gone, and they didn’t want me in their life.

I told myself that, and for a long time, I believed it.

The truth is I didn’t go back because I was scared. Scared I would miss it. Scared I would no longer be accepted. Scared that too much had changed.

So I left a piece of my heart in that tiny town and never looked back.

3 months ago.

When I planned my massive summer road trip I wanted to make sure I went to all the places in Colorado that held significance for me. 

As I mapped out the route, I made sure to give myself some time to stop and explore this town from my past. The place where I first felt joy and friendship. Where I took my first steps and laughed for the first time.

As soon as I exited I-25, I searched for the Pizza Hut where I used to get my free pizza for completing Book-Its! I looked to the side of the road and saw that it now had a bright, green roof and was in fact a pot shop with a sign that read,

Bud Hut.

My beloved Pizza Hut was now a dispensary.

I laughed it off, but also felt like someone should have fought to preserve that cherished piece of my childhood.

As I continued down a completely familiar, yet strange road, I began to realize just how much of this place had stayed with me.

I have dreamed about these roads and hills. I may have never physically come back to visit, but I now made the connection that dreams I have had my whole life were rooted in this place.

One particular goal I had for the trip to Walsenburg, and throughout the whole trip to Colorado, was to visit graves of people who had an impact on my life; who got me to this point.

Of course, it was most important for me to go see my dad in Denver, but I had several others I needed to pay my respects to.

I remember these people as a blessing in my life; some of my first examples of kindness and grace. People who I wish I had been able to say goodbye to, but didn’t.

As I made my way into town, I had several places I wanted to see, and visit, including the two cemeteries where these people were buried. One cemetery is located on the north end of town and one on the south. 

I got to the north cemetery first and wondered how I was going to find their graves. There was no one there and no phone number to call to help me locate them. I figured I had driven all this way to see them though, so God would lead me to where they were. I circled one half of the cemetery and felt like I was looking for a needle in a hay stack. I was about to leave when I said to God one last time, “please help me find them.” And with the literal next turn of my head, a name caught my eye and I was able to say my thank yous and goodbyes. 

When I got to the south cemetery, I prayed the same prayer, “please help me find her.” And I did. I cried. I prayed. I said my thank yous and goodbyes, and got back in my car, and left. 

There is something healing about visiting cemeteries. Those who have gone before us speak volumes about their lives through the flowers and mementos left at their gravesides. 

Whether you believe in an afterlife, or not, you cannot deny that life doesn’t truly end with death. 

We live on in who, and what, is left behind. 

I’d like to think that I could have enough of an impact that people would come to visit my grave even 27 years after my last interaction with them. 

Just a random visit while passing through on a summer road trip.

Aside from the cemeteries, I wanted to drive past that house on Welton Ave. I wanted to see the neighborhood where I learned to ride a bike and made snowmen in the front yard. I wanted to see the bowling alley. The schools where I learned to read and write. The Safeway where we went grocery shopping. The church where I was baptized.

It felt like home. It felt unknown. It felt like a missing piece to the puzzle that never actually went away, just got lost for a while. 

Today.

I will be 35 in 3 days. 

It’s a milestone I will reach whether I feel completely prepared for it or not.        

There is still so much time to say and do the things that matter most. 

I have regrets, as we all do, but I’m glad that I finally went back to Walsenburg. 

And while I may always wonder what could have been, I know I must focus on what comes next. 

The places that shaped me are chapters and even though a chapter may seemingly end, it never hurts to revisit it, reread it, and maybe even, 

rewrite it. 

❤