Drink. Room-temp cheap merlot in a chilled glass because that’s what I like.
Snack. Generic cheddar rice snacks because I just needed something salty.
Music. Dario Marianelli’s score to Pride and Prejudice because I’m a romantic.
Like many things this week, I’ve been putting off writing in here not because of lack of inspiration but because of a general withdrawal from anything stimulating. After a year and a half of semi-involuntary seclusion, sometimes the littlelest of events can be overwhelming. Not these events have been little. A $500 dollar quote to get my rear windows fixed and a $700 quote to get the leak in my trunk fixed. A half-sister only physically known to me for less than three months in the hospital with what is apparently a serious infection despite a lifetime of an apparently weak immune system. A volatile step-brother. who glorifies and lives up the worst qualities of our shared dad, trying his best to restrain his rage in a horrible divorce where the ex-wife has recently been showing her true colors in the purplish yellow bruises and scratches up and down the body of their 20 month old son. As things get bad, things get better. Saved myself money by pulling the door panels off myself and jury-rigging the window regulators by duct taping them to the tracks. Half-sister is slowly but surely recovering and step-brother had a fortunate turn of legal events in support of his side of the story.
It could always be worse. Random thoughts from here on out; haphazardly stored away throughout the past week.
Walking up the concrete steps to work the other day. Whitecapped with salt stains from the much-appreciated snowfall. Salt stains are merely a part of life back home requiring the need to have your car washed and underbody flushed on a weekly basis lest your car chassis rusts through completely. Something of which I’m familiar with. Thank Heavens I was only pulling into a parking space at college when my front wheel snapped off at the axle and not on the interestate or up on the business spur. Something else memorable…the salt stains on our clothing. Especially jeans. A full day of classes and walking back and forth across campus, white rimmed peaks would rise up the back of your calves and people wondered why we didn’t bother with nice clothes in college…jeans, flannels and carharts were de rigeur for both guys and girls.
I heard robins the other day walking to my car from the bus stop on my dinner break. Glorious pink and orange and blue sunset. Really thought for just a moment, in a lazy blink of eye, that I was back home on the edge of the sea-lake with 200 year old white pines and the sweet acidic scent of their needles in the air.
I wondered how many times I have left to visit with my grandparents and the thought that not many makes me wish I never left home. Gramma thanked me for calling as often as I do. Of her 27 grandchildren, I’m maybe one of four who keep in touch. I have the large family I always wanted… Isn’t it like it’s said, though, be careful what you wish for? The older I’ve become I realised it isn’t size that makes a great family, it’s much more. Like unconditional love and support, willingness to keep each other standing in the storms or unabashed openness without fear of judgement. My family grew by five this past winter, not counting numerous ‘aunts’, ‘uncles’ and ‘cousins’. Family who hadn’t seen me in twenty-five years and family I never remembered meeting. I’d forgotten, willingly, for most of my life that I was born a part of an entirely different family than the one I’ve known. Answers to questions I never knew I had. Does it change who I am? Or does it mean that it’s woken up the part of me I laid to rest a long time ago? A family of strangers.
It’s not easy, his place among the stars
Never knowing the depths of the sky as they know.
Turning circles circling to the same song on the radio waves.
At the zenith of his day, he gets the best view of them and I of him
None of us focusing on who’s focusing on us,
I look to him and he looks to them
Each one dreaming of something better.
As yet untitled.
My bare feet cautiously move from the dull shade of cool grass
To the hot cement, sweltering from the long afternoon,
The heat shocks my cool feet then slowly uncurls upwards,
Twisting and turning until my whole body is alive
I close my eyes and breathe deeply filling my lungs with the sound of heat bugs
And thick warm air
My eyes open and I see a creature, some being of a summer dream
Her skin is hot pink and her hair is a wild fire orange
That sparkles like water in the sun.
She whispers something to me and we smile
We both start to run
The wind whips our hair
We almost hear it snapping
The tall grass stings our legs
And we jump
Into the air
For a moment we are
Unleashed
Free
When we reach the ground
A bubble moves from deep inside of me to my throat
And becomes a giggle
My summer friend and I laugh until our sides ache
When we catch our breath she points off towards the horizon
I look and my breath catches
A sunset
A tangerine and hot pink explosion
Of color
I turn to my friend but she’s gone
A tear burns like the sun down my cheek
I watch it fall to the back of my hand
And a smile dawns across my lips
My skin is the hot pink like the sunset
My hair is the wild fire orange
A laugh rushes out of my throat
I stand up and run
With the wind again.
