THE WINDOW

The window jerked open with a harder push than it needed. It wanted to be opened. It was waiting to be opened. The quiet howl of the wind was reverberant in its sweet, haunting tone. There was nothing to see but bare gangly trees. The snow was so white it lit up the pitch-black darkness. The sylvan behind the house was so vast, so secretive, and so inviting. Her arms rested on the damp windowsill and her mind settled to remember what used to be out there.

 

The redolence of the woods never changes. It’s satiated with mystery. How many times as a child she slid down the embankment into her own make-believe forest was countless. The sun would creep through hundreds of trees with liquidity beams full of swirling dust and debris. The dried leaves were crisply ground underfoot. The sound of the crunch was her companion, her guard. The path was never traced or marked, but she always knew the way. Wild excitement followed the occasional hare, skillfully darting in and out, desperate to engage her in a chase. “Yes of course” she whispered. But wait, over there, something more seductive. It was a sleek delicate doe, breathlessly still, and gaping back at her from the distance. No thorny headdress to wear - just a glistening coat - tight as the skin of a drum stretched and tailored down her lightening fast legs. And poof! She shouldn’t have looked away. Oh, but luckily though - the real high priestess of the playground coos a promise to stay awhile. Tranquil and nestled everywhere above her, blackbirds that claim to have seen heaven and talk about it. Envied little creatures with enlightened melodies that dance down from the treetops. 

 

To literally traipse through that maze now would dispel the enchantment. As a little girl, she could hold reverie in a jar and twist off the lid to her notional musings without intellect. But as a woman, she feels suspicious and petrified by the truths (or lies) such innocence can conjure up. It’s better to beckon from afar. She can no longer denote that same fluid sensation behind walls accidentally built too thick and too high. They’re sandbagged, by the sheer strength of willfulness, to stay present and devoid of emotion that she can neither understand nor control; then battles now to the death. “On guard!” she cries, as brutal thoughts bang inside her head, and ricochet down her chest, only to drop and settle in the pit of her stomach. She can’t breathe with them lodged there so she chokes them down a little further with the rest of the bile. 

 

Only one time before now had she opened this window and summoned the woods. It was the end of summer right before she left for California. She jerked it open that night too. It was a warm evening and the moon was hiding since nightfall. She inhaled deeply...acutely. She asked if she were doing the right thing. Should she go? And without a beat, the moon appeared from nowhere. Her heart sank a million miles and she lost her breath within the fierce glow. Time stopped. Her extremities seemed numb, even paralyzed, and the only sensation and movement were on the inside. The pang felt like fear but she wasn’t afraid. The answer…the truth…it had cut through clean.

 

Twelve years had quickly passed since then and tonight the air felt cool as the snow drifted down sideways. A wistful breeze gently moved the branches of the trees in all different directions. She asked, should she do what it takes to hold on to what she knows she's found? And before she could even finish the thought – the trees in her eye line began to sway simultaneously in the same direction. So hard and so forceful, in unison on the same route, like several hands ferociously waving hello. Hello! Hello! Remember me? You used to play here! And again her body froze. Her mind drenched in knowing. The girth and potency of yes irrefutable. Coincidence is too easy, too cerebral. She can’t fight that sometimes the universe feels magical, or at the very least is capable of reflecting back the truth she already knows. 

 

LIGHTNING BUGS

It sparks incredible fluorescent yellow-green. You can’t calculate the sparks. They just happen. You can’t predict them either, because sometimes, they don’t happen. My favorite insect is the lightning bug. My father gave of us each a jar, with a lid, to catch them. They weren’t that easy to trap in the dark, but that of course was the game. I can still smell the cut grass, from earlier in the day, when he cut it. We all piloted the conduit to be mowed. Our work was to pick up the rocks so they wouldn’t get jammed in the blade. We placated that harrowing thought my father harbored, with our tiny hands. I hated all the jobs my father made us do. They seemed stupid. And we certainly did not get an allowance as an incentive. He just demanded, and we all begrudgingly did what he said. Even when he was asking pleasantly it still seemed like he was yelling. 

 

When my brother wasn’t home, I had to grip the light to beam down on the engine, so my father could expertly whirl and whiz his ratchet around. It shone the light, in the exact same way, as when it was hung from the hood…but my father insisted it didn’t. And thirty years later, I know it was his way of spending time with me, and I also know he didn’t know any other way. Subsequently, I know a bit about tools. I’ve built and fixed many things because of it. I can drill like a pro. I can fix a flat and change my own oil. I can make blueprints in my head of things I want to build. The soundproof vocal box, that I built in the bedroom of my New York apartment, is a perfect example of how my father has influenced me. I’d really like him to see it someday, because unconsciously, somewhere inside, he would know it’s because of him. 

 

But, back to the garage, where my sulking never stopped him from directing me. He would say 3/16th, and eventually, I would reach in the toolbox, and pick out the wrench or ratchet bit first try, without even looking at the engraved number on it. There is nothing but nothing my father cannot figure out and fix. It’s just a fact. He was such a contradiction. Girls were supposed to be and act a certain way, and yet he had me out in the garage with him. I never really got dirty but the smell of oil, grime, and grease define something tangible. It transports me right back. To his happiness, I guess.

 

But tonight, there are lightning bugs out here. It’s about 8:30 at night and there’s no school tomorrow. We have our jars. The mosquitoes find my blood succulent. My sister isn’t getting bit but I am. I don’t care. My brother already caught one. My sister isn’t even trying, except when my father looks in her direction. Ooh! I got one. Its wings spin like the propellers of a helicopter, and the light only comes from its lower body. It’s electric - but there’s no plug. How do they glow? I'll have to hurry because it seems they don’t stay around long, or maybe they do, and I’m just summoned to bed too early. I should be grateful I am still up because my mother makes me go to bed so early. I would just like another in the jar because I think she will get lonely alone. If I can get one more I can set them free together, forever. Maybe I will catch, the exact same two bugs tomorrow, and the next day, and the next. But I don’t know. I don’t see them anywhere now. They were gleaming so bright a second ago but now it’s just dark. I know the screen door is going to unfasten any second. I can hear the squeak before my mother even pushes it. She says to let them go and come inside. My father has lost interest by now, he’s back in the garage. It’s ok. They’ll be back tomorrow I think to myself as I let my one catch go. I barely untwist the lid before it vanishes. 

 

I am a lot like the lightning bug. Sometimes I glow really bright, and then suddenly I don’t. You can never predict my sparks either. I only show myself at certain times. I spin around crazy fast, just like they do. I’m only alive in the summer. I’m incomprehensible, just like their radiance. And I want to be caught and set free - just like I think they do - otherwise they wouldn’t illuminate to be found in the first place.

​

THE CALL

Somewhere around 9am the usual deafening city chatter prickled my ears when I left the subway stairwell up to Bleeker Street. I can hear tiny pebbles, loose cement, and dirt crackle under my shoes while feeling a cool, swoosh of wind from people on both sides of me rushing by in their usual urgent way. Not a moment later my clunky cell phone rings. It never rings this early. In fact it never really rings. This is after all ten years ago. Cell phones played a much lesser role in our lives back then, and were still the secondary way to get in touch. No texting and the Internet speed still dreadfully slow. 

 

The ring startled me in a happy way as I dug through my bag. Back then it was exciting for your cell phone to ring. We still wanted to talk to people unlike now where we just text everything – even birthday wishes. Hello?It was Diann. Instantly a huge smile plastered itself across my face because she is very difficult to get in touch with – it has felt somewhat sparse and sporadic over the years and so I felt a bit like I won a prize given her crazy schedule of four older children and a brand new baby. I was in Los Angeles for eight years before and now in New York for two years so syncing up is tricky. That winning prize lasted less than a second as she started to tell me what she was watching on television. Breaking news was reporting on the World Trade Center being hit by a plane. I was not far from there. I started to look around and cross down to Broadway and Houston to see something. I can’t remember now if I saw the smoke at that point but all I knew and still know is someone was with me as I walked to find out. I don’t know if I was as alarmed as I should have been because I’m slower to panic if crisis isn’t directly clobbering me. The only thoughts were an accidental crash and there was no chaos in the streets, only very distant sirens. The day was actually pretty stunning so I’m not sure I could really register anything contradicting the billowing skies basking through the buildings between the streets.

 

We walked backed to Lafayette toward my office and while I can’t remember our exact words I can remember that the call prepared me in a significant way for the very long nightmare to follow. For whatever reasons I have not been able to let go of the feelings from that call, and ten years later hearing the messages from trapped 9/11 victims gives me a much better understanding of why. And while it’s just so completely different from what they felt making calls and leaving messages – someone had reached me and I was not alone. While I know that the comparisons I dare to make are just so outrageous I feel compelled to make them anyway. While I inevitably had to go through that day and weeks to follow completely alone – it crucially began with an important person in my life. I suppose there is just something about the way she mothers or how ridiculously suited and perfect she is for the job that transcends and spills over into our friendship that I would feel safe just to hear her voice – but I know I did. So my gall at comparison would be that while victims did succumb to a tortuous death many were able to contact important people to them and maybe just hearing that voice live or on a machine helped comfort them somehow before they met their fate. I just know on some microscopic level it must have. I’m sure many didn’t get the chance – but it is evidenced many did and I somehow know or dare to imagine what it meant.

 

We hung up and while I can’t remember the details I’m sure we spoke again once the cell phone lines became unblocked. She had luckily reached me before that happened because they quickly became clogged and wouldn’t hold signals. I believe this was crucial to how I handled the rest of the day. I felt like I had contact with mine, someone had reached me before everything went so bleak. I don’t know why I’m so adamant about the significance but I am. I know that I was comforted by and spoke with so many I love that day but this story always starts with that call. 

 

I went up to my office and was surprised to find so few people there. The office was dark. The power was not off so maybe it was some bizarre coincidence of foreshadowing. I don’t really know but the air was suddenly thick and stuffy. The CFO had a television on in his office. I didn’t even realize there was a television anywhere in our office. It was so run down, still a grass roots business at that point. We were poor and struggling. But there sat a television and it was all finally real and suddenly heavy. We watched the first tower crumble in utter disbelief. This was just so inconceivable. Weren’t those herculean buildings? Somehow the damage seemed smaller on a television. It just didn’t compute that what happened would crumble that type of building. It was as if they were made out of clay as they incinerated into thin air. Until that exact moment we really believed that everything would be fine.  We even clung to hope with one tower still standing. But suddenly it let go and we howled as if we were in it or running away from it.

 

We didn’t know what to do. I think we felt the most panic right in that moment. Everything changed. The CEO didn’t want to evacuate even though we were fairly close to downtown. But when we looked out the office window over Lafayette and saw the stream of very dusty people marching uptown like uniformed ants he knew he had no choice but to comply and let us evacuate. We didn’t know what else could happen. We didn’t know if more planes were coming. As I opened the door to the street there was a very loud silence, panic masked in weird restless calm. So much dust on everyone streaming by. The footsteps were brilliant and somewhat in step. I felt heavy by something cataclysmically changing all around me. I just couldn’t register anything but disbelief. It wasn’t like the earthquake in Los Angeles a few years earlier. Or the black out in New York that followed two years later. Or even my building fire three years later on 7th Street. This was so unlike any other catastrophe. In a sense it felt like a tiny war…and I was there off in the distance… just another survivor retreating from the bloody battlefield. 

 

I watched the flow for a while but then I made a sudden move to get in line robotically with everyone. I wasn’t prepared for a forty-block walk home. I had on platforms. After a few blocks I stopped quickly, bent down and took them off and continued on barefoot with eyes to the ground so not to step on anything sharp. I could feel every bit of filth on those streets grind into my soles and I felt very heated but not hot. I wanted water but I’m not sure it seemed plausible at the time to stop. The conversations were quick and changed as I sped up or slowed down. I started to realize how close I actually was even though technically Houston is many blocks from the Trade Center. But, the dust on people put me so much closer to it all. The smell in the air suddenly started to get pungent as the winds were surely by now shifting the toxins across the entire city. Burning rubber is all I could assimilate it to but yet it was nothing like burning rubber. And it lasted for weeks. The longer I walked and listened to everyone’s frenzied voices - the more a calm came over me. Sometimes when others are afraid I just want or need to feel brave. But that quickly changed when I got home and turned on the television and the scenes replayed over and over.

 

I talked to family and many close friends throughout the day but the details to any of that are very vague to me now beyond the lovely sense of comfort that only family and friends can give you. My roommate was out of town, which was becoming more and more usual with trips to Connecticut or Florida. I didn’t really know what to do with myself for the rest of the day or how to handle the amount of loss we all just witnessed live as it occurred. September 11, 2001 definitively seems the de facto start of our Internet revolution. And now there is little in life we have to imagine with smart phones permanently fastened to our hand - vigorously spewing out life and death play by plays in real time. Inevitably that breech in security must have influenced the speed of technology.

 

But back then it was still only television. I kept it on and could not stop watching for literally inexplicable stretches of time. I was more and more distraught by the outside situation with no hope see anyone to help lighten my own internal situation. I am not really sure how I dealt with it because being in New York at the center of it was so radically different than watching it from another state. Here you just couldn’t escape it. We were under attack. There was little doubt to that. I can’t recall if non-essential businesses were requested by Mayor Giuliani to temporarily shut down or not but the company I worked for did. It seemed desolate outside as if some people had in fact left. I think it was a time to volunteer if you were of that fabric or to just stay out of the damn way and keep things uncongested if you weren’t.

 

I did see my roommate’s brother for a short time that dreary first night as he was temporarily blocked from taking the commuter home. Mass transit shut down. He was not really distraught or at least that’s how it seemed to me. For some reason I more remember him annoyed and uninterested so we didn’t really talk about it. Somehow we just talked about everything but. I can very clearly remember being slightly entranced by the shape of his eyes as we sat on the couch talking. I don’t know what it was but I can still see it so vividly. Maybe I needed to focus on something nice in lieu of so much ugliness. I can’t explain it because it wasn’t the color of his eyes – it was just the interesting curves and shapes encasing them. It’s kind of silly now to think I thought this that night…but I did.

 

The rest of the week I spent watching CNN coverage that I couldn’t tear myself away from hoping survivors would be pulled out – but finally I needed to go outside even though something in me was slightly paralyzed. I don’t think I liked the city at that moment. But, eventually I got my camera loaded with film and took the subway to Union Square. I didn’t know where to go. I knew that Ground Zero, as they were already calling it, was closed off - but I’m not sure I would have wanted to go regardless. Stepping off the subway to Union Square there was a shocking amount of displays, tributes, etc. I shot one roll of B&W getting a few interesting shots (most notably of a girl lighting a candle in the center of a ring of candles and flowers) but then quickly retreated home after seeing a huge wall with hundreds of signs and pictures of the missing. It was just too palpable. Grief was thick in the air. Everywhere. I had somewhat thought I would feel better to connect and be with everyone but they were all just strangers in pain. I needed someone of mine but there wasn’t anyone here. I turned the key to my apartment and felt a little surge of relief. I debated turning the television back on and for a few brief moments felt resigned not to – but only minutes later I wanted company…any company, so I caved.

 

The day before returning to work (now walking the streets a bit more freely again) I passed by a clothing/gift shop where I bought a t-shirt with American flag on it. I don’t really know why. That’s not the type of thing I do. I generally don't make statements like that but for whatever reason I bought it and wore it to work. The CEO didn’t seem to be affected at all by the events and frankly it angered me that he put his silly CD’s above what had happened. He was so worried about missed sales during those few days. But I guess everyone handles everything differently. And maybe sometimes things get in me much deeper than they should because I have nothing of my own to invest in. I just keep trying to contain everything attaching itself to me without toppling over. I feel like an empty steel can full of magnets. Nothing is mine but the can. The rest is just a bunch of magnets stuck inside. And I can’t let them go because they are all I have.

 

Perhaps I made this big anniversary harder on myself by watching the news rebroadcast live as it happened, you tube videos of jumpers, multiple documentaries, 911 calls, voice mail messages from those trapped, and ATC tapes – but I just needed to see it all again as it happened then. And for someone with a very compartmentalized albeit bad memory – that day from my own perspective is visceral again. There’s so few times in my life that I can render up an actual physical sensation…not a memory…a sensation that stems deep from the gut. It’s different. Memories are usually rewritten and somewhat gloriously worn as a badge (even the disturbing ones)…but sensations are live from your nerves. Live, as it really happened. So while of course I am romanticizing and embellishing my memories in written form today…what came first was the live sensation yesterday…and where that took breath from was the first call ten years ago.

 

I’m glad today is 9 years and 364 days away from the 20th anniversary of 9/11. And what I hope most is it’s still the most tragic thing to happen on American soil. I don’t want to be pessimistic and believe something will top it…not on this truly beautiful day…September 12th, 2011. 

​

DEBRIS

Her eyes flutter for a blurred glance toward the large digital numbers on the bureau. She doesn't need a noisy alarm because her body is much more reliable than a clock. The batteries never go dead. There's no plug or waste of an outlet. Without a doubt, and as sure as the sun rises, she will wake when the neon green figures shift to morph six o'clock. It's warm and beautiful. It's safe and quiet. It's a dreamy soft vigilance. Her mind has forgotten her worries from the night before. Her heart isn't yet racing and anxious. Her eyes close again and she feels weightless. The first few minutes of morning are stunning. She is swaddled with sheets and blankets that did not feel the same as the night before. It's like a warm bath except that her ribs doesn't ache from the pressure of the water when she breathes in. She wallows in the way her body feels gushy and inert. It's worth waking every day for this one maudlin moment.

​

It isn't long after her feet touch the floor that everything rushes back. Her thoughts are like a tidal wave she can see coming. Her legs are unable to move fast enough through the shallow water to get out. There's nowhere to go, it's coming too fast. Right as it is about to hit and sting her face she succumbs. The liquid fills her lungs and she will not come back up. She will kick and fight but not find her way to the surface until bedtime. As quickly as it comes on, it leaves. So exhausted she falls right to sleep. Soon she will wake again and be saturated with peace. It's golden. It's the same color as the plan, "clear away the debris." This idea is so attractive, so visual. The words are gorgeous. They're crystalline. They're unadulterated. They illustrate that the exact instant of finding morning. There are no unwanted particles to the primary sense of consciousness. These words herald freedom and the possibility to connect with her being. They sound like a life she's never known. They grab hold of her soul as if they could make her whole. They clean her messy, mysterious crime scene and scour off the pain splattered across the wall.

​

The fragments scattered around her vibrate through her body. Everything and everyone is inside her. She can't keep them out. There's no room for her and she doesn't know how to removed them without damage. The only time she fits is when she hears her name. The sound of it ripples through her and catapults her somewhere present. Four letters. She remembers herself. She likes the sound of it.  She likes when people say it. It seems they rarely do. Hearing it snaps her to attention and squashes her destructive contemplation. She love the way her mother handwrites it. It's cursive but different. The "L" doesn't have those frilly loops. The "I" and the "S" don't connect to the "L" or the "A". She's copied the style but can't transcribe it to the exact specifications. Hers is only similar. Whenever she see her name written by her mother she swears she is almost hearing it out loud. The scribble flows into a lovely round systolic rhythm. She can't do that. Her pressured grip feels pleasantly stuttered and controlled. She needs to view the letters clean and even, clear and precise. They look like what she wants to be. Or maybe what she wants everyone else to be.

​

There must be some secret passageway she is not aware of that invites everyones clutter into her mind. She's the junk drawer, the broom closet, the mudroom, the attic, and the basement. But she wants to be the foyer. There is no wreckage in the foyer. "Clear away the debris." Like a sphere of emptiness, it's depth unrevealed. Anything you can't actually touch is not real.

​

GOOD-BYE

She fans through her beat up lexicon to the G's. Her finger scrolls down purposely and stops at good-bye. The definition has two meanings: expressing good wishes on parting, or said in reference to something gotten rid of. But how good-bye has felt all her life is a third definition not in the dictionary. Her red pen etches and bleeds the page with the world "change!" Exclamation point, doubt underlined. Change delineates everything she is. Change equals good-bye.

​

She said good-bye to unawareness when her body left her no choice. She can still see the water forcefully filling the tub. It wasn't so easy to strip down that day like she'd done countless times before in front of her younger sister. She couldn't see their huge porcelain playground any longer. Her eyes blinked and blinked to bring it back to size, but it still appeared tiny as the plastic replica in her dollhouse. She couldn't fit. Her body involuntarily seemed to orbit toward the fogged, damp mirror. Her hand squeaked and slid down cautiously to reveal an unfamiliar reflection. She couldn't pretend she wasn't changing. She never shared the bath again. "Good-bye," she mumbled in relief.

​

She next said good-bye to rusticity when her mind left her no choice. She can still hear how loud and long the bell seemed to ring that day. She entered the classroom like she entered every classroom. She would be on the outside no matter where she sat. She would go unnoticed because the words would not come out. But something changed when the teacher instructed everyone to form a circle. She was forced inside. The teacher carefully lobbed at each desk the whitest piece of paper and the sharpest pencil she'd ever seen. He simply said, "Write. Write about anything." Here normally awkward left hand all but glided across the brilliant blank sheet that was beautifully void of faint blue lines. And when she looked up to see everyone still holding their pencils in fear she knew nothing in her mind would ever be the same. "Good-Bye," she mumbled in excitement.

​

Presently she seems to say good-bye to everything and so tries to embrace the only thing she can ever truly have and hold which is change. Good-bye is pretending it isn't agonizing to move because it really is. The pleasantry of "good" before the hyphen masks nothing for her. She is never expressing good wishes on parting...she is wishing she never had to part. She is never referring to something gotten rid of...she is only painfully rid of something. She changes once again. Sometimes things build so high that she needs to fall apart just to see the ground again. She is learning to flow with it or be sucked under while pretending to be placid inside as she trickles downstream. She doesn't bother any longer to station colorful pushpins in the map of her life to mark change because now it's in every moment. "Good-bye," she mumbles mechanically.

​

HAZEL

Sometimes I wish was my mother was like my grandmother. Even though I know my mother had a terrible childhood I can’t help but still wish that. They were extreme opposites. I used to view my mother as the adult and my grandmother as the rebellious child. My mother is extremely straight laced. My grandmother was overly laid back. She was also an alcoholic. Actually she was a drunk. Alcoholic sounds too pleasant. She was definitely a drunk. Falling down, blacked out, missing all her front teeth, happy drunk. Her beady eyes were always bloodshot. Her cackle was full of phlegm. Her little pudgy body was planted in the same place every time I saw her. She was always right there behind the veneer of cigarette smoke. The huge kitchen table was terribly beat up with beautiful knots and markings strewn throughout. You could follow the patterns and paths for hours. It had long benches on each side and big mismatched armchairs at the ends. She never sat in either one of those obviously more comfortable chairs. She was always seated at the right end of the bench that faced the door. Maybe so she wouldn’t have to move to greet anyone who came in. But the door was never locked anyway. I’m sure that was just her spot. 

 

She reminded me of a fortuneteller with all her paraphernalia lined up perfectly in front of her. The large crystal cut ashtray full of cigarettes with red lipstick at each mangled end. The little cylinder-like glass, half full of Black Label beer, with the bottle placed a hair adjacent to continually top off the head. The red soft pack of unfiltered Pall Mall cigarettes, ever so carefully torn open on one side. The blinding chrome lighter that spun around in circles with her thumb and forefinger as the sun from the window whirled its reflection around the walls faster than I could follow. And the almost hidden antique lipstick case, snuggling close to the cigarettes. Tarnish stubbornly settled into the details of the intricately sketched flowers and leaves. I never once got to see her apply it. But she was never without her red lipstick. It burrowed in the lines of her lips and seeped into the cracks at the sides of her mouth. Without exception it hit dead center to tickle my cheek. I could smell all her pain in the stench of beer as I leaned in for the kiss. She seemed happy or numb I guess.

 

She had ten children. She was a hardcore alcoholic very early into her marriage. Her former popularity evaporated. She was suddenly the mother of the poorest most talked about family in town. Trash. Worthless. Drunks. As a young girl her family was proper and wealthy before the stock market crash took everything and before the horror and disgrace of a mother who vanished. My great grandmother left my grandmother when she was very young and never came back. No one ever heard from her again. She didn’t want to be a mother. She didn’t want a family. She wanted to be a dancer. She ran away to a new life. Maybe she danced on Broadway. Maybe she never danced. The funny thing is my mother always wanted to be a dancer. She told me she was always leaping off the couch and pirouetting around the house like a ballerina. But she never left us for that dream.

 

My grandmother had no idea how to be a mother because she never had one. So I think my mother never really had one either. She was dirt poor. Money drank down to the last drop. She was neglected and hungry, never clean and never loved. But I think my grandmother loved her the best she could. She just had an illness. My mother says she was pure evil. I never thought that when I was with her. I don’t know what to believe because the fact is my grandmother said she didn’t want to see my mother before she died so maybe it was true. I wouldn’t want to know what it’s like to have my mother say that to me. I wouldn’t survive. I’d rather twirl on my toes, round and round, harder and faster, spinning so quick she’ll never catch me to leave me. I know I’m very much like my mother but I also know I’m very different. She will never forgive her mother for the life she had. She wants to be the antithesis of everything she knew. 

 

But we aren’t even real. My mother only cares what every one thinks. She’s mortified when any of us draw attention to our family. Our house had to look perfect. We had to look perfect. We had plastic on the furniture my entire childhood. I can still feel it ripping off my bare legs. It was so loud and uncomfortable. Our outfits were perfect. My sister and I usually matched each other. I always hated that. But I can’t deny my mother was a masterful seamstress. She made us beautiful clothes. We had matching capes for Easter. Pink one year, yellow the next, white the following and green after that. We always wore beautiful dresses, patent leather shoes and brilliant white socks. Our long hair was always sparkling and pulled back with ribbons made into perfectly even bows. It always hurt so badly when she combed it out after washing it because it reached down to the end of my back. It was forbidden by my father to be any shorter than that. My head jerked with each stroke trying to get the knots out I made from sleeping on it. Sometimes I felt my father was instigating this perfection. He’s beyond immaculate. He works on cars all day and never looks dirty. He was very demanding in the way we looked. Even my play clothes were ironed. I felt nervous to soil them when I went outside. I’m still perfectly flawed.

 

No one was ever going to say we were poor. No one was going to stare at us for any other reason than how dark my father was. And they always stared. My sister once asked my father why he was Black and she wasn’t. He just laughed. It never bothered him. But I guess it bothered me. I didn’t want to be different from anybody. And we were definitely different. I suppose I wouldn’t have thought much of it if I weren’t so relentlessly bullied and teased. It just made it impossible to blend in. I always got upset. I didn’t know how to ignore it. I only knew that it was devastating at the time. I feel guilty that I was ashamed. I did forsake my own father.I never revealed this in confession. I never knelt through my penance of Hail Marys and Our Fathers. I was never admonished, never cleansed. Maybe I’m still full of sin.

 

There just seemed to be life at my grandmother’s house. There were no gates and childproof locks. It was free. I used to love going to the attic. My grandmother had her last child late in life and he was still living with her when we used to visit. He made the attic into the most interesting thing I’d ever seen. I loved the way the large planks in the floor creaked as I entered. Hello, I’m here.The smell was musky from incense. The walls were completely decorated with huge colorful posters. We could never put anything on the walls of our room. It made holes. It wouldn’t match the emerald bedspread or lilac curtains. I never got bored being in that attic. There was a drum set and an 8-track player and all kinds of weird things to look at. But my most favorite thing though was the Parchesi game. The original edition was really beautiful. I loved to shake the dice in the little holder that fit perfectly in my hand. I loved the sound of moving my men toward home. I loved the pattern of the board and the feel of those little wooden pieces. I had to be red. I always wanted to climb the stairs for home and win. It was so exciting to have some of your pieces home. I could barely wait through everyone’s turn to roll again. Please don’t let them land on me and send me back. I cupped the shaker again, rattled it spastically and then let the dice skid across the board to reveal my good luck. Yes. All my pieces got home. We never had that game at my house. 

 

Besides the attic there was also the best fort ever outside.  I’d never seen anything like it. The house was built into a huge rock ledge. The entire left side was granite. The right side was a steep hill. Just behind the house where the rock ended and the woods started was a secret opening. The trees and vines grew curiously around the opening. It never closed. It was just like a cave inside. This was my uncle’s second hang out. There were wood crates to sit on and tons of old beer bottles lining the inside. Some were empty and some had candles stuck inside. But the focal point was this one really huge brown jug with every color of wax dripped down the sides. I imagined this was the one everyone sat around at night. Talking. Laughing. Living. I never wanted to leave before it got dark but we always did. I just wanted to stay and see the fun one time but I never did. My uncle said he had the best parties there and that when I grew up I could come. But he was long gone by the time I grew up. The last time I went there the opening was overgrown. 

 

My grandmother never nagged and complained. She always had funny stories. She was never bothered by the things people did. She was very open-minded. No boundaries. I know that irked my mother a little. She obviously wanted her to have them. I really think my grandmother felt that free whether she was drunk or sober. She never had any rules for herself or us. She never made us eat anything we didn’t want. She never cooked rice and beans.She let us run around and be loud and do whatever we wanted. I could tell my mother wanted to stop us but she never did. I think she was too afraid to not be loose in front of her mother. She knew she would have control again once we left. My father would have definitely stopped us but he was always working on Saturday when we went. And the minute we got in the car everything shifted. Like when you’re at the beach before season and that dreaded cloud rolls in and makes you cold. Be quiet now. Don’t move or breathe until we get home, and even when we do, don’t move or breathe there either. I just wish my mother could have seen all the things I saw in my grandmother. I wish she could love her again the way I do. 

​

LOGAN

How can Logan feel abandoned by a mother still in her life? It didn’t make sense at first. It sounded intriguing but how is it possible? Maybe Dr. Kaye is speaking metaphorically. Maybe she means emotionally? Maybe it’s buried so deep and yet stands so tall that Logan should consider hiring a demolition crew. Jackhammer. Crane with a big ball at the end. Knock it down or dig it up for crying out loud. Or maybe it’s more reasonable to let Dr. Kaye chip away at it in hopes that the frame will stay intact if it’s meticulously pulled apart. She seems to have a built-in stud sensor. She knows exactly where the beams are. She’s located the holes and uncovered the plaster filling the cracked foundation. She navigates the many floors and knows what is missing from each room. She can’t actually see in and still she knows.

 

The doorknob twists gently to the inner office and the newest apparition in Logan’s life smiles widely to invite her in. The room is balmy and comfortably bright. There is absolutely some kind of white light that surrounds Dr. Kaye. Her lithe legs shift beneath her occasionally. Graceful like a swan and comfortable like its feathers. There is something abounding in that to Logan. Her position is engaging. It draws Logan in. It feels real. The questions twist smoothly like hand blown glass. The answers smear pigment on a stark, blank canvas. Empirical revelations. Snapshots. Her camera specially modified with an x-ray lens. Silence. Cacophony. More silence. She must have a hidden sound wave device, like the supersonic ones that detect dolphins from hundreds of miles away, because she notes everything caught between Logan’s lips and tongue. Of course she feels abandoned. How can she say the things she says and not feel abandoned? Her mother literally looks through her. Clear to the other side. Like she has a big hole in her chest. She looks in and addresses whoever else is there not her. Never Logan. Sometimes she swears her mother flies right through that hole. Nothing is real between them. Not in person and less and less over the phone. Her mother’s speech is mumbled and almost slurred. She forgets everything. She repeats everything. It’s just so clear that she is aging. Logan doesn’t want to age.

 

She isn’t quite sure if her mother, ironically enough named Joy, was ever happy. And she’s also not sure why she seems to become more and more disheartened with each passing year. She is self-pitying. She reminds everyone of everything wrong with her. Weak heart. Broken ribs. Headaches. Stressful job. Her husband. She defines pain through eyes that are disturbingly sad. She is petrified of dying. She verbalizes her fear in a way that Logan must pretend she doesn’t hear. It’s so hard to listen because death is going to happen regardless and she’ll never be settled with where she’s going if she continues to fight it. Joy has no faith. No hope. She believes in nothing. How did she get to this dire place? Why does she want to take everyone with her?

 

It all makes sense to Logan why her mother seems so unmindful of her. She comforts herself with her own version of the story because she will never really know the truth. She was born the day before one of the most horrific events in recent history. How confusing it must have been to give birth and then the next day have the entire country in upheaval for its leader’s death. The raw footage is brutal and always reviewed in slow motion. Joy probably cradled Logan while the television replayed it over and over again. His head whips back from the gunshot. His wife panics for herself and moves away from the bloody body. It was all so merciless. But she once wrote Logan a beautiful note about it. She said that he died to make room for her. Someone special was leaving so someone more special could come in. Maybe she’s wrong about her mother not seeing her. Maybe her mother struggles to mollify what she really feels when she looks at Logan. How can she not relive that angry, empty day she gave birth alone? Her husband, her baby’s father was not there. Maybe he was in jail. Or back with his first wife. Logan will never know because her mother will never tell. It doesn’t matter. She still knows it was detrimental because it blazes like a scarlet letter “H” nailed to her mother’s bludgeoned chest. It stands for hate. She wants to wear it so everyone knows. Hate. Betrayal. Disdain. It’s all fantastical conjecture. Maybe the detachment is as simple as not being able to bond with a colic baby. They never stop crying. Nothing is good enough. Nothing works. Didn’t she know right then and there this child would always be difficult to hear? What could Joy have loved about any of this?

 

Her mother obviously does feel something because she keeps her. She made her after all. But she doesn’t really want her as she is. And it’s acceptable to Logan because she’s afraid her mother will die before she’s ready to handle it. Or not talk to her. Or be disappointed and sickened by things she’s done. She shouldn’t declare any of this because she feels she is willing something bad to happen. Last time she raged she got a call the very next day that her mother was in the hospital after having a heart attack. She was later diagnosed as only having a weak heart muscle that causes severe constriction and pain. There is nothing they can do but medicate her. Her mother said they told her she was going to die from it. They don’t know when but she will. She reminds Logan of this often. It makes her so scared because she doesn’t always have sympathy for her when she says it. She feels awful about that because she knows the day her mother does die she will be completely devastated and remember feeling that way.

 

Dr. Kaye’s gleaming eyes are locked in place as she leans in marginally and repeats, “Do you feel abandoned”? Yes Logan thinks, but why? Maybe because she knows she can never challenge her family because she has seen them disown and re-own over and over again. She would rather suffer in silence than go through that cycle of pain. Maybe she knows she can never share what she has done in her life because she has heard them masticate any and everything slightly left of center. She knows she can never talk to any of them because they don’t want to hear anything but themselves. She knows she is characterized as eccentric and different and strong so they don’t ever consider or worry about her. She is abandoned even when she is standing with them. She is invisible, and for some reason that feels good, even though she realizes staying that way will never change any of this. She just wants peace within herself and the freedom to do and say whatever she wants, no matter what anyone thinks. She wonders if there’s an off switch for all that hurt.

​

Her lungs were burning from running as she stormed the office many months ago for their very first session. She slowly caught her breath and began her intrinsic spiel of why she was there. Dr. Kaye patiently listened for some time, deftly coding her diagnosis within minutes, and then at some point asked, “What did you learn about intimacy from your mother?” Logan wasn’t really able to say, and later thought the answer was nothing. But the truth is she learned quite a lot. Negative as it may be, it’s still a lot. Probably the most obvious thing is distance. Keep your distance girl. They are no good. They will hurt you. They will use you. They will lie to you. You must fight for control. You must win at all costs, because if you are not winning, you are losing. Sulk for the upper hand. Hold a grudge until they give in. Just don’t even bother to care about them. There is no gray area.Logan thinks of all this as she stares at the message envelope on her cell phone. Caller ID reveals it was Johnny. It’s now been three days and she still has not listened to his message. Her usual impulsiveness stopped dead in its tracks. She doesn’t want to know what he said. She’s considering deleting it without listening. 

 

Logan would probably be bed-ridden with despair if someone were doing to her what she was doing to him. But her estrogen now lays slain. Her testosterone rises like cream. She almost feels something relatable to wrong but not with her usual all consuming condemnation. 100 proof levity. She’s like a man. There is no question or doubt that they agreed it would be just sex. No strings. She told him she didn’t want to lead him on, she was not in the frame of mind for dating right now, and he didn’t care. So why does he keep calling. It isn’t fair. He agreed. She replayed that night just once for clarity. The new BeckCD was spinning faintly in the background. It set a somewhat strange and sensual mood. Before it was playing she kept saying no in her head, but once it started she said yes. All of the sudden his kisses weren’t loud and purposeful as they’d been seconds before so she guessed he felt that same odd sensation that seemed to shift everything. She stopped fighting her head and went with her body instead. She was intentionally saying yes. It wasn’t natural in the sense of genuine wanting. He had to know. It wasn’t based on anything except the specific intent to let go. Let go! Let go!It was premeditated. She planned it not sure she could do it but inciting his desire by just kissing him was a strong aphrodisiac. She sipped her forgotten red wine as if it were a magical potion. She pretended it gave her the power of some mythological goddess able to entice the mere mortal now strapped between her legs. She closed and then opened her eyes now in her astral body. 

 

He doesn’t know it but he is really only telephoning now for that creature of make-believe. Outside that moment there was nothing. Truly nothing. He thinks he brought that passion out in her. He has no idea how long it took to cultivate that. She controls that vehicle for herself. She’d rather pretend he doesn’t exist because she could never, ever pretend to have feelings. Her sense to leave it alone is extremely pungent. And she feels almost justified considering his diabolic reputation, though a hair conflicted because he’s likeable regardless of that. But her restraint stays palatable. It doesn’t matter what she should do just on the level of basic human decency because she could never be tactful enough to escape in the way she would want. She never lied so she shouldn’t have to explain.

 

There’s no doubt about this as she’s strongly acquainted with what it feels like to really long for a man. She’s a score into wanting someone she can never have. Jesse is the archetype for every man she encounters. No one has even come close. No one can compare. It seems she is never going to chance upon what else is out there because of him. He has no perception his presence has ruined her. The pedestal she glued him on used to reach the stars. It’s miraculously gotten shorter and shorter in recent years. Maybe it could disappear altogether. At least now she’s able to let others in to some extent. Though the moments are fleeting at best, it’s still better than when she couldn’t let anyone in. Even though Jesse still affects her when they’re in the same room, she’s sure now her life was also saved by never having a relationship with him. He will always have the qualities she wants, but he also has qualities she could never want. He’s just as self-absorbed as she is and his mind is exactly the same fragile piece of china. Crash!And even though the reasons they will never be together are far more complicated than any of this, it’s still enough on its own. She knows it true. There was only one scandalous moment, a split second juncture when she convinced herself it wasn’t. They were tipsy and awkward and unconnected. He knew. She knew. And he did exactly what she is doing to Johnny now. The difference is she played by the rules. Or more accurately she was forced to play by those rules because she broke other rules she could never fix.

 

The proximity of their seats is far enough to feel comfortable and close enough to let go. She wonders if Dr. Kaye ever took out a tape measure to get the distance just right. Maybe in the secret book of psychotherapy there is a standard degree that nurtures the best results. If only Logan’s family had figured out that correct space. It’s never been right. It’s always been too far. If they ever lurched close now Logan would surely jerk back in fear. Isn’t fear what Dr. Kaye believes Logan’s condition is based on? “You’re scared half out of your mind,” she gently stated during a session in which Logan was apparently closed off. Danger! Enter at your own risk.But her rig plowed through that flimsy wire barricade. The drill hit oil again. She doesn’t buy into that tough exterior the way her family does. Logan’s completely fooled them somehow. Actually she’s just fooled herself. It gets increasingly harder and harder to bear the weight of such thick and heavy pretense. Her legs quiver from the pressure like never before. She’s uncertain she can sustain it much longer. She desperately wants to experience what it’s like to feel light. She doesn’t want to continue to see tomorrow as a brick wall with a posted sign that says Dead End. 

 

The fear of the past, present and future has always been calamitous and perverse. Logan suits up every day in her noisy armor. She clinks her way through an ever-altering existence and dents up that blinding titanium as her world shifts on and off axis. It’s become too labor intensive to get through the day. She can no longer get out of her own way. She wants reprieve from her own specter. She wants her days to be fueled by the experience of herself and not by someone else’s determination of success and failure. She reluctantly submits to vocation never fully decompressed from the depths of recreation. The vista is bleak. It’s tense and controlled. It’s terrifying to fall short. It’s the dreadful equivalent of a trip home to her family. Her throat constricts to hold back the urge to gag every time her foot cuffs the platform of the train. The seats have become so much more oppressive then she ever remembered before. She transports to a parallel universe. The old railroad cars jolt off track and foretell a final bumpy destination. Going to work, going home, going nowhere. Abandoned, distant, afraid.

​

​