Asleep in a Concrete Pond:
Lost in an empty reflection, my eyes drifted across a current.
Rippling within globes of memories,
Forgetting themselves amongst the shifting distance before me,
As my dreams fell into the clouds,
My lungs gasped for breath,
And my heart raced like pangs of raindrops upon a concrete pond.
I awoke only when I heard my name.
A thundering whisper that now drifted, across a flat and once vacant wind.
A sudden, gentle caress fell upon my empty shoulders,
Closing out the bite of a shivering wind.
A glowing grumbling gust spun me around so as to witness the candle she held.
The twisting flame twirled and teased the cold darkness that was trapped behind the silent curve.
She found me.
Searching, crawling to find me through the silent black emptiness, light had forgotten its home here.
Words would never suffice for this beautiful ache of gratitude piercing its sting through my shattered prayers,
My tongue sat fat and paralyzed,
Horrified of falling short to capture the grace, the beauty, the perfection of her everything.
It hid inside my cheek, behind my teeth, like a frightened puppy peering over its mother's tail.
My words drift deep underneath an intimidated slumber
Falling to my knees, painfully atop crystallized ice peaks, letting out a crunchy snap into the black.
Reaching up, I buried my frost chapped cheeks against my sun, nestled in her powerfully hushed whispers.
I watch the fire of her gaze warm my trembled fears.
No eyes have ever tasted a vision as this, her eyes blinking over colored irises of white light
Drunk with beauty my senses wept
She gripped my mud caked palms
Squeezing them like tight grips of ice, the melting crystal tears slipping between my fingers
She carried me above a murky haze to reach for the warm hands of today’s embrace
And led my warm naked feet atop cotton soft white sands to find sleep.
Hoping to fade, between these fallen dreams of my wasted yesterdays.
Yet these dreams giggle and playfully wrestle dangerously close to the ridges of reality
It's a loving symphony of dances, dipping inside themselves like a rainbow of bouncing bubbles.
But a euphoric blindness now finds itself diving upon my opening eyes
A ravenous consciousness greedily eats my last visions of the bright glowing bliss
The frost in the awakened air wraps its arms around me
My eyes rapidly adjust now as the shadow hovers over my eyes like a misty cobweb, too hard to untangle
She has forever been my favorite memory, my favorite present and my favorite tomorrow.
Thank you for always holding my shivering wet heart close whenever I couldn’t outrun the storm, thank you for always finding me when I was lost in the shadow of a dying sun, and thank you, from the depths of the heart of a once very lost and frightened soul, thank you for always illuminating the path back home for me. The way home to you.
Thursday, January 21, 2010
Sunday, October 25, 2009
Saint Francis
Triangle Virginia is a phlegm the state will never spit out.
It is a town that thirsts for its victims as a tapeworm would search for a stray dog. Its sole purpose is to provide low income housing for the area’s marines and it will forever drown below the standard poverty level. This is where my mother and I called home when she decided to join me in my escape from Miami.
Our apartment complex sat atop a once vacant sewage field. The scent of soggy garbage and rust drifted on every frostbitten breeze that rushed through our tattered screen windows. The lock on the green aluminum front door showed evidence of dulled stab wounds, a result of several failed burglary attempts. Our carpet lay across slabs of plywood and had no connections to the wall so every step was made cautiously as to not drag the television onto the floor. The television was black and white with a twisted hanger acting as an antennae. To say the least, it would not exactly have been a tragedy if the tv dropped but the re runs of Three’s Company were the only entertainment we had.
My family was forced to enroll me into a private school after my departure from the detention center in Miami. Saint Francis of Assisi was a Catholic school that was horrendously overcrowded and we were four months past the registration deadline for new students. I sat outside a large oak door decorated only by a faded slanting place card that read “Director” as my mother walked through dressed in sweatpants and an oversized Lowe’s work shirt she had kept from her last job. I sat nervously in an orange plastic school chair as I heard numerous whimpers turning into cries as they seaped through the door. My mother pleaded with the school’s principal, impressing the idea upon him that I was mentally disturbed and needed a Christian influence in my life to set me straight. Mascara was dripping into pools around the corners of her lips as she grabbed me by the hand and walked me back to the silver Honda Accord my dad was forced to surrender after my mother’s threats to show up at his office.
So I started school on a Thursday. The classroom I sat in consisted of about twenty desks that were connected to chairs. The wooden tops could be lifted to access a storage area for books. In the front of the class was a large aqua green chalkboard. This board worked on a pulley system and when a student pulled the rope on the right the large wall would raise up and reveal a spacious room decorated with various hooks and drawers to store our winter clothing. When not in use, the blackboard remained partially up so only a student’s legs were visible as they hung up their jackets.
Ross was the name of a very unique child that sat in the seat directly next to me. Ross had a strict routine that he stuck to every day. When the clock neared 1:30 there would be an aroma that circulated into the air. This was a distinct smell that has latched its claws forever into my memory. I would compare the scent to that of a rancid slice of meat wrapped in a sleeve of wet newspaper. Poor Ross had a difficulty controlling his bowels. He was portly to say the least, and as evident by his maroon polyester shirt tucked into his underwear and the dark stains around his pelvis, he was not blessed with social grooming skills. Every day as we sat down after lunch Mrs. Grandly would be the last to taste the lurid smell. “Ross, would you like to go freshen up?” she would ask with a calming familiarity. In essence she was asking ‘Ross would you like to change into the spare clothes you bring to class everyday because you shit your pants again?’ The students and I eventually relied on this fragrance as a dictator of how much time was left in the day before we could go home. The discarded clothes were always placed in a large brown paper bag that he plopped beside his desk and next to my leg. This daily event was the only pleasure I got out of Saint Francis.
It didn’t take long for me to rebel against attending classes. I figured out ways to lose myself from the group as we traveled to Friday Mass or afternoon recess. In a town with a population of 2,000 there was no need to invest in entertainment or commerce. Therefore, skipping class was not exactly exciting. I often found myself wondering down a creek bed searching for crawfish or throwing gravel at cars from the top of the school’s roof.
One morning I had decided that I wanted to bypass ditching my teachers between classes and go directly to the source of my pain. It was Tuesday morning and I informed my mother that I would not be attending school at all that day. Mom had gotten a job at a local clothing manufacturer. Day after day she would stand in a warehouse in front of a conveyor belt placing stitched labels atop sweaters before a large steam press. Her employer was a overweight black man who had a southern draw in his voice and a quick temper. She was given no lenience with him whenever she cried and being an ex marine he was eager to jump on any employee for tardiness. She was fifteen minutes late by the time she managed to grab me by the hair as I hid under the crooked coffee table. I fought for a moment before I heard her shriek into my ear, “You’re going to schoooool!”. She locked me into the passenger seat with a fierce snap of the seat buckle. We both sat in an angered silence as she stared between the blinding drizzle on the windshield and I grinded my teeth awaiting an opportunity to escape.
The school appeared on the horizon too soon before I realized I had missed my chance. I wasn’t one to die quietly in defeat though. I reached down for the black knob of the stick shift my mother’s hand was resting on and grinded it into any position it would fit. The car bounced loudly back and forth as our necks jutted forward into our chests, my mother’s gas station coffee launching into the steering wheel, splashing the beige interior. There was a delicate calm in my ears as I examined the extent of exactly what I had done and then I saw her hand reach out for the black knob again. Being in an absent daze I did what any animal would do when forced to protect their goal, to protect the integrity of what their actions were supposed to stand for; I attacked. I slapped my clenched fist hard onto her pale forearm. The blow caused her left hand to swerve the steering wheel far to the right as we veered into the rainy morning’s haze. “Oh. My. God. You little Bastaaaard!!!!!,” she shrieked into the ceiling of the small car. The engine revved and the sound of our tires squeeled into the parking lot like a dying cat as we launched over the first of several speed bumps. The silver car chased past the smoke of our exhausted muffler as we made loops in the parking lot to access the easiest entrance into the school. Stop. My mother didn’t hesitate as she unbuckled her seatbelt and opened her door with one movement. I got my first sensation of the panic Terry Martin could inflict as I watched her manic frame circle the back of the car from the rear view mirror.
I had never felt a force so fierce as that of the one my mother’s grip had on the thick of the gray scarf wrapped around my neck. My body was thrown viciously across the spray painted four square design on the pavement our car had driven onto. My knees scraped across the loose asphalt pebbles as they tore into the fabric of my linen dress pants. She continued to pick me up by the hair and drag me forcefully into the front double doors of the school’s main entrance. The warm damp air smacked my face as the doors opened and allowed me to fully understand where we actually were.
The interior oval structure of Saint Francis of Assisi, consisting of twelve classrooms ranging in level from first to twelfth grade, allowed each room to face directly into the center arena that we now stood. To be accurate I was not standing, rather, I was on the ground being pulled by my now stretched shirt sleeve. Classroom doors were never to be closed at Saint Francis. When my mother had dragged me as far as she could I stopped crying loudly and resisting as I realized every student and teacher in the school could see us. I can imagine it being quite an exciting break to the morning lectures. “You son of a bitch bastard piece of sh** monster!!!, she hollered into the silent air of the Catholic hallways. “You’re just like your f***ing father!!!”. She struck me atop my forehead and shoulders in unison with every slanderous syllable she spewed. When I put my arms up to block her fists, she pulled me by my hair again and slapped me across the mouth continuously. She fought like a warrior, hatred and years of pain and misfortune seeped through her fingers with every blow. The veins in my face were broken now as evident by the long red steaks lining my cheeks. The loud cursing had dulled to booming vibrations in my skull as I saw her every move come at me in a blur. And just as suddenly as it had started it had stopped. My eyes opened to the ceiling and then to my right, as I saw my mother in her burgundy coat march furiously away, "You deal with him," she hollered. I didn’t blink my eyes until the large double doors slammed tightly with a deafening thud.
I laid there for a moment until Mrs. Grandly and the school counselor appeared above me. They quickly picked me up by the arms and escorted me into my class. I have never witnessed a stronger silence in my life than that moment when these two women walked me to class with a thousand eyes watching our every movement, every mouth gaped open. There were no snickers, no jokes, for no one had yet registered what they had seen.
I was sat down at my desk very gently as Mrs. Grandly delicately brushed my cheek with the back of her hand. She regained her position in front of the class and began to address our lecture but stopped in mid sentence, “Gregory why don’t you hang your jacket up?” I hadn’t realized that I was still wearing my jacket fully zipped up. My right sleeve was still hanging loosely past the end of my knuckles. “Mmmph Okay,” I managed to let out through my hoarse throat. I kept my head down and focused my eyes on every crack of the linoleum floor as I made my way past the curious students. I ducked under the blackboard and positioned my jacket to hang on its hook when my right foot dragged across the floor in back of me. The cheap rubber sole of my black dress shoe had managed to create enough friction with the ground to let out a high pitched sound very much resembling that of a loud fart. It squeaked sharply and lasted far too long for anyone to miss it. It only took one kid to shout what every twelve year old in the room was thinking, “Greg farted!!!” The laughter roared through the air like a freight train delivering a much needed end to a horrible tension in the air. My heart dropped and I was thrown from my blind daze into a horrifying awareness of my surroundings. “I Didn’t fart,” I pleaded from behind the blackboard, my feet the only thing visible to the class as I nervously tried to recreate the sound again by kicking against the ground with my shoes. I had no luck as my classmates saw a pair of black loafers dancing furiously back and forth behind yesterday’s algebra problems chalked against the board. The laughter only gained momentum and soon my cries could no longer be heard, “I didn’t fart, it was my shoe!!!”. My neck drooped forward as I laid my forehead on the cardboard backing of the chalkboard barrier. My tears fell in splashes onto my thighs as I managed to regain my balance and duck back under the wall into the class. There was no more shame left in me. As I walked slowly back to my seat I caught Ross staring at me with a serene grimace. He knew as well as I did that I had joined in the rankings of the school’s popularity roster.
I was the new Ross.
It is a town that thirsts for its victims as a tapeworm would search for a stray dog. Its sole purpose is to provide low income housing for the area’s marines and it will forever drown below the standard poverty level. This is where my mother and I called home when she decided to join me in my escape from Miami.
Our apartment complex sat atop a once vacant sewage field. The scent of soggy garbage and rust drifted on every frostbitten breeze that rushed through our tattered screen windows. The lock on the green aluminum front door showed evidence of dulled stab wounds, a result of several failed burglary attempts. Our carpet lay across slabs of plywood and had no connections to the wall so every step was made cautiously as to not drag the television onto the floor. The television was black and white with a twisted hanger acting as an antennae. To say the least, it would not exactly have been a tragedy if the tv dropped but the re runs of Three’s Company were the only entertainment we had.
My family was forced to enroll me into a private school after my departure from the detention center in Miami. Saint Francis of Assisi was a Catholic school that was horrendously overcrowded and we were four months past the registration deadline for new students. I sat outside a large oak door decorated only by a faded slanting place card that read “Director” as my mother walked through dressed in sweatpants and an oversized Lowe’s work shirt she had kept from her last job. I sat nervously in an orange plastic school chair as I heard numerous whimpers turning into cries as they seaped through the door. My mother pleaded with the school’s principal, impressing the idea upon him that I was mentally disturbed and needed a Christian influence in my life to set me straight. Mascara was dripping into pools around the corners of her lips as she grabbed me by the hand and walked me back to the silver Honda Accord my dad was forced to surrender after my mother’s threats to show up at his office.
So I started school on a Thursday. The classroom I sat in consisted of about twenty desks that were connected to chairs. The wooden tops could be lifted to access a storage area for books. In the front of the class was a large aqua green chalkboard. This board worked on a pulley system and when a student pulled the rope on the right the large wall would raise up and reveal a spacious room decorated with various hooks and drawers to store our winter clothing. When not in use, the blackboard remained partially up so only a student’s legs were visible as they hung up their jackets.
Ross was the name of a very unique child that sat in the seat directly next to me. Ross had a strict routine that he stuck to every day. When the clock neared 1:30 there would be an aroma that circulated into the air. This was a distinct smell that has latched its claws forever into my memory. I would compare the scent to that of a rancid slice of meat wrapped in a sleeve of wet newspaper. Poor Ross had a difficulty controlling his bowels. He was portly to say the least, and as evident by his maroon polyester shirt tucked into his underwear and the dark stains around his pelvis, he was not blessed with social grooming skills. Every day as we sat down after lunch Mrs. Grandly would be the last to taste the lurid smell. “Ross, would you like to go freshen up?” she would ask with a calming familiarity. In essence she was asking ‘Ross would you like to change into the spare clothes you bring to class everyday because you shit your pants again?’ The students and I eventually relied on this fragrance as a dictator of how much time was left in the day before we could go home. The discarded clothes were always placed in a large brown paper bag that he plopped beside his desk and next to my leg. This daily event was the only pleasure I got out of Saint Francis.
It didn’t take long for me to rebel against attending classes. I figured out ways to lose myself from the group as we traveled to Friday Mass or afternoon recess. In a town with a population of 2,000 there was no need to invest in entertainment or commerce. Therefore, skipping class was not exactly exciting. I often found myself wondering down a creek bed searching for crawfish or throwing gravel at cars from the top of the school’s roof.
One morning I had decided that I wanted to bypass ditching my teachers between classes and go directly to the source of my pain. It was Tuesday morning and I informed my mother that I would not be attending school at all that day. Mom had gotten a job at a local clothing manufacturer. Day after day she would stand in a warehouse in front of a conveyor belt placing stitched labels atop sweaters before a large steam press. Her employer was a overweight black man who had a southern draw in his voice and a quick temper. She was given no lenience with him whenever she cried and being an ex marine he was eager to jump on any employee for tardiness. She was fifteen minutes late by the time she managed to grab me by the hair as I hid under the crooked coffee table. I fought for a moment before I heard her shriek into my ear, “You’re going to schoooool!”. She locked me into the passenger seat with a fierce snap of the seat buckle. We both sat in an angered silence as she stared between the blinding drizzle on the windshield and I grinded my teeth awaiting an opportunity to escape.
The school appeared on the horizon too soon before I realized I had missed my chance. I wasn’t one to die quietly in defeat though. I reached down for the black knob of the stick shift my mother’s hand was resting on and grinded it into any position it would fit. The car bounced loudly back and forth as our necks jutted forward into our chests, my mother’s gas station coffee launching into the steering wheel, splashing the beige interior. There was a delicate calm in my ears as I examined the extent of exactly what I had done and then I saw her hand reach out for the black knob again. Being in an absent daze I did what any animal would do when forced to protect their goal, to protect the integrity of what their actions were supposed to stand for; I attacked. I slapped my clenched fist hard onto her pale forearm. The blow caused her left hand to swerve the steering wheel far to the right as we veered into the rainy morning’s haze. “Oh. My. God. You little Bastaaaard!!!!!,” she shrieked into the ceiling of the small car. The engine revved and the sound of our tires squeeled into the parking lot like a dying cat as we launched over the first of several speed bumps. The silver car chased past the smoke of our exhausted muffler as we made loops in the parking lot to access the easiest entrance into the school. Stop. My mother didn’t hesitate as she unbuckled her seatbelt and opened her door with one movement. I got my first sensation of the panic Terry Martin could inflict as I watched her manic frame circle the back of the car from the rear view mirror.
I had never felt a force so fierce as that of the one my mother’s grip had on the thick of the gray scarf wrapped around my neck. My body was thrown viciously across the spray painted four square design on the pavement our car had driven onto. My knees scraped across the loose asphalt pebbles as they tore into the fabric of my linen dress pants. She continued to pick me up by the hair and drag me forcefully into the front double doors of the school’s main entrance. The warm damp air smacked my face as the doors opened and allowed me to fully understand where we actually were.
The interior oval structure of Saint Francis of Assisi, consisting of twelve classrooms ranging in level from first to twelfth grade, allowed each room to face directly into the center arena that we now stood. To be accurate I was not standing, rather, I was on the ground being pulled by my now stretched shirt sleeve. Classroom doors were never to be closed at Saint Francis. When my mother had dragged me as far as she could I stopped crying loudly and resisting as I realized every student and teacher in the school could see us. I can imagine it being quite an exciting break to the morning lectures. “You son of a bitch bastard piece of sh** monster!!!, she hollered into the silent air of the Catholic hallways. “You’re just like your f***ing father!!!”. She struck me atop my forehead and shoulders in unison with every slanderous syllable she spewed. When I put my arms up to block her fists, she pulled me by my hair again and slapped me across the mouth continuously. She fought like a warrior, hatred and years of pain and misfortune seeped through her fingers with every blow. The veins in my face were broken now as evident by the long red steaks lining my cheeks. The loud cursing had dulled to booming vibrations in my skull as I saw her every move come at me in a blur. And just as suddenly as it had started it had stopped. My eyes opened to the ceiling and then to my right, as I saw my mother in her burgundy coat march furiously away, "You deal with him," she hollered. I didn’t blink my eyes until the large double doors slammed tightly with a deafening thud.
I laid there for a moment until Mrs. Grandly and the school counselor appeared above me. They quickly picked me up by the arms and escorted me into my class. I have never witnessed a stronger silence in my life than that moment when these two women walked me to class with a thousand eyes watching our every movement, every mouth gaped open. There were no snickers, no jokes, for no one had yet registered what they had seen.
I was sat down at my desk very gently as Mrs. Grandly delicately brushed my cheek with the back of her hand. She regained her position in front of the class and began to address our lecture but stopped in mid sentence, “Gregory why don’t you hang your jacket up?” I hadn’t realized that I was still wearing my jacket fully zipped up. My right sleeve was still hanging loosely past the end of my knuckles. “Mmmph Okay,” I managed to let out through my hoarse throat. I kept my head down and focused my eyes on every crack of the linoleum floor as I made my way past the curious students. I ducked under the blackboard and positioned my jacket to hang on its hook when my right foot dragged across the floor in back of me. The cheap rubber sole of my black dress shoe had managed to create enough friction with the ground to let out a high pitched sound very much resembling that of a loud fart. It squeaked sharply and lasted far too long for anyone to miss it. It only took one kid to shout what every twelve year old in the room was thinking, “Greg farted!!!” The laughter roared through the air like a freight train delivering a much needed end to a horrible tension in the air. My heart dropped and I was thrown from my blind daze into a horrifying awareness of my surroundings. “I Didn’t fart,” I pleaded from behind the blackboard, my feet the only thing visible to the class as I nervously tried to recreate the sound again by kicking against the ground with my shoes. I had no luck as my classmates saw a pair of black loafers dancing furiously back and forth behind yesterday’s algebra problems chalked against the board. The laughter only gained momentum and soon my cries could no longer be heard, “I didn’t fart, it was my shoe!!!”. My neck drooped forward as I laid my forehead on the cardboard backing of the chalkboard barrier. My tears fell in splashes onto my thighs as I managed to regain my balance and duck back under the wall into the class. There was no more shame left in me. As I walked slowly back to my seat I caught Ross staring at me with a serene grimace. He knew as well as I did that I had joined in the rankings of the school’s popularity roster.
I was the new Ross.
Monday, August 10, 2009
Hypothermia at Miami Beach
My childhood trips to the beach were never fully appreciated until I was abnormally sun burned, the police were dispatched for my mother or I tried to take the city bus home. The beach can often be a source of peace and tranquility to normal families. They find the excursion to be a way of bonding and spending time together whereas my family found it to be an easy way to embarrass each other in public.
Miami Beach was 10 miles away from where we lived but for some reason my mother would pack for it as if we would be traveling overseas, never to return again. Suitcases were literally packed to the brim with clothes from every season. Of all the things thrown in though, there was always a logical reason behind it. She always explained herself as if something was wrong with me. “What do you mean why am I bringing a snowcap? Do you know how long it takes to get sand out of your hair, she questioned. Extra pants and long shirts were taken in case one of us got chilly. The temperature would reach 105 during the day and my mother would be damned if one of us were going to catch a cold.
It was easy to hide the unneeded wardrobe in the car but no one at the beach was going to miss the 10 foot wooden canoe strapped to the top of the silver 1984 Cadillac El Dorado we were piled into. Unfortunately she had chosen the canoe when faced with the dilemma that both that and the rope hammock would not fit in the car. It didn’t bother mom that there was not a single tree on the beach or that no one in their right mind would try to paddle out into the ocean with a canoe that was built before she was born. To her it was something else in the house that could, in some way, be related to a water activity. The tackle box, a compass and my grandfather’s spear gun he used as an eagle scout all fell into this category.
Food was something we never went without when we went to the beach. Yes it was edible but it was not food that complimented a humid day under South Florida’s sun. Things like tuna fish casserole leftovers, mashed potatoes and cans of vegetable soup were crammed to the top of the family cooler. I still shudder when I think about the blue cooler with the missing top, its size so large and comical that it belonged on the set of a children’s television show or outside an army bunker holding meat rations. The blue behemoth had recently been acquired at a garage sale where it sat below a sign that read “Free: if you can fit it”. The food never remained cold and I would often find myself staring at the other families on the beach eating their hotdogs with the toppings spilling over onto their hands while the fathers flipped another sizzling burger over on the grill. I would have cried in envy had the meatloaf I was gnawing on not sucked all the moisture from my mouth.
All the annoyances of the day would peter out for a moment when our car would finally pull up to that beautiful turquoise wonderland the beach had presented. My legs would start to sprint before my body was even out of the car as I raced in glee to the crisp refreshing water staring at me. Everything moved in slow motion as I galloped and breathed in all the amazing sights ahead. Birds flew overhead in perfect harmony, the clouds opened up to shine the sky down on me as two kids looked up from their sandcastle to nod at me, sharing a moment like, “Yeah we know what you mean.” The crest of the cool wave tumbled over and swam to my aching toes as I stepped onto the soft wet sand and positioned my body to dive in. “Gregory!!! Wait!!!,” pierced into the tranquil sky and rang into my ears. It was my mother. “I need to put on your suntan lotion,” she screamed in gasps as she dropped the cooler to the sand and ran towards me, arms flailing. The moment of peace had come and gone as quickly as the wave I was about to jump into had. I lowered my head in defeat as I walked quickly towards her to avoid any further loud screaming.
Every summer I came to visit, my mother would take it upon herself to make sure that I got the darkest tan possible. Every summer she would dismiss my excuse that ‘It was impossible for me to get a tan and the efforts only resulted in horrible sunburns,” as something a girl would say. It was as if she dreamt of me going back to my friends in Virginia with a tan so incredible that it could only exemplify how great of a mother I had. As I appeared before her I could see that she was squinting hard at a black plastic bottle she was holding at an arm’s length away from her face. It was called “Tan Amplifier” and it was now being poured by the handful over my entire body. It was greasy as it beaded down my face and was massaged into my chest. I would later find out that the “Amplifier” in its name signified its amazing power to tan when there was barely any sun available. There was not a cloud in the sky that August day as I darted back across the scorching sand and into the water.
By the end of the day I think everyone on the beach knew of our presence. Even if I had tried it would have been impossible to have gotten lost. All I would need to do is look for the woman wearing the snowcap or watch for where the tide was inching upon a weathered canoe. I would not start to feel the effects of burn on my body until I was crammed next to the cooler in the back of the car and the salt in my fishnet bathing suit had begun to dry and itch. The drive home in the interstate traffic would not be a pleasant one at all. I screamed in agony as my mother sat in the front and reread the bottle of suntan lotion. “I’ll be damned,” she said as she realized what had happened. “Well, just think of how great of a tan that’s gonna turn into,” she said as I pulled out a wool scarf from the suitcase to rest my head on.
Miami Beach was 10 miles away from where we lived but for some reason my mother would pack for it as if we would be traveling overseas, never to return again. Suitcases were literally packed to the brim with clothes from every season. Of all the things thrown in though, there was always a logical reason behind it. She always explained herself as if something was wrong with me. “What do you mean why am I bringing a snowcap? Do you know how long it takes to get sand out of your hair, she questioned. Extra pants and long shirts were taken in case one of us got chilly. The temperature would reach 105 during the day and my mother would be damned if one of us were going to catch a cold.
It was easy to hide the unneeded wardrobe in the car but no one at the beach was going to miss the 10 foot wooden canoe strapped to the top of the silver 1984 Cadillac El Dorado we were piled into. Unfortunately she had chosen the canoe when faced with the dilemma that both that and the rope hammock would not fit in the car. It didn’t bother mom that there was not a single tree on the beach or that no one in their right mind would try to paddle out into the ocean with a canoe that was built before she was born. To her it was something else in the house that could, in some way, be related to a water activity. The tackle box, a compass and my grandfather’s spear gun he used as an eagle scout all fell into this category.
Food was something we never went without when we went to the beach. Yes it was edible but it was not food that complimented a humid day under South Florida’s sun. Things like tuna fish casserole leftovers, mashed potatoes and cans of vegetable soup were crammed to the top of the family cooler. I still shudder when I think about the blue cooler with the missing top, its size so large and comical that it belonged on the set of a children’s television show or outside an army bunker holding meat rations. The blue behemoth had recently been acquired at a garage sale where it sat below a sign that read “Free: if you can fit it”. The food never remained cold and I would often find myself staring at the other families on the beach eating their hotdogs with the toppings spilling over onto their hands while the fathers flipped another sizzling burger over on the grill. I would have cried in envy had the meatloaf I was gnawing on not sucked all the moisture from my mouth.
All the annoyances of the day would peter out for a moment when our car would finally pull up to that beautiful turquoise wonderland the beach had presented. My legs would start to sprint before my body was even out of the car as I raced in glee to the crisp refreshing water staring at me. Everything moved in slow motion as I galloped and breathed in all the amazing sights ahead. Birds flew overhead in perfect harmony, the clouds opened up to shine the sky down on me as two kids looked up from their sandcastle to nod at me, sharing a moment like, “Yeah we know what you mean.” The crest of the cool wave tumbled over and swam to my aching toes as I stepped onto the soft wet sand and positioned my body to dive in. “Gregory!!! Wait!!!,” pierced into the tranquil sky and rang into my ears. It was my mother. “I need to put on your suntan lotion,” she screamed in gasps as she dropped the cooler to the sand and ran towards me, arms flailing. The moment of peace had come and gone as quickly as the wave I was about to jump into had. I lowered my head in defeat as I walked quickly towards her to avoid any further loud screaming.
Every summer I came to visit, my mother would take it upon herself to make sure that I got the darkest tan possible. Every summer she would dismiss my excuse that ‘It was impossible for me to get a tan and the efforts only resulted in horrible sunburns,” as something a girl would say. It was as if she dreamt of me going back to my friends in Virginia with a tan so incredible that it could only exemplify how great of a mother I had. As I appeared before her I could see that she was squinting hard at a black plastic bottle she was holding at an arm’s length away from her face. It was called “Tan Amplifier” and it was now being poured by the handful over my entire body. It was greasy as it beaded down my face and was massaged into my chest. I would later find out that the “Amplifier” in its name signified its amazing power to tan when there was barely any sun available. There was not a cloud in the sky that August day as I darted back across the scorching sand and into the water.
By the end of the day I think everyone on the beach knew of our presence. Even if I had tried it would have been impossible to have gotten lost. All I would need to do is look for the woman wearing the snowcap or watch for where the tide was inching upon a weathered canoe. I would not start to feel the effects of burn on my body until I was crammed next to the cooler in the back of the car and the salt in my fishnet bathing suit had begun to dry and itch. The drive home in the interstate traffic would not be a pleasant one at all. I screamed in agony as my mother sat in the front and reread the bottle of suntan lotion. “I’ll be damned,” she said as she realized what had happened. “Well, just think of how great of a tan that’s gonna turn into,” she said as I pulled out a wool scarf from the suitcase to rest my head on.
It'll Put Hair On Your Chest
Ray Leubano was a friendly gust of wind on our family’s last matchstick of dignity. What with my mother’s strong attraction to construction workers and Ray’s ability to drink a can of beer while smoking a joint, they were bound to find each other. We met this strange Mexican man in lot number 76 of the trailer park, which was two parking spaces down from us. My mother and I were enjoying a sopping wet humid day in Miami as we walked past the shopping carts and scattered debris that carpeted Fowler’s trailer park, when we heard a faint whistle to our left. As I turned my head I noticed a short man with no shirt that seemed to be waving and whistling at us. His hair was tangled into a thick dark mat that had a halo of stray hairs dancing in a circular blur. The stench of his scalp caused this blurring effect much the same way that heat would off the afternoon pavement. I would later find out that “shampoo was for pussies”. As Ray once put it, “This bar of Dial is your soap, your conditioner and your shampoo”. His jeans were cut just above the knee. I use the term “cut” loosely, as the pants themselves appeared to have actually had their legs torn and ripped off in a frenzy, as if he had become some sort of werewolf the night before. The way Ray drank, this was not so far from the truth. He stood before us with no shirt and his upper body showed evidence of years of manual labor as his muscles sank down on him like a suit of armor. His stomach on the other hand, showed evidence of years of heavy drinking, as it poked out like a basketball, his belly button popping out with force every time he breathed.
“Hey mommy, you want a beer,” he slurred as he knelt down and picked up a large glass bottle of beer, the label wet and scratched half off. “Uh, no thank you. This is my son Gregory,” she calmly replied as she made a gesture towards me, implying to Ray that I was too young and innocent to know about alcohol. I hated it when she called me Gregory. I always pictured that name on an overly cheerful male flight attendant, “Hi my name is Gregory, can I get you a pillow?". Ray was now staring at me. “Hey Gregorio, you want some cerveza? It’ll put hair on your chest,” he said, stumbling in my direction. This was Ray’s argument for everything, whether it was for me to get him a beer from the fridge or to try some Tabasco sauce on my cereal. “Come on Gregorio, it’ll put hair on your chest”. I still don’t know what it means. My mother just smiled and reached into her blue vinyl oversized purse for her compact. “So what’s your name,” she questioned from behind the small plastic mirror as she formed her lips into a pouting position. “My name’s Ray,” he said in a gravely voice as he took a swig from his drink. Just as he was setting his beer down on the pavement an orange tattered beast leapt down from the sky and onto Ray’s bare shoulder. “Ahhh pinche gato!” he screamed as he looked for a rock to throw at the monster, which had bolted out of sight. “That’s princess. She been livin here for a while,” he gurgled under his breath as he massaged his upper shoulder, now raw with three long pink scratches. What Ray was referring to was the orange cat that lived with him. The trailer park was the cat’s true home, but Ray fed him enough to keep him coming back. This thing was a reddish orange that seemed almost rusted with age, its face covered in scars and the left corner of his ear missing. On most nights, myself and the rest of the trailer park were invited to listen to a concert of hisses, screeches and wails made by the friendly neighborhood felines as they fought to their heroic deaths. Princess was no doubt one of the main performers. The fact that Ray had named him Princess only added to the animal’s rage, for he was clearly a male cat, this being obvious due to the sight of his abnormally large furry testacles that strutted from behind his legs as he walked. Ray and Princess had more in common than they knew, for they were both stuck in this trailer park with no escape or attempt of escape in sight, they both terribly needed showers and as Ray stumbled into the plastic lawn chair in front of my mother and I, his jean shorts opened just enough to let his furry testacles plop into sight.
My mother acted as if she didn’t notice the horrible sight before us as she said politely, with her hips slanted and one hand planted on her side seductively, “Well maybe you could come by and help us fix our air conditioner. There is a nice dinner for you if you say yes.” Ray looked up with a drunken glaze and half cocked smirk, “Hey anything you want me to eat I’ll eat.” He then nodded and winked. Dear God. “Okay then Ray, it was nice to meet you, we live just two doors down. Come by anytime,” she smiled again as she turned to walk away. I was too young to understand how crude the comment was but I was not too young to see how repulsive the man behind the comment was. My mother on the other hand, saw an “honest side” to him and told me that I should be polite to him. “Don’t you want your mother to be happy,” she said when we got back home inside the trailer. I calmly reached for the gray circular handle and twisted open the heavy glass shutters. As I looked out the window and breathed in the warm, dusk filled sky I saw our shirtless friend running away down the asphalt street cursing at the orange cat. He then leaned his body onto the side of a large green dumpster and proceeded to urinate into an oval arch that splashed before his bare feet. “No mom, I don’t want you to be happy,” I said under my breath as I sank down into the polyester cushions of our sofa.
“Hey mommy, you want a beer,” he slurred as he knelt down and picked up a large glass bottle of beer, the label wet and scratched half off. “Uh, no thank you. This is my son Gregory,” she calmly replied as she made a gesture towards me, implying to Ray that I was too young and innocent to know about alcohol. I hated it when she called me Gregory. I always pictured that name on an overly cheerful male flight attendant, “Hi my name is Gregory, can I get you a pillow?". Ray was now staring at me. “Hey Gregorio, you want some cerveza? It’ll put hair on your chest,” he said, stumbling in my direction. This was Ray’s argument for everything, whether it was for me to get him a beer from the fridge or to try some Tabasco sauce on my cereal. “Come on Gregorio, it’ll put hair on your chest”. I still don’t know what it means. My mother just smiled and reached into her blue vinyl oversized purse for her compact. “So what’s your name,” she questioned from behind the small plastic mirror as she formed her lips into a pouting position. “My name’s Ray,” he said in a gravely voice as he took a swig from his drink. Just as he was setting his beer down on the pavement an orange tattered beast leapt down from the sky and onto Ray’s bare shoulder. “Ahhh pinche gato!” he screamed as he looked for a rock to throw at the monster, which had bolted out of sight. “That’s princess. She been livin here for a while,” he gurgled under his breath as he massaged his upper shoulder, now raw with three long pink scratches. What Ray was referring to was the orange cat that lived with him. The trailer park was the cat’s true home, but Ray fed him enough to keep him coming back. This thing was a reddish orange that seemed almost rusted with age, its face covered in scars and the left corner of his ear missing. On most nights, myself and the rest of the trailer park were invited to listen to a concert of hisses, screeches and wails made by the friendly neighborhood felines as they fought to their heroic deaths. Princess was no doubt one of the main performers. The fact that Ray had named him Princess only added to the animal’s rage, for he was clearly a male cat, this being obvious due to the sight of his abnormally large furry testacles that strutted from behind his legs as he walked. Ray and Princess had more in common than they knew, for they were both stuck in this trailer park with no escape or attempt of escape in sight, they both terribly needed showers and as Ray stumbled into the plastic lawn chair in front of my mother and I, his jean shorts opened just enough to let his furry testacles plop into sight.
My mother acted as if she didn’t notice the horrible sight before us as she said politely, with her hips slanted and one hand planted on her side seductively, “Well maybe you could come by and help us fix our air conditioner. There is a nice dinner for you if you say yes.” Ray looked up with a drunken glaze and half cocked smirk, “Hey anything you want me to eat I’ll eat.” He then nodded and winked. Dear God. “Okay then Ray, it was nice to meet you, we live just two doors down. Come by anytime,” she smiled again as she turned to walk away. I was too young to understand how crude the comment was but I was not too young to see how repulsive the man behind the comment was. My mother on the other hand, saw an “honest side” to him and told me that I should be polite to him. “Don’t you want your mother to be happy,” she said when we got back home inside the trailer. I calmly reached for the gray circular handle and twisted open the heavy glass shutters. As I looked out the window and breathed in the warm, dusk filled sky I saw our shirtless friend running away down the asphalt street cursing at the orange cat. He then leaned his body onto the side of a large green dumpster and proceeded to urinate into an oval arch that splashed before his bare feet. “No mom, I don’t want you to be happy,” I said under my breath as I sank down into the polyester cushions of our sofa.
Who Shit in My Boots??
The visits to Miami often included an evening’s stay at my grandmother’s house. Referred to as “Granny Friel” you would never find her without a Pall Mall dangling from her lip and a salty brimmed Budweiser can semi dented on the side to allow for easy grasping. The house sat literally unchanged as the neighboring areas grew with the eras they witnessed. The fluorescent orange shutters had dulled over the years as well as the sky blue front door. Inside the house lay a thick fog of cigarette smoke and dust and the sound of my granny coughing became a familiar ring in the back of our ears. The most popular sight of the abode was the Florida room, or the television room where a pale white blanket of flesh and fat enveloped the lime green sofa. The occasional moan that emitted from underneath the massive presence was the only indication that it was, in fact human. “Hi Uncle Tim,” I hollered with joy as I ran to embrace his enormous stomach. “It’s good to see you, I missed you,” I said as I tried to wrap my arms around him. “What the fuck is that, he screamed as he jumped up swinging his right arm into my forehead launching me past him into the side of the end table, scattering National Enquirers across the dimly lit room. He sat up with a face of wrinkles and indentions that were left from sleeping on the television remote. “Oh hi Gregory,” he let out with a relieved smile. Picking up a half smoked cigarette and blindly reaching for his lighter he questioned, “What the hell are you doing on the floor?”
I would often find myself roaming in the backyard of the Friel estate which consisted of about two acres of dry crab grass speckled with the remains of once drivable cars, now retired to stand upon cinderblocks, the paint jobs rusting away under the scorching heat of South Florida’s sun. There was a large pool on the deck that I cannot remember ever being full. It had formed a sort of ecosystem in itself and now resembled a miniature version of a steaming swamp. We witnessed generations of hideous frogs and lizards come and go as they belched and urinated their way into our lives, not much different than the other members of the Friel family actually.The patio had been screened in at one time but now only long aluminum supports remained. Long grasses and weeds had grown over what was once a poor excuse of a greenhouse. This was where the various pets of the family had called home and taken refuge from my grandfather’s alcoholic “moods” over the years. Now it just sat there off in the corner, windowless and concrete colored. I could imagine it being used in 1939 Poland as a cell to beat unruly prisoners in. The only reason I know that it was once livelier was the black and white picture my mother kept in her jewelry box at home. It was a picture of her monkey Pepe Cleo Friel perched on the greenhouse doorstep. She named him Pepe after the gay Cuban gardener the family had hired and Cleo because my grandfather had brought him home for her after the hurricane, named accordingly. She loved this monkey, as any kid would. Hell, what kid wouldn’t love a monkey? They didn’t enforce many wildlife protection laws as they do now so anyone could basically own any kind of animal they wanted. My uncles owned baby alligators at one time but after being too much to handle, they brilliantly let them free in a local running canal. Back to Pepe; now my mom has been known to smother things; human, animal, most things. A lot of people have had animals run away or panic and leave but I guarantee my mother is the only person in the world that has actually forced an animal to kill itself. That’s not really fair as I’m sure it was a group effort of the entire Friel family that drove poor Pepe to his ultimate demise.“Screeech,” my mother would frequently hear when arriving back from school. Either her two brothers were feeding it pepper sauce or my grandfather was chasing it to beat him for shitting in his boots, but either way that monkey was never at ease. Next, it was my mothers turn to torture and humiliate him. She would squeeze poor little Pepe with so much love that one little “eep” was all that came out of his exhale. She would then bathe him, paint his fingernails, and tie ribbons in his hair. I can imagine Pepe fighting and struggling from the curling iron for a few minutes and then eventually giving in with a sigh and frown of acceptance as he was pampered into misery.It was a hot summer day when Pepe came upon a solution to his Friel family situation. Pepe waited until everyone left the house and my grandfather had drank himself to sleep. He had thought about this moment for weeks in advance, clinging onto a little blue baby sheet at all times, impressing the idea onto others that he truly loved this blanket. Finally they had allowed him the chance to keep it with him in his cage. Up and over the top of his cage the little blue blanket was thrown; Pepe had practiced this movement countless times before with pieces of ivy that had fallen from nearby trees and the loose braided hairs of his tail that he had collected over time. The noose was in place as Pepe looked around one last time with a hint of hesitation when he heard a voice shout through the air, “Alright motherfucker who shit in my boots?!.” The rope snapped and Pepe left this world with a relieved smile.
At night I could always look forward to a friendly game of Uno, a card game that used as much skill as one would use to breathe or blink their eyes. Seated at the head of the table was my great grandfather. This was the meanest person I have ever known and the constant dirty scowl on his face summed up his personality. His chin turned up so far that it literally touched the bottom of his nose and the glasses he wore resembled thick glass ashtrays as his eyes were magnified to a comical degree. “Give me a goddamned card,” he bellowed. “Dad for the last time we are not playing Gin, now put your hands down and pick up your cards. We’re playing Uno with Gregory,” she calmly instructed. Grandpa Worm always loved me and cherished my visits. “Who the hell is that? One of Terry’s bastard children,” he politely gestured. Good old Grandpa Worm I thought to myself. Little did he know that his utter disgust for life would bite him in the ass as he would ironically outlive all his children. By 9 o’ clock my relatives would all be drunk and or passed out. The only one left up were my Uncle Tim and I.Uncle Tim had a slight drug problem I would come to find out and for some reason most drug addicts constantly needed cash. As he approached me to ask if I needed a refill of my generic brand cola he noticed me admiring the money I had in my wallet. “Your dad give you money,” he asked softly as his eyes gleamed with anticipation of the answer. “Yeah he gave me a hundred dollars to spend while I’m here,” I said back. “You know, he said, it’s not good to carry one bill with you. You should get change so that way you can have five twenties instead of one hundred dollar bill,” he said with a sound of superiority and great wisdom. “Uh yeah that does sound right I guess. Do you have change,” I asked. “No but I can get you some,” he quickly responded as if he had been waiting for me to say that all night. “Okay,” I said and handed him my money. He left and informed me that he would be back in no more than twenty minutes.Several hours passed before I realized he wasn’t coming back. All I managed to do was cry and run to tell my grandmother. “That son of a bitch,” she screamed. “Did he take anything else?” She was referring to the set of china dishes she left out after we had dinner. In her drunken stupor she had forgotten to lock them away in her cupboard in the closet. He had in fact taken it all, including my hundred dollar bill.I didn’t see Uncle Tim the rest of that wonderful stay in Miami but my granny did reimburse me the one hundred dollars, but not before telling my dad about the ordeal. She told him to sit me down and let me know about Uncle Tim’s “problem”. When I got back home to my father though, he never spoke of the incident. But a week later after I finished mowing the lawn I asked him for my pay, only to hear him respond, “I’ll pay you but I need to get some change from Uncle Tim first.” I could hear him laughing to himself as he walked away into the house.
Wednesday, July 29, 2009
The flight to Miami only took about three hours but during that span of time, being the friendly 12 year old that I was, had managed to meet most of the passengers seated nearby. I was so eager to see my mother, whom I hadn’t seen in nearly a year that I could not help but unbuckle my seat belt early as we taxied around the runway in search of our specified gate. The old woman who sat next to me smiled gently as she had heard all about my forthcoming visit to see my mother. Finally, we came to a halt.
I walked with a glowing confidence as I exited the plane and gripped onto my oversized luggage. I kept at a steady pace with the cattle of other passengers while we made our way down the long corridor that ended at the baggage claim gate. As I walked I heard a faint commotion far in the distance which was sounding more and more like muffled yelling. As the group of passengers and I got closer, the sound started to become eerily familiar. It was definitely a woman’s voice and she was obviously involved in some sort of confrontation but I couldn’t put my finger on the reason all this rang so close to home. The other passengers could now hear the commotion as well, as we all searched amongst ourselves to find some sort of answer behind it. One man looked over at me while I shook my head and smiled sympathetically as if I was saying to him, “It’s a shame there are such troubled people in the world.” The moment we shared, as two sane people, came to a life shuddering halt as I quickly realized why I knew that sound oh too well. “Dear God no,” I thought to myself. “I mean it couldn’t be,” I tried to reason. “I mean could that really be her?” I questioned one last time. The yelling was now starting to form audible words, which were mostly comprised of vulgarity and racial slurs. “It was her,” I managed to think as my steady confident march slowed to an embarrassing walk that left me looking lost. My eyes darted up to the ceiling to focus on the elaborate paintings of pelicans and seagulls which, by the way, still haunt my dreams. The noise was gaining a face now.
My mother was being pinned against a golden brown brick wall by a heavy black woman. The woman wore a tight fitting security uniform and beads of sweat were forming at her brow. She wasn’t a necessarily happy woman to say the least and she was taking out years of frustration on the small frame of my mother. Oh, but mom wasn’t one to go without a fight. For some reason my mother was trying to get past the gate to meet my plane but wasn’t allowed to pass without a boarding ticket. My mother didn’t need “a fucking boarding ticket to see her own goddamned son” and she was determined to let everyone know that. “That’s my son,!” she let out in a horrifying gasp as her eyes locked in on me from underneath the sleeper hold that Shandra the security guard had had her in. “That’s my son, that’s my SON,” I can still hear it in my soul.
I remained calm and tried to blend in with the other travelers, innocent to this incredible sight. I focused on the sliding doors just past my mother who was now spitting at the guards due to the fact that her thumbs were restrained behind her. At that point I wasn’t thinking of the lack of transportation from the airport because I would have willingly walked home on my hands if I could have just made it a few more feet to the doors without being seen by her again. My adrenaline was pumping hard now as I walked side by side with the old woman from the plane who was now babbling on about maybe being able to meet my mom when she came to pick me up. “Oh if you only knew lady,” I said under my breath. “Freedom was only seconds away now”, I thought. But not quite. “There he is. That’s my son!” she hollered and waived as she met my eyes. Hundreds of pairs of eyes shot over to me in an instant. “Oh God,” it’s happened. The man I had shared a moment with earlier now looked down on me with a sort of sad disappointment as I was shunned from the group. “Don’t give me that look, I was once like you,” I pleaded to the group. The sudden break in commotion left my mother with a window of time to escape as she freed her head from under the woman’s forearm. Running towards me with her arms flailing insanely in the air I remained still and accepted the ill humored fate that I was given. I was her son.
I walked with a glowing confidence as I exited the plane and gripped onto my oversized luggage. I kept at a steady pace with the cattle of other passengers while we made our way down the long corridor that ended at the baggage claim gate. As I walked I heard a faint commotion far in the distance which was sounding more and more like muffled yelling. As the group of passengers and I got closer, the sound started to become eerily familiar. It was definitely a woman’s voice and she was obviously involved in some sort of confrontation but I couldn’t put my finger on the reason all this rang so close to home. The other passengers could now hear the commotion as well, as we all searched amongst ourselves to find some sort of answer behind it. One man looked over at me while I shook my head and smiled sympathetically as if I was saying to him, “It’s a shame there are such troubled people in the world.” The moment we shared, as two sane people, came to a life shuddering halt as I quickly realized why I knew that sound oh too well. “Dear God no,” I thought to myself. “I mean it couldn’t be,” I tried to reason. “I mean could that really be her?” I questioned one last time. The yelling was now starting to form audible words, which were mostly comprised of vulgarity and racial slurs. “It was her,” I managed to think as my steady confident march slowed to an embarrassing walk that left me looking lost. My eyes darted up to the ceiling to focus on the elaborate paintings of pelicans and seagulls which, by the way, still haunt my dreams. The noise was gaining a face now.
My mother was being pinned against a golden brown brick wall by a heavy black woman. The woman wore a tight fitting security uniform and beads of sweat were forming at her brow. She wasn’t a necessarily happy woman to say the least and she was taking out years of frustration on the small frame of my mother. Oh, but mom wasn’t one to go without a fight. For some reason my mother was trying to get past the gate to meet my plane but wasn’t allowed to pass without a boarding ticket. My mother didn’t need “a fucking boarding ticket to see her own goddamned son” and she was determined to let everyone know that. “That’s my son,!” she let out in a horrifying gasp as her eyes locked in on me from underneath the sleeper hold that Shandra the security guard had had her in. “That’s my son, that’s my SON,” I can still hear it in my soul.
I remained calm and tried to blend in with the other travelers, innocent to this incredible sight. I focused on the sliding doors just past my mother who was now spitting at the guards due to the fact that her thumbs were restrained behind her. At that point I wasn’t thinking of the lack of transportation from the airport because I would have willingly walked home on my hands if I could have just made it a few more feet to the doors without being seen by her again. My adrenaline was pumping hard now as I walked side by side with the old woman from the plane who was now babbling on about maybe being able to meet my mom when she came to pick me up. “Oh if you only knew lady,” I said under my breath. “Freedom was only seconds away now”, I thought. But not quite. “There he is. That’s my son!” she hollered and waived as she met my eyes. Hundreds of pairs of eyes shot over to me in an instant. “Oh God,” it’s happened. The man I had shared a moment with earlier now looked down on me with a sort of sad disappointment as I was shunned from the group. “Don’t give me that look, I was once like you,” I pleaded to the group. The sudden break in commotion left my mother with a window of time to escape as she freed her head from under the woman’s forearm. Running towards me with her arms flailing insanely in the air I remained still and accepted the ill humored fate that I was given. I was her son.
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