Prepare....

I always wanted to be a good girl scout.
And when I wasn't...
when I wandered off on the way to meetings to stare at the Tinker Man...
scribbled on my sit~upon...
burned the house down on the way out the door to my first camp out...

I gave up.

And then I always wanted to dress up like one for Halloween.

Pretend to be a good Girl Scout...

To be prepared...


I wanted to parade around in my little green dress, and my anklet socks,
earning badges I was proud of,
and melting Smores on an open fire.

Instead,
I dressed up like hookers, and hippies, and David Bowie....
zombies, and witches, and a Box of Frosted Flakes...
faeries, and cinderellas, and neon bumble bees,
cowboys, and drunks, pregnant football players and butterflies...

I woke up every halloween and pulled a new face out of the chest of drawers, and wrote pretend Frank Kafka novels...
rang random doorbells...
And held out my bag for candy...

I don't have a sweet tooth anymore...

And I don't want to be a Girl Scout anymore...

It doesn't matter whose child it is....

There were wires everywhere and the hum of soft shoes padding up and down the halls almost drove me mad. How could they be so quiet when my world was exploding? How could my heart pound louder than every machine they had plugged in, louder than the canned voice calling Dr. Kildare on the loud speaker? How could they not crumple, fall to their knees with me...and know....

Long before he stabilized they told me in a foreign antiseptic language..."we've done all we can do"... and then they scattered, pigeons on a highway dodging five o'clock traffic.

And then he lived.

They came back to pack him up, uninsured, in my little red car. Naked and broken. Nobody wished us well on the way out the door. They didn't call in the morning to check on him.

This time they kept him.

And for 72 hours someone will watch over my child. With the cheese curl toes. The homemade tattoo on his ankle. The blonde hair with the slightest red sunset. For 72 hours he will be mad, but he'll breathe.

And I'll cry,
But I'll sleep...

Because he'll be safe....

Them's fightin' words....

I gave up fussin' and fightin' a long time ago... my last voluntary hoo~hah left me hidin' in the dog house, literally. Thank God I'm skinny. There were cuss words and accusations. One ice cold beer propelling it's liquid soul across the room. Splash! Right on target. "Now, I'm in your face" were the last words I remember dripping from his chin. I ran......

That was over twenty years ago.

I don't like noise or commotion. Except for Led Zepplin. I've lived through a few world wars in the living room, the street, in nightmares come true, and I've survived. Long enough to choose peace. I've never raised my right hand and volunteered again, but I've been there, in the middle of mahem, begging, pleading....waiting.... I remember, recite, the words my Father taught me "wage your battles well"....and whisper them over and over again, worry beads under my breath, when anger show's it's yellow face.....

I'm a chicken, actually.

Fightin' frightens me. Things are said that can never ever be erased. Faces are made, expressions frozen forever like Superman, waiting for just the right moment to come flashing back.....haunted deja vue. Doors are slammed. And sometimes windows break.......

I need the beach......
And a podium....

Peace~love..........

I married once...

He kept asking. Over pink champagne at New Years. Slurping raw oysters and leaning over pool tables. Doing the helicopter dance on Friday nights. He just kept asking. And one night, over steaks and an HBO re-run, I said OK and we picked a date.

Of course, it was a catastrophe. The pony-tailed redneck and I, but what the hell, we loved to dance, he was a great cook, I was a starving artist and....

he had her...."Baby Dumplin'".....And I fell in love with her hopelessly, and forever, and instantly. My first born daughter, seven, blonde hair ~long and tangled, cheese curl toes, and green eyes.

In the third grade, she had to draw a family tree for art class. The teacher called me. I still have it tucked away, it's roots wild and scattered, it's limbs heavy and old, and names hanging everywhere, like wild laundrey whisped from it's line.....the intricate scribblings of a child....connecting the dots between the people she was born to, and those she was fated to.

Tonight, I dug it out, and saw what she saw....the endless constellation of dots...

What is and what is meant to be....

Saturdays and Starfish

1992
"It's our birthday,
Saturdays and Starfish,
We're five and six"......

I look around. They're building mad castles in the sand with teetering towers and deep,deep tunnels. In their own world. People passing barefooted on the beach smile at the day and night babies in the sand. Jonah is lighter complected than the sun's reflection, platiunum hair drooling down his neck in a rat's tail, eyes the color of see-through. Haley is Sophia Lauren as a child, long limbs stretching, brown eyes a sepia full moon. She is in charge; The Castle Contractor.He follows her lead for a moment and then spins on hands and knees chasing a sandcrab. "A buwfday giff, a buwfday giff"! he chants in circles. She rolls her eyes and continues to dribble wet sand on their steeples.....

I bite my bottom lip and draw. Pray I can capture this moment. When the tide is still and thoughtful, and my babies are at peace...growing in the sun.

2007

My little ones. Bigger than me. He just pulled out of the drive way in his canary yellow "please don't pull me over tonight" Chevy Blazer. A party is growing one text message at a time. She's going for dinner with her long time "Isn't he so cute?" Boy-O... candelight and clinks!

I can't draw fast enough to catch this moment.

Be safe little ones. Happy Birthday, my loves.....