On the Marking of Years
4.
Someone posts an empty dress shirt online, in memorium.
Someone posts a photo of a party shirt, swaying.
Someone posts a photo of their new puppy, a new lease on life.
He got me, for the first time, to spend time outside.
Someone posts a photo of a Ferris wheel in which it looks like the spokes are holding hands.
The best day of my life. Better than Disneyworld!
I do not post or write. I simply listen.
What should I write, in any case?
Here I sit and witness the drive-by of time?
5.
On my first day of school, so the story goes, I could already read. The teachers were annoyed, since that meant they’d have more trouble than they wanted to deal with. They told me to stand in the corner, underneath the American flag, and face the wall and spell the words they read out. They started out simple and got more complicated, I suppose to see what I could do. I don’t remember how many words I spelled, or the time it took. I remember my face getting red. I remember the stars and stripes of the American flag and the crackle of the PA system. I remember the pushing in of everyone’s chairs as everyone got up to leave for recess, and I kept on. I remember the flood of embarrassment, not of pride. And I remember the last word, the word I got stuck on: emergency.
6.
“Did you know that Little Red Riding Hood’s real name was Elizabeth?” Sophie asks me one night after dinner.
“No, I didn’t,” I say.
“And did you know that she told the wolf way more than he needed or even wanted to know?”
I ask what she means, and she gives me an exhaustive list: where exactly her grandmother lived, for one, behind exactly which blueberry bush. What exactly she had in her basket, sweetbreads and wine. Exactly how long she was supposed to be out for, and where her mother was watching, at the window, expecting her back.
“That’s way too much information, right?” she asks.
I tell her that yes, I suppose so.
She tells me that they’ve written down Elizabeth’s character traits: sweet, polite, shy.
“Like girls usually are,” she says.
I say yes, I suppose she’s right.
That night, I go into her bedroom and watch her sleep. Her hair is spread out over her pillow. Her eyes are shut so tight, she wouldn’t even see if a light was flipped on. Wouldn’t even see a wolf if it popped up beside her.
Thank god for that, I tell myself, and shut the door.