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every race night is shot through with sunlight
Thursday, May 26th, 2005 02:25 amIf I'm going to be getting three hours of sleep a night, I can just go back to college. My mom was all in favor of my going to bed early tonight because "there's no reason not to now"—little does she know there was never a reason! Ha ha! Unless you count compulsive fic reading over the internets as a valid reason, which I think you do.
I got out of bed before eight this morning; I put my sister on the bus, took the dog for a walk (emptied the dishwasher, took out the trash, milked the cows and slopped the hogs, etc., etc.), and brought my dad's thyroid medication and a change of clothes over to the hospital. Jesus but it was hot out today. Hot, but still not summer yet; the temperature still drops when the sun goes down and the nights are gorgeous, almost cool; there was fog down the street this morning.
My dad was supposed to be ready to come home around lunchtime. I came home to eat breakfast and maybe snatch a nap, but while I waited for his phone call I read Autumn's The Taste of Apples (SG:A), a long, beautiful and brilliant story, beautiful and strong and sad, about knowing and being known and loneliness. It broke me apart and I offer it to you here in sincere hopes that it will do the same for you. Lunchtime came: I made myself a sandwich and a smoothie and signed offline, switching to reading my book in bed with the cat lying warm and heavy across the backs of my legs. I walked the dog again when he whined for it. The sonogram technician thought my dad had gallstones but a doctor hadn't seen the results yet. My mother came home. I lolled around on my parents' bed with back cramps and scratchy eyes while I walked her through today's strength-training regimen (back and biceps); I took a shower and walked the dog again; we went out for Thai and brought cousin M. along.
There was no sign of my dad leaving the hospital any time in the immediate future when we brought him a change of clothes and his razor after dinner. The tests were done late, the last test hadn't been read by the doctor so while it might be gallstones—which would render both tomorrow's scheduled test and tonight's stay unnecessary—we had no official word on that, so stay tonight he did. Is. I'm tired. I'll be getting up at the same time tomorrow morning as I did today—I don't mind anything I've been doing, just the time I have to do some of it at.
I took the dog for one last walk, up and down the alley in the yellow suburban half-light of night, lit by a streetlamp or two, the bulging moon, occasional headlights, ambient lighting from the cities north, east, south, and west of us, plus the lights in everyone's backyards, triggered whenever we passed by. If I were a burglar, I'd say thanks for lighting the way. There was a frog squatting on the sidewalk at one end of the alley, still as stone and unmoved every time we checked on it; the dog tried to bound after something skittering in the pile of dead leaves by our gate, but I pulled him back to peer at what it was before I let him attack it and saw in the striped and shadowed orange streetlight that it was a zebra butterfly, injured, fluttering on the ground and scattering the leaves as it tried awkwardly to fly. The dog strained at me, but I led him away. I'd come across a leaf-filled puddle one day and put it in a poem, comparing the leaves, dead and drowned, to the velvet wings of butterflies they'd reminded me of. I wondered if this was a transformation, or at least the beginning breaths of one, the leaves really butterfly wings after all, buckled and crippled, warped like pages of homework you'd spilled coffee all over and mopped dry, cursing. You can press butterflies and flower petals both between leaves of a book meant for just that, to keep them dried and dead, slightly crumpled and only slightly faded.
I even remembered to feed the fish this morning (my dad had forgotten all about them, as though he has his dog now and doesn't love them anymore—or so I teased; my mom forget them too). The light in our backyard switched on as the dog and I came into the house, reflecting off and into the pond to show the fish were sleeping on the bottom, fat silvers and oranges and golds. With my flip-flop I killed a roach on the kitchen floor. The dog had spotted it but did nothing to help, crouched over it with his legs splayed and his nose near the ground, tracking it curiously. Roach guts smeared all over my shoe and the floor, which the dog would have eaten if I'd given him half a chance. Dogs.
The dog misses my dad. You can tell by the way he's followed me around all day, padding into my room to rest his head on my bed and whine for some love and affection. Both the animals are curled up in my room right now, but I'll be kicking them out so I can go to sleep. Poor animals. The rest of the house is yours for the night.
I got out of bed before eight this morning; I put my sister on the bus, took the dog for a walk (emptied the dishwasher, took out the trash, milked the cows and slopped the hogs, etc., etc.), and brought my dad's thyroid medication and a change of clothes over to the hospital. Jesus but it was hot out today. Hot, but still not summer yet; the temperature still drops when the sun goes down and the nights are gorgeous, almost cool; there was fog down the street this morning.
My dad was supposed to be ready to come home around lunchtime. I came home to eat breakfast and maybe snatch a nap, but while I waited for his phone call I read Autumn's The Taste of Apples (SG:A), a long, beautiful and brilliant story, beautiful and strong and sad, about knowing and being known and loneliness. It broke me apart and I offer it to you here in sincere hopes that it will do the same for you. Lunchtime came: I made myself a sandwich and a smoothie and signed offline, switching to reading my book in bed with the cat lying warm and heavy across the backs of my legs. I walked the dog again when he whined for it. The sonogram technician thought my dad had gallstones but a doctor hadn't seen the results yet. My mother came home. I lolled around on my parents' bed with back cramps and scratchy eyes while I walked her through today's strength-training regimen (back and biceps); I took a shower and walked the dog again; we went out for Thai and brought cousin M. along.
There was no sign of my dad leaving the hospital any time in the immediate future when we brought him a change of clothes and his razor after dinner. The tests were done late, the last test hadn't been read by the doctor so while it might be gallstones—which would render both tomorrow's scheduled test and tonight's stay unnecessary—we had no official word on that, so stay tonight he did. Is. I'm tired. I'll be getting up at the same time tomorrow morning as I did today—I don't mind anything I've been doing, just the time I have to do some of it at.
I took the dog for one last walk, up and down the alley in the yellow suburban half-light of night, lit by a streetlamp or two, the bulging moon, occasional headlights, ambient lighting from the cities north, east, south, and west of us, plus the lights in everyone's backyards, triggered whenever we passed by. If I were a burglar, I'd say thanks for lighting the way. There was a frog squatting on the sidewalk at one end of the alley, still as stone and unmoved every time we checked on it; the dog tried to bound after something skittering in the pile of dead leaves by our gate, but I pulled him back to peer at what it was before I let him attack it and saw in the striped and shadowed orange streetlight that it was a zebra butterfly, injured, fluttering on the ground and scattering the leaves as it tried awkwardly to fly. The dog strained at me, but I led him away. I'd come across a leaf-filled puddle one day and put it in a poem, comparing the leaves, dead and drowned, to the velvet wings of butterflies they'd reminded me of. I wondered if this was a transformation, or at least the beginning breaths of one, the leaves really butterfly wings after all, buckled and crippled, warped like pages of homework you'd spilled coffee all over and mopped dry, cursing. You can press butterflies and flower petals both between leaves of a book meant for just that, to keep them dried and dead, slightly crumpled and only slightly faded.
I even remembered to feed the fish this morning (my dad had forgotten all about them, as though he has his dog now and doesn't love them anymore—or so I teased; my mom forget them too). The light in our backyard switched on as the dog and I came into the house, reflecting off and into the pond to show the fish were sleeping on the bottom, fat silvers and oranges and golds. With my flip-flop I killed a roach on the kitchen floor. The dog had spotted it but did nothing to help, crouched over it with his legs splayed and his nose near the ground, tracking it curiously. Roach guts smeared all over my shoe and the floor, which the dog would have eaten if I'd given him half a chance. Dogs.
The dog misses my dad. You can tell by the way he's followed me around all day, padding into my room to rest his head on my bed and whine for some love and affection. Both the animals are curled up in my room right now, but I'll be kicking them out so I can go to sleep. Poor animals. The rest of the house is yours for the night.