Oh God! I didn’t tell my conscious mind that I was time traveling today! And now the tips of my fingers and the cracks on top my sunburnt lips are stained with berry. Transformed into deeply violet expressions of the night sky. I probably smell of salty skin and the character musk of my grandmother’s house. My feet are definitely stamped brown from Mother Earth’s stealthy signature, following suit from the fashions of my Grammie. We were given daily lessons on the search and scavenge required to reveal Earth’s magic. Frog hunting and plum pickup a typical itinerary we revisited as a day’s lesson plan. See? My body takes me back, as if that’s still what growing up feels like. I miss the dirt and the mud my sisters and I spent our weekends creating in. I miss willingly being in the same mud puddle as my sisters. I somehow still convince myself that there is time to return to this. Reality tells me that it began slipping the moment it arrived. Tells me that this is my family’s curse, An intergenerational struggle towards unity. It’s no one’s fault, we were bred to be this way. To us there is celebration in survival. We made it another day, didn’t we? I close my eyes tight and transport back to the living room of my Grandmother’s. I blink and see the golden headed 3 prancing around my Grammie as we sing about sunshine on a cloudy day. I return to this image when I need more sunshine on my cloudy days. I blink. The familial living room reorganizes itself and replaces the children with grown up versions. You can feel the defeat in the room. The crowned victor being life. We are all trying to pretend that we still know how to talk to each other. Trying to pretend that we don’t notice the change in rhythm. -KN
