I spotted the ring spinning with the rest of the jewelry in the turntable case of the antiques store. I watched it go by six times before I asked the clerk to take it out, before I slid it on my finger, before I told him to hold it for me, before I bought it and began to wear it daily, its blue stone, marbled like the the surface of the Earth, reminding me that there are worlds out there, worlds waiting for me, worlds that I cannot wait to join.
Archive for the ‘Kind of true’ Category
Smackdown
April 2, 2008No one cared about the Yankees-Indians game, not even when the score hit Yankees 3, Indians 12. She was the only one thrilled to watch, even though the bar’s television showed more fuzz than ball.
They were all waiting for the Cubs game, oblivious to the sheer joy of watching a pinstripes smackdown.
No appropriate gift
March 30, 2008She had made a habit of planning something for the day, even if he claimed not to care or, sometimes, not even to remember it.
Thus, breaking that habit was difficult. There wasn’t even anything appropriate to give—her heart was off limits, after all, back behind the barbed wire where, some days, she wished she’d kept it all along.
But she could not lie. Her nature was this: to buy a card, to see a gift that would bring a smile, to want to buy it even if the giving no longer made any sense whatsoever.
Dining alone
March 26, 2008The world appears filled with couples, until you realize that it only seems that way because you go where others fear going alone.
After all, if everyone in the world was comfortable enough to take themselves to a nice dinner, why would any of us need each other?
The chip
March 24, 2008“This one has the chip in it,” the passenger said, sliding her passport across the podium.
“The chip,” said the TSA agent. “That’s just one of those measures they’re using to…”
He paused a long time for a man facing a long line. Then he used his fingers, which were gloved in blue latex, to mark two languid quotes in the air.
“…keep us safe,” he said. Then he winked at me.
Where a meltdown is awkward
March 22, 2008A bookstore. A crowded bar. The hallway at school. That park that the tornado decimated as it careened through the center of town.
Before singing the National Anthem. The corner pizzeria. The down escalator. On the phone, when one’s boss is on the other end.
A press conference. A parking lot alongside the river. On the bus to work. One’s own back yard, when there are houseguests.
Steam
March 18, 2008“Why are you the one crying?” he asked.
She could not get the explanation to leave her mouth. It would make only as much sense, anyway, as steam in the air over a boiling pot. If only she were designed more like a tea kettle, she thought. If only she were built to shriek.
She set down the phone, roiling. She pressed her palms against the table. When she lifted them back up, they left damp ghosts where her hands bore down.
100 Proof 