introspective periscope : peeking inside since Y2K ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- coffee and politics, part one closing up - nineteenth of september, 2001 "the coffee is just water dressed in brown."~ani difranco its getting late but i've got to wait on the laundry anyway. and i've had a pot of coffee or two split two ways between us. and i want to be awake for just a wrinkle of time when he finally does come home. he's got that second job now. we'll make it and i've got something in which to believe. i'm not worried anymore. he helps me find faith. but this isn't about him. i've got a friend that i haven't seen in a little over a week til just tonight. he doesn't always tell me when i'm wrong. he comes just when i need him most. tonight, i didn't know it, but i needed him. we drove to the record store together in his father's truck because his jeep is a "piece of crap". it might be a piece of crap but its gotten us to many happy destinations. we've shared a lot in that truck. the cold september rain was streaking down the windshield and i didn't need him to say it out loud. his voice is like my mother's and i put my seatbelt without saying a word. after i'd wiped the spots of water from the lenses of my tortise rimmed glasses, we looked around. i knew exactly what i wanted and we were out the door. there was a boy at the counter who had a thing for the girl behind the counter. she should call him. girls can be so dumb sometimes. i admit. and i'm a girl. we were out the door and i felt a small passing urge to jump in one of the expansive puddles in the parking lot. i felt an urge to splash the cold on my nerves to soothe something in me that hasn't been right in awhile. but i didn't. i got back in that truck and we drove to our formal destination. the perkins flag is even bigger at half staff. i mean. its huge any day but today, it was large and blanketing. i've been very sensitive to the symbol and tonight was no exception. but tonight, he helped me talk it out a little bit. he helped me get to the root of it with patience and a little bit of his brand of understanding. its like i said: sometimes, he just lets me believe i'm right even when i know i'm wrong. lately, until this afternoon, i haven't felt wrong about the things in which i believe. we sat under the track lighting. overtones of green and teals...the upholstery and his shirt...the rim of his coffee cup. the light cast strange shadows when a few tears finally forced their way out, surfacing and wetting my otherwise dry, composed cheeks. i wish you could understand my side. i wish you would give me the chance to explain it all out in the analytical manner i've tried....until tonight i couldn't find the words. you see. there's more to it than what left-wing thinking to which i imagine everyone thinks i'm partial. its not leftist thinking...i would say it was humanitarianism to an extent. you see, i have these strong images of a girl like me with different coloured skin with all of these dreams before her. i picture a girl just like me climbing the stairs or riding an elevator in those twin towers or on one of those planes... (my life has become computers and telephones and planes and cars.) ...and i picture that girl telling her boyfriend that she loves him and dreaming of the life ahead of her. of seasons to come and to enjoy and to share. of goals. of forevers. of love. of all of the things that make us human. i picture that girl waking up tomorrow and i picture that girl dying in some blast of fire or however they'll decide to do it. the american people must be appeased. i realize i'm in the minority. we always said we'd cry if the other one died, B and I. And we always chuckled, saying "at least you wouldn't have to live through it." the reality focuses when i wipe away the streaks on my lenses. its more realistic these days. and i can't stop thinking of that girl, whatever colour her skin may be. i think we forget that there are white people and black people and yellow people and every coloured people all over this planet who are just like us...just like us. i cant' stop thinking of that girl and wondering if she will be afraid. if she was nervous to go to work because of what she heard on the news. if she will feel it. if she will even know what happened when it hits. what her boyfriend will live through..if he will live. i can't stop thinking that that could be any one of us. and its that very thinking thats making me sick to my stomach when i see that flag waving...blanketing. its that repeated thought that won't let me be any part of this. but i don't think you can understand. and so we drank coffee and we didn't talk about the afternoon. we talked about the politics and the mentality. we talked about his job interviews. we talked about things that meant something to us, carefully avoiding the topic of what has bothered me more than anything today because it involved someone special to both of us. both of us. but things are changing so fast. i feel like i'm growing up a little bit at a time. i'm learning things about myself. there are things i like very much and things that bother and worry me. i never said i was perfect. i get the feeling that things will keep changing. and change is so welcome these days.... its getting so late but i've got so much to say....the laundry is done. i can't stop thinking. i need a break from all of this. sometimes, my head just swims like my fish. sometimes, i lose my balance with the weight of words. he came just when i needed him. i needed him. i needed the coffee. thank you, B. ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- .what came before. - .what happened next. a diamond at the bottom of the drain - 20 october 2017 |
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