Part 6 (1/2)

A Happy Childhood

I AM SIX

My friend Katie in the water my friend Christie in the water Phantole day in the water i iht iesicles creao underwater laps hold your breath back and forth and back again three tiles look at each other blow your air out sit on the bottoh dive we find pennies at the bottoh we race at swioldblocks we fly in the air we enter the water with the glee of girl splashi+ng

I AM EIGHT

My sister my adoration my sister my awe my sister's room world of art world of music world of poetry and dried flowers and watercolor covers and long auburn hair

I AM 10

Vacationing at Salishan My father calazes out at the Oregon ocean Myin the pool of a resort, laughing, like other peoples' children

I AM 11

I play clarinet with my friend Brody and we tap our feet three-quarter tiers between the struggle of learning and the dance of

I AM 13

The family of my friend Christietrips with theo attic where we slept in our sleeping bags I stare at her while she sleepsI have to pee I put o to sleep I pee my pants hide o and listen to her parents all day wonder ”What smells like fish?” and Christie ss in the weeds knee-deep in the water of our lives

I AM 15

In the women's locker roo in youth in V-shaped torsos Alirls safe in a roo, swi besides family

Illness as Metaphor KISSED A GIRL AND MADE ME CRY

When I kissed Annie Van Leewan and got mononucleosis I was 11 years old My skin took on a yellowish pale color and the blue veins in my own hands looked as if I'd colored them with one of my father's architectural felt tipped ht becath - I re where it went - why couldn't I lift et out of bed or stand without fainting I could not eat, or walk, or go to the bathroom, or dress, undress, on my own I could not bathe I could not reach water

My lory My father at that time had chosen to try his luck as a freelance architect His office the bedroom next to mine -the room that had been my sister's Before she left In other words, it was my father as ho to think how to tell you how four weeks can be years It isn't possible, I know But it happened It's language that's letting ated, as if the very sun and s open up so I can tell this It's the yielding expanse of a white page

InMy father redressed owns My father stroked my hair Kissed my skin My father carried me to the bathtub and laid me down and washed me Everywhere My father dried me off in his arms and redressed arettes and Old Spice cologne His yellowed fingers The er fro a pen or pencil His steel blue eyes Twinning ht,beautiful ho I see the 's gonna get better You'll see” And leave early the next

There is only one other time inthose weeks Because there are times when a soul has to leave a body, times that are not death Some people know this like a hymn I knew she - my body - was still there, but I left her lifeless in the arms of a father

I went into a white Inside the white, there were sunflowers And lapis colored glass And deep aqua pools There were beautiful rocks everywhere - but you had to find them Small and exquisite journeys that took all day Like in a very good dream Inside the white too there were stories As if written on the walls or floors or sky of the white The words You could see them Reach out and touch them Just like the rocks You could pick up the rocks or words and carry the After a while I believed in theht, it would be possible, even beautiful, to die

But even girls whose strength has abandoned the the fork or spoon froet up out of , is this what irl in a body cast, finally touching the floor andcalled will? And ain entered the water To swim Away from my father's house, every day I swath ofthe strength of a girl

Everything about hi WHEN I WAS 13 I CONFESSED MY FATHER SECRETS IN the black box of catholic to another father in the house of our father who told me I should not tell lies

Honor thy father

Say seven Hail Marys

It's wicked to hts I prayed to the thing called God so hard I choked on the spit inernails into flesh so hard little scarlet hton the inside was burning

No matter how many times I entered the cool waters of the pool, I left the ith a fire in me

Mercy did not come from God the father Mercy came from a book That was the year I read Saint Joan of Arc by Vita Sackville-West My sister gave me the book when she left our father's house

At 13, I foundAnd I had to skip es that I did not understand But I already kneho Joan of Arc was, because my sister had explained it to me Girl woman with a war in her Voice of a father in her head And so I knew if I kept reading I would co I didn't want to and I couldn't not

Joan of Arc's burning scene is on page 341 Instead of a crown of thorns they placed a tall paper cap on her head She did not die until the fire reached her head People saw all kinds of things - one person saw a dove leaving her skull Despite the oil, sulphur and fuel used, her entrails and heart would not go to ash The executioner had to throw them in the Seine

I could see her How it looked How it smelled How her hair went to flame How the bone form of her skull appeared, until her jaw and teeth shown, a terrible smile or a screa that Honor thy father It is wicked to irl

That i up in a fire burned inside ion Her face skyward Her faith muscled up like a holy war And always the voice of a father in her head Like e of a burning wo woman into my heart and left belief to the house of father forever

I didn't hate the fire I hated the people who did not believe her And I hated the father that let her burn And I hated the men who I think I hated men The more I was around the theerously close to the flame

The Hairy Girls GIRL SWIMMERS ARE HAIRY

I don't kno s, but cos unless they are preparing for the big ionals, State, Senior Nationals, for instance So when I was a girl who barely had any hairs looking up at the towering corpus of Nancy Hogshead froht scary And they had pube hair sticking out of their suits up at the top of their thighs and going into their business Boy Talk about terrifying

OK that's a lie It wasn't terrifying It wasIt er showered in the locker rooed to pet, and her stuff as a little furry special place, especially since as a girl I was afraid to look at tits or twats or even faces

That's a lie too I stared at tits and coochie as hard as a drunk eyeballing a fifth of vodka

These hairy women - they were - they were mythic As a kid, I had no idea what they were in real life - students, girlfriends of so, females who used hand-held hairdryers, people who shopped at the mall with purses and drove cars around - but at the pool and in the locker rooms they were mythic I think that's why I reer than life to a kid woer and Evie Kosenkranius and Karen Moe and shi+rley Babashoff