paisleypiper's Diaryland Diary
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we're a happy family we're a happy family
I am not certain why today I had the memory of one of my largest childhood accidents return to me so vividly (see previous entry). It may have been going to this large park which houses our zoo, and outdoor theater and a nature center. I took a series of pictures of a broken swing set, which reminded me of being on the playground as a girl with the other kids daring each other to go around the world. I remember watching how the entire swing set used to rock when the big kids would swing high enough to flip over.
It may also have been the milkweed that I photographed at the nature center. My school had a lot of milkweed and I used to play with it in all of its stages. But it is so magical right now with all of the soft, gossamer hairs that escape as the covering becomes dried and withered. I always think about how this moment is the defining one for the milkweed. The seeds are released, blown around, the plant is in the process of becoming dormant. I�m not a botanist, but it seems interesting to me how releasing seeds are the last achievement of so many weeds.
This morning Quinn and I had breakfast with Mother and the Major. Every once in a while we go out to breakfast on Sunday, before the church crowds hit the few good breakfast places. When we get there, there are plenty of empty tables. When we leave, we are faced with crowds of hungry faces, looking at us, wondering why we took so long.
Or maybe it was not so long as much as it just felt so long. I was in rare form today, poking fun at myself before I could get ridiculed. This defense bothers me but it is easier than getting picked on and berated for one hour and fifty minutes. Before traveling 40 feet, the Major with great annoyance observed �I see you have not paid yet paid your sales tax on your car.� The car I just got Tuesday night. The car for which I still do not have the title. Then Mother started in on how she saw on the news that �you lost� against the expansion of the institution. She was so happy that �I� lost, although it was not an �I� sort of struggle. But that doesn�t matter, she was just thrilled that I lost something. It brings a subtle joy to her heart because things like this open the door for lectures about how I should be ashamed of who I am, where I live, how I live. That if I had done things their way, we would all be a lot happier and life would be smoother, more predictable, with lots of money to insulate me from heartache.
It isn�t that they know I am gay. Or that Quinn is my partner. This is not information I would ever share with Mother and the Major. We don�t discuss weighty matters. What upsets them is that I do not live in Neatside, I am not married to a doctor or an attorney, that I do not have children, that I am not an advertising executive, that I do not drive a Saab, and that I do not take fancy vacations or do anything that can accessorize their lives. These are the people who were proud of me not for leaving an abusive, scoundrel, jerk of a husband, but for not sharing any of the uncomfortable and unnecessary details with them. I was actually thanked for this by the Major who said that it would have been too hard on my mother and by my mother who said that it would be have worried the Major. �We don�t need to know what happened; just that we need not set another place at Thanksgiving.�
Mother and the Major like Quinn through some combination of her longevity, her patience, her politeness, and her ability to not appear bored.
During breakfast, Mother and the Major insisted that Quinn and I rent Moulin Rouge. I refused, because I do not want to see it, because I do not like Nicole Kidman. And there are thousands of movies to rent, besides. But they would not budge. This is how they are. Until Quinn and I lied and said we rent the darn movie, if nothing else, then for the sets. The Major has to see a lot of movies for the sets.
Another breakfast successfully completed. I was feeling as though breakfast was a fiasco, but Quinn assured me that they enjoyed themselves. This is the point � an easy way for them to feel in touch and to kid themselves into comfort. They want a happy family and it seems easy enough to give them that with a few visits and some patience.
12:17 a.m. - 2002-09-02
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