(no subject)
If you actually decide to read this you will be in for the long haul. Don't start it if you can't make it to the end. Things should come in lump sums so make this a lump sum.
Symphonies of the Innocent
:The small spectrum of I
There are books and magazine articles that will tell you that listening to classical music while pregnant will help develop the unborn child’s brain. It is said that the child hears the Brahms, the Mozart and their futures are suddenly changed by the intricate melodies. Perhaps that happened to me, but I don’t remember any kind of mind-transforming performance coming from the speakers across the room. I hear stories of my very young childhood. I see pictures of small events captured on camera. However, I think it wise to stick to first hand experiences.
A kid starts preschool and is thoroughly entertained with that thing they call learning … for a while at least. Then you start going for recess. After that, you start going to school so you can go home and watch Captain Planet. Who needs Mozart when there is a jingle in a cartoon that goes something like: “Captain Planet he’s our hero! He’ll bring pollution down to zero!” Yes, those were indeed good times. I’m pretty sure the best experiences I ever had in California were those where the dirt was kicked up from under my feet as I was running down the trail towards my fellow Planeteers. Our hair was matted down to our sweaty foreheads because of all the frolicking we had made into a weekly ritual. We’d stand in the middle of the bike arena with dirt under our fingernails and dust accenting the contours of our faces. Our hands would be placed together with our imaginary, yet very official, Planeteer rings raised to the sky we were arranging to save. Those were the days when television at least taught you how to recycle. So perhaps I do not always recycle, but that is beside the point.
When you grow up, the size of things always seem so different from what you remembered when you were the little girl with Aladdin and Jasmine underwear. I wonder now, whether the hill my sister and I rode our little red wagon down was really the size of the Rockies, as we once thought it was. Mom (formerly known as Mommy) heaved the wagon to the top of the hill for us as we panted at her side during this long and treacherous climb up the freshly mowed summit. We flipped up the handle so that we had some kind of control of direction. From the top to the bottom is literally a blur. When you reach flat ground your cheeks feel like they are permanently puffed out from all of the flapping that must have happened on our descent. This image may have come from the reruns of Rugrats where the introduction to the show places Spike, the pet dog, in front of the fan, slobber steaming and jowls quivering. Looking back, I’m sure that neither my sister nor I ever left a trail of spit when we descended from the top. No child can possibly produce enough slobber to even try and compare to that of an animated dog. One thing we did have was plenty of pearly whites that would have been impossible to cover up because we were grinning so wide. On the walk home from the park, away from our beloved and vast mountain, Mom couldn’t help but smile because we were so happy.
Every young girl has a fantasy of her perfect house, the perfect wedding, and the perfect husband. Perhaps I didn’t go as far as to make up intricate details of the fabulous life I’d convince myself I would live, but I did name the playschool dolls, Annie, when exploring the different rooms in my pink plastic mansion. It was such an unequaled appliance that I never had to preheat the oven with the little blue door. I could put in the plastic turkey and in about two seconds it would be ready to serve my husband who was graciously waiting at the table. This is a rather silly thought because he is the one who should have taken those two seconds to slave over the “hot” stove. I suppose the only times my husband ever made me breakfast or dinner was on our anniversary which happened to occur about every other day or so. Apparently, that is not how anniversaries work when you get a little older, but that same girl in Aladdin and Jasmine underwear couldn’t have cared less. It is hard to imagine that anything could go wrong within the confines of such a seemingly perfect atmosphere; however, the mind of a young child wanders, and the story that had been outlined during dinner may have trailed off the pages of the script. When the silly little scenarios turned ugly, you could always start right back at the entryway and be careful not to repeat the horrible events that had previously occurred. I suppose that in some instances it would be great if life were that simple, but playing doll house did get a little boring when the cognitive thoughts started popping out of nowhere. As would life if everything were perfect.
Perhaps I do not remember if it was the cognitive thoughts or something else, but life just wasn’t the same after I stopped believing in Santa Claus. Maybe it was not Old St. Nick at all. Taking that one-way road trip to Moscow with a moving truck in toe might have been the start of that new era. I used to have the best of friends when I was seven. No one compared to little miss Jaina Bee though. Sisters make great fun when you print out all of the future animals you will own and pretend to take care of the horses, puppies, and kittens you had chosen on the internet. It took years to scrub the dirt off our feet with a pumice stone when we imagined ourselves on top of noble steeds as we ran barefooted across the lentil fields. Our mom was never happy when she had to clean the tub after such a romp. But the layers of dirt washed away eventually, as did the amount we played together. Some say that things never last forever and I cannot help but agree. Little girls grow up and no longer want to play with their shorter and younger counterparts. Puberty, I’m convinced, is the sole reason I was abandoned. Damn puberty!
When my sister stopped wanting to play only with me we didn’t have a hard time finding a laughable pair just up the road from the little blue box we live in. We had lunch together once a week. This became the replacement of the once beloved Captain Planet adventures. We no longer saved the air, water, and animals. Now, we made creamy and satisfying macaroni and cheese (from the blue box, of course!). We’d have our grand party and set the table with plastic jewel cups. The colors were, of course, not random, but selectively picked so that it would suit its drinker. Pink for Jaina Bee. Red for Manda Panda. Purple for Cora Mae. Teal for Anna Banana. These luncheons were not really the highlights of the stories we wrote as we cavorted when we escaped the rule of our parents, but it was a paragraph none-the-less.
Going further than the luncheons, the great sister, the dollhouse, the Planeteers, and flying down the Rockie’s slopes would be all too much to tell. After childhood you no longer have the same kind of fun. Fun becomes a secret that you can’t tell anyone but your closest friends. It is telling your parents you are staying the night at someone’s house when you never went there at all. You climbed on top of that roof with a blanket tucked under your arm and just laid there. This kind of fun can be drafty, but the sky was clear; the stars were vivid that night. The merriment is now just for you to keep. It cannot be shared or told because there is no way you could give justice to the experience. Solace now lives in the palm of the hand. The hand is sometimes extended for a sneak peek of this great foolery that is now a secret between those who where by your side as it was happening. They teach you how to share in kindergarten, but that only applies to stories of childhood. Once you’re tall enough to ride the giant roller coasters, you will find that some of the best stories are the ones left untold.
It is said that Mozart and Brahms transcribed everything that was running through their minds, but I do not agree. They shared what they wanted people to know and hear. The notes and melodies are written to soothe other’s minds, yet it is what remains unwritten that soothed it’s composer’s soul. They kept what they thought sacred, as I have done here. I have shown you a piece of my past, but I cannot share my present because I am now tall enough to ride the great roller coaster and have learned to give only fragments. I have learned that you cannot tell your greatest stories or adventures because emotion cannot be easily translated. Listening to the classical geniuses in the womb may have brought me to my thoughts on story telling, or it may have done nothing of the sort … I’ll tell you my present when you’re taller.
Symphonies of the Innocent
:The small spectrum of I
There are books and magazine articles that will tell you that listening to classical music while pregnant will help develop the unborn child’s brain. It is said that the child hears the Brahms, the Mozart and their futures are suddenly changed by the intricate melodies. Perhaps that happened to me, but I don’t remember any kind of mind-transforming performance coming from the speakers across the room. I hear stories of my very young childhood. I see pictures of small events captured on camera. However, I think it wise to stick to first hand experiences.
A kid starts preschool and is thoroughly entertained with that thing they call learning … for a while at least. Then you start going for recess. After that, you start going to school so you can go home and watch Captain Planet. Who needs Mozart when there is a jingle in a cartoon that goes something like: “Captain Planet he’s our hero! He’ll bring pollution down to zero!” Yes, those were indeed good times. I’m pretty sure the best experiences I ever had in California were those where the dirt was kicked up from under my feet as I was running down the trail towards my fellow Planeteers. Our hair was matted down to our sweaty foreheads because of all the frolicking we had made into a weekly ritual. We’d stand in the middle of the bike arena with dirt under our fingernails and dust accenting the contours of our faces. Our hands would be placed together with our imaginary, yet very official, Planeteer rings raised to the sky we were arranging to save. Those were the days when television at least taught you how to recycle. So perhaps I do not always recycle, but that is beside the point.
When you grow up, the size of things always seem so different from what you remembered when you were the little girl with Aladdin and Jasmine underwear. I wonder now, whether the hill my sister and I rode our little red wagon down was really the size of the Rockies, as we once thought it was. Mom (formerly known as Mommy) heaved the wagon to the top of the hill for us as we panted at her side during this long and treacherous climb up the freshly mowed summit. We flipped up the handle so that we had some kind of control of direction. From the top to the bottom is literally a blur. When you reach flat ground your cheeks feel like they are permanently puffed out from all of the flapping that must have happened on our descent. This image may have come from the reruns of Rugrats where the introduction to the show places Spike, the pet dog, in front of the fan, slobber steaming and jowls quivering. Looking back, I’m sure that neither my sister nor I ever left a trail of spit when we descended from the top. No child can possibly produce enough slobber to even try and compare to that of an animated dog. One thing we did have was plenty of pearly whites that would have been impossible to cover up because we were grinning so wide. On the walk home from the park, away from our beloved and vast mountain, Mom couldn’t help but smile because we were so happy.
Every young girl has a fantasy of her perfect house, the perfect wedding, and the perfect husband. Perhaps I didn’t go as far as to make up intricate details of the fabulous life I’d convince myself I would live, but I did name the playschool dolls, Annie, when exploring the different rooms in my pink plastic mansion. It was such an unequaled appliance that I never had to preheat the oven with the little blue door. I could put in the plastic turkey and in about two seconds it would be ready to serve my husband who was graciously waiting at the table. This is a rather silly thought because he is the one who should have taken those two seconds to slave over the “hot” stove. I suppose the only times my husband ever made me breakfast or dinner was on our anniversary which happened to occur about every other day or so. Apparently, that is not how anniversaries work when you get a little older, but that same girl in Aladdin and Jasmine underwear couldn’t have cared less. It is hard to imagine that anything could go wrong within the confines of such a seemingly perfect atmosphere; however, the mind of a young child wanders, and the story that had been outlined during dinner may have trailed off the pages of the script. When the silly little scenarios turned ugly, you could always start right back at the entryway and be careful not to repeat the horrible events that had previously occurred. I suppose that in some instances it would be great if life were that simple, but playing doll house did get a little boring when the cognitive thoughts started popping out of nowhere. As would life if everything were perfect.
Perhaps I do not remember if it was the cognitive thoughts or something else, but life just wasn’t the same after I stopped believing in Santa Claus. Maybe it was not Old St. Nick at all. Taking that one-way road trip to Moscow with a moving truck in toe might have been the start of that new era. I used to have the best of friends when I was seven. No one compared to little miss Jaina Bee though. Sisters make great fun when you print out all of the future animals you will own and pretend to take care of the horses, puppies, and kittens you had chosen on the internet. It took years to scrub the dirt off our feet with a pumice stone when we imagined ourselves on top of noble steeds as we ran barefooted across the lentil fields. Our mom was never happy when she had to clean the tub after such a romp. But the layers of dirt washed away eventually, as did the amount we played together. Some say that things never last forever and I cannot help but agree. Little girls grow up and no longer want to play with their shorter and younger counterparts. Puberty, I’m convinced, is the sole reason I was abandoned. Damn puberty!
When my sister stopped wanting to play only with me we didn’t have a hard time finding a laughable pair just up the road from the little blue box we live in. We had lunch together once a week. This became the replacement of the once beloved Captain Planet adventures. We no longer saved the air, water, and animals. Now, we made creamy and satisfying macaroni and cheese (from the blue box, of course!). We’d have our grand party and set the table with plastic jewel cups. The colors were, of course, not random, but selectively picked so that it would suit its drinker. Pink for Jaina Bee. Red for Manda Panda. Purple for Cora Mae. Teal for Anna Banana. These luncheons were not really the highlights of the stories we wrote as we cavorted when we escaped the rule of our parents, but it was a paragraph none-the-less.
Going further than the luncheons, the great sister, the dollhouse, the Planeteers, and flying down the Rockie’s slopes would be all too much to tell. After childhood you no longer have the same kind of fun. Fun becomes a secret that you can’t tell anyone but your closest friends. It is telling your parents you are staying the night at someone’s house when you never went there at all. You climbed on top of that roof with a blanket tucked under your arm and just laid there. This kind of fun can be drafty, but the sky was clear; the stars were vivid that night. The merriment is now just for you to keep. It cannot be shared or told because there is no way you could give justice to the experience. Solace now lives in the palm of the hand. The hand is sometimes extended for a sneak peek of this great foolery that is now a secret between those who where by your side as it was happening. They teach you how to share in kindergarten, but that only applies to stories of childhood. Once you’re tall enough to ride the giant roller coasters, you will find that some of the best stories are the ones left untold.
It is said that Mozart and Brahms transcribed everything that was running through their minds, but I do not agree. They shared what they wanted people to know and hear. The notes and melodies are written to soothe other’s minds, yet it is what remains unwritten that soothed it’s composer’s soul. They kept what they thought sacred, as I have done here. I have shown you a piece of my past, but I cannot share my present because I am now tall enough to ride the great roller coaster and have learned to give only fragments. I have learned that you cannot tell your greatest stories or adventures because emotion cannot be easily translated. Listening to the classical geniuses in the womb may have brought me to my thoughts on story telling, or it may have done nothing of the sort … I’ll tell you my present when you’re taller.