family

Tha Language Barrier

Every country on earth has minorities. In every country there are people who don’t know the language well, who are living where they are because of necessity or family connections or a job. People don’t appreciate just how hard it is to live somewhere and not know the language. Working at the credit card company, I’ve found just how easily affection springs up whenever someone hears someone speaking their own language. For one, there are a lot of Russian speakers at work, and they’re almost always to be found during their breaks to be speaking with each other in Russian, even though all of them speak perfect Hebrew. But it’s irresistible to speak your home language while around others who know it.

Another example of this is how English-speaking clients react when they find out I can speak English. My bosses recently realized that I’m American and have since been foisting every English speaking client they can upon me. I don’t really mind though, because the rush of gratitude I can hear in these clients voices at being addressed in soft English, rather than garish and barking Hebrew, is a reward unto itself.

This raises a common question though – if you’ve moved to a country and are living there permanently, isn’t it part of your responsibility to learn the language? Or should you be allowed to expect that you’ll always find someone who speaks your language to help translate things for you?

Move [Part VII]

Miss Flanders was standing at the window into the room where Marianne was currently strapped into the chair. She looked thoughtfully at the girl, and saw that Marianne had succeeded in this next part of training as well – there were two wooden blocks floating now, one on each side of her.

Miss Flanders returned to the monitors and sat down in front of them, tracking the little lines with her calculating eyes and trying to decipher what the girl was thinking of that was giving her such extraordinary power so as that she managed to move two things simultaneously as she was doing now.

A door opened, and Miss Flanders spoke without turning around to see who it was.

“I think she’s thinking about her family again.” She pondered aloud. The man who had entered made an indistinct noise in his throat and put down the tray he was carrying beside the monitors. He handed one of the mugs on the tray to Miss Flanders and sat down beside her, staring intently at the monitors with her.

“There’s something new there, though. Look, right there, see it? Just once in a while. What could that be?” He said quietly as Miss Flanders took a sip of the drink he had given her. She made a face at it.

“God, that tastes nasty,” She said. “Anyway, yes, I see it. We’ll need to start analyzing that tonight. You want to do it, George? I want to spend some time with her tonight, see what I can get.”

“Sure,” He said, smiling as he saw Miss Flanders pupils widening slightly and taking a sip of his own mug. “It does taste nasty, you’re right.”

Move [Part VI]


Marianne was in a chair that resembled the kind found in dentists’ offices, except that there were no trays full of sticks for fiddling in mouths beside her. Instead, she was loosely strapped into this chair at her wrists and ankles, and she was alone. Opposite her she could see a wall that was one long mirror. She knew that this wall must be a one way mirror and that the people who gave her instructions were, in fact, on the other side and watching her every move. As if it’s not bad enough that they get to see my thoughts, she thought bitterly.It had been three days now since Marianne had been taken from her cold, steel room. Miss Flanders, the woman who had collected her from there, had taken her to a spacious room, steel like the first, but warm and full of comforts. She had a comfortable bed with a thick mattress, a desk with some writing paper and pens on it, and, best of all, a bookcase crammed full of books. There was also a spare bed in the room, but Marianne was quite alone and there didn’t seem to be any other occupant at any time.

Marianne felt that she was now pampered, as if to placate her after the bad treatment she had received. Miss Flanders and the others greatly wanted her cooperation, and she was ashamed that she had given it to them, mostly because she was too weary and too scared to defy them.

But not for much longer… No, mustn’t think about that, or they’ll know. She quickly began to think about her mother again and about her sadness and aching heart and the way she missed her home. But in the back of her mind, which she had learned to hide away, a plan was forming…

Rosy Thoughts [Part III]

Rosy was staring out her window when she heard footsteps in the hallway. She leaped back into bed, covered herself with the thin summer blanket, and closed her eyes, trying to breathe naturally as she did so. She had been out of bed and standing, staring out of the window, for the past hour – she was quite sick of lying down all day and it made her muscles hurt. That didn’t mean, however, that she was ready for her parents to know that yet.

Matt opened the door slowly, and, upon seeing Rosy’s slightly flushed face, he deduced that she was awake and only pretending to be asleep at the moment. Nevertheless, he walked slowly into the room, shut the door quietly, and sat down gently on the bed, as if trying not to startle her out of sleep.

As he ran one large, rough hand over her brow, Rosy opened her eyes slowly, trying to seem groggy. She looked at him for a moment, and then turned her head from his face. She couldn’t stand when he looked at her like that, his face suffused with love. If he loved her so much, she thought, he’d make everything work out with Mama.

Rosy’s reasonable side immediately flared up at this thought, and began chiding her – “your parents DO love you – you know the divorce has nothing to do with you really!” – but before her thoughts could get into a serious flurry, she turned her head back to Matt’s face.

“What?” She asked sullenly.

“Are you feeling any better, Rose-Bud?” Matt asked quietly.

“No.”

“Are you feeling very rotten?”

“Yes.”

“I’m so sorry, Rosy,” Matt whispered. The door creaked open once more, and he looked around to see Laura peeking in. She entered the room and came and sat down on the other side of Rosy, perching on the little room that was left there for her.

Rosy looked from one parent to the other before fixing her gaze on the ceiling. She hadn’t seen her parents together in the room since the day she had entered her bed and refused to leave it. She had forgotten, somehow, how nice their faces looked, close together like this.

Matt and Laura exchanged a weighted glance, both of them steeling themselves for the conversation to come. Their eyes seemed to be conversing: -You with me? –Yes, we’ll do this together. –For our girl. –For our Rosy.

“Rosy,” Laura began with a barely concealed sigh. “You know Papa and I are getting divorced – you’ve heard us talking about it. We should have had a conversation about this earlier.”

Rosy continued to stare at the ceiling.

“Honey, we never meant to put you in such distress,” continued Matt. “We want you to understand that this has nothing to do with you. Mama and I love you very much, and we’ll both always be in your life. We’d never leave you – neither of us – and no matter what happens, we’re always going to make sure you know we’re both here for you.”

Rosy was fighting the urge to roll her eyes. She could almost hear her parents practicing this – this – this horrid TV-mom-and-dad talk. She wasn’t stupid, she knew all this. She knew her parents loved her, at least in some distant, rational part of her brain. The rational part also knew that she was probably getting one of the best divorces there could be – neither of her parents had some other creepy person on the side, and neither of them was going to move to Alaska and start a band. She knew her life would be pretty normal even after the divorce, and she knew also that she would be alright with this in time.

But Rosy’s rationality didn’t seem to alleviate the pain in her chest and the tears that prickled in her eyes as her parents kept on talking about how much they loved her, how much they were worrying about her, and how much they hoped she could forgive them.

As Rosy screwed up her eyes and felt the tears streaming out from under her closed eyelids, she felt something shift inside her mind. As her parents both showered her with kisses and held her hands and wept a little bit with her, she could feel her irrational thinking begin changing its views. It seemed as if more and more of her mind began to agree with what her small, rational space had been saying all along, that “They love me, they do love me, it’s going to be alright because they love me.”

Rosy stayed in bed for another day after the conversation. After that day, though, she got up, she hugged her parents, and she went to school. She felt rotten still, and would keep feeling horrible all through her mother’s moving into an apartment building down the street, all through the faux-cheery shopping trip for furniture for the new room for Rosy in her mother’s small apartment, all through the year or so it took for her to get used to spending half a week in one place and the other half in another. Eventually, though, as Rosy passed into her teens with two smashing birthday parties, one in each of her homes, she grew used to it. She knew she would, but that didn’t make it any less pleasant to wake up one morning and realize that she was content, finally.

Sniff

Leaning out of the window, bringing in the laundry, hands touching the cold clothing hanging in the cold air, I catch a scent. Just a whif at first, and then the smell fills my nostrils, and I breath it deeply, tears gathering in my eyes. It’s the smell of latkes, this sort of potato-patty thing – it’s a traditional thing to cook during the Jewish holiday, Hannukah, which is ending tonight. Why is it that the enticing smell of fried potatos makes my eyes water? My father used to make them every holiday time, and when I was smaller and ate an even smaller variety of foods than I eat today, I hated the smell. Today though, it makes me hungry to smell it and cry to think that my father won’t ever make it again and I’ll never get to show him that I might like his cooking for once.

It’s incredible how smell triggers the memory, isn’t it? The smallest of scents blown into your nostrils from a tiny breath of wind can remind you vividly of a sumemr’s day when you got your first kiss, of a night of partying with friends, of a person you haven’t seen for a long time or of a place you miss and long to be in. It’s amazing, in my mind, how smells can bring up memories long forgotten or ignored.

Sniff away, then, I say – you may discover some feeling or time you hardly remember.

Move [Part IV]


Hannah, a forty-three year old woman, sat in her kitchen on a cold winter day and tried to read the paper. She wasn’t very successful, as her thoughts kept straying from the latest accidents and political upheavals and wandering off towards the letter lying open next to her.

She sighed and shoved the newspaper away from her, picking up the letter instead. She read it through once more, and sighed again. This was the sixth week that her Annie hadn’t come home. She had promised she’d be back every week – she’d promised! – but instead, every week without fail, Hannah received a letter from her. This week was no different. The letter read:

Dear Mom,

Hey! How are you? I’m so sorry, but I can’t come home this weekend either. I know, I know I promised, and I WILL be seeing you soon, it’s just that there’s so much to do here that I really can’t miss out on a weekend because I’ll fall dreadfully behind. OK, I know what you’re thinking, Mom, and NO, there isn’t some boy who’s keeping me busy. It’s seriously my studies.

The Set have us working super hard, but it’s all so interesting! I know I nattered on about this last week, but seriously, the internet connection is just so fast that I can’t even imagine how impatient I’ll be with the one at home when I come visit! They don’t let us access any E-mail sites though, which is why I have to write you in the old fashioned way. Anyway, I really do love my classes and all the things they’re teaching us here – my favorite teacher is Miss Flanders, she’s got this really amazing way of keeping us all in line by being totally charming – no one ever wants to interrupt her, she’s got such an amazing presence!

Anyway Mom, I really hope you’re not mad at me – you know that I hate that… I’ll try to call next week if I have time and maybe even come visit. Hope you’re doing OK, I miss you!

Much love,

Marianne

Hannah absentmindedly wiped the tears from her eyes as she looked at the printed page. She knew Marianne always typed when she could, as her handwriting was really quite messy. Still, Hannah was still of the generation that liked signed letters. She also wondered about this whole “Marianne” business. She only called her daughter that when she was angry – most of the time she was Annie for her, and Marianne hardly ever used her full name anywhere. It was only the name on her birth certificate and passport. Other than that, everyone, not only Hannah, called her Annie. How odd, Hannah thought to herself once more. She folded the letter back into it’s envelope with an air of resignation. Maybe Annie will really call next week – she thought to herself – I hope so.

Move [Part II]

“Annie! Annie, honey, look what you got in the mail!”

“What? Mom? What is it? Come on, give it to me!”

“It’s… The big envelope! You got in! Sweetie, look, you got in! Oh, love, I’m so proud of you.”

“Oh my god! I got in! I can’t believe this! YES! Oh- oh, Mom, don’t cry, please don’t cry. I’ll be back from there every weekend, you know I will.”

“I know, I know. But the house will be so lonely without you. I still don’t love the idea, you know that. I mean, I know it’s a great honor to be able to join this experimental group that the Set have started, and I know it’ll be an amazing thing to put on your college applications in a year, but still…”

“Mom, you know how bored I am at school. You know that I would start college right now if I could. The Set are offering kids like me the opportunity of a lifetime! I can’t pass this up. Mom, tell me you’ll be ok without me…”

“Of course I will, honey. I’m just going to miss you, that’s all. As long as I’ll get to see you once a week, I’ll be alright.”

“I’ll be home every weekend, Mom. Promise.”

Marianne stared blankly at the boulder in front of her. It was still hovering. She moved her eyes, and her concentration, to the right. The boulder moved with her mind. The loudspeaker made a gurgling cackle and the ever-present voice told her that that will do. Marianne let the memory fade away as she shook her head and rubbed her aching, tired eyes. The boulder fell to the floor with a crash as Marianne threw herself on the thin mattress that lay on the floor in the corner. She felt herself crashing into unconsciousness just like the boulder and then knew no more.

Frisbee

Some misunderstandings I understand.
Some mistakes make perfect sense
And I sense that they’re innocent and harmless,
Though how can I get you to harness
Your emotions when you’re high strung,
When you’re stung by the bee
The bee that doesn’t like me.

Can you dance with me, Madam,
Can you hold my hand, dear?
I miss you so much and I fear…
I fear that you’re lost, or that I lost my way
In the murky ocean, can’t get back to the bay.

In my hand there’s an image
Of happier times, yes there were some.
Some wonderful wonderful days,
When we gazed onto the vast horizon
With chocolate cupcakes and candles and a breeze.
How did I lose my frisbee back then?
How did the tubes come into our lives?
Oh why can’t we just live in hives?

Can you dance with me, Madam,
Can you hold my hand, dear?
Embrace me all night and all day and all year
And all of my life, never leave my side
Even when I say “go away”
Please stay on as my guide.

Written in August, 2008. Haven’t looked at it since. Seems more like lyrics than like a poem, so please tolerate the lack of obvious rhythm, because there is one, it just only works in my head.

Rosy Thoughts [Part II]

“Damn wind-chimes,” muttered Matt as he closed the door softly on his daughter’s sleeping form. She was genuinely asleep, finally, and Matt didn’t want the “chink-chink” of the dishes clinking against each other in the kitchen sink to wake her. He stood outside the closed door for a moment and sighed, then braced himself and walked into the kitchen.
A dark-haired woman, Laura, was standing at the sink, soap running through her fingers and steam fogging up part of her glasses as she bent over the sink and washed the few dishes that were in there. She heard Matt walk in, and her shoulders stiffened slightly. She wished he would move out already. Even though he slept on the couch, his presence in the house seemed to fill her every waking moment with an itch she couldn’t scratch without making it bleed.
“Coffee?” Matt offered quietly as switched on the electric kettle. Something in Laura seemed to break, and she turned off the water-tap.
“Yes, please.”
Matt reached into the cupboard and took out two mugs as Laura dried her hands on the dishtowel and sat down at the kitchen table, burying her face in her hands. They smelled lemony from the soap. She hated the smell of lemon. Stupid grocery store, she thought, why do they always run out of the good smelling soap?
“What are we going to do about her, Lor’?” Matt set a steaming mug of coffee in front of Laura and took the seat across from her, taking a long sip from his own, equally steaming mug. Laura’s shoulders stiffened and then slumped again as she picked up her mug. Her shoulders were aching, she was making that move so many times each day.
“I don’t know…” she murmured. “Do you think there’s something seriously wrong with her?”
“Um. Yes?! She’s been in bed for a week, goddammit! She’s hardly eating, she hardly responds to us! How can you be so calm about it?” Matt spoke barely above a whisper, still afraid to wake his daughter, but his tone was clearly one of a man who very much wanted to shout.
“Oh Matt, give me a break – she’s upset! It’s natural! She’s drawing attention to herself. I love her so much, and I’m worried about her too, you know, but I’m worried about how she’s going to be when the divorce is final more than I’m worried about her now.” Laura couldn’t bear to look at Matt. She felt somehow that his worry was an insult, as if he cared more for Rosy than she did. She knew the thought was ridiculous, and also knew that Matt was being disgustingly naïve, believing Rosy was really sick when Rosy was obviously sick at heart but not in body.
“I don’t want to leave while she’s like this. I can’t do it, Lor’,” Matt voice broke on the word ‘leave.’ He seemed on the verge of tears for a moment, but then he pulled himself together and looked at his still-wife-soon-to-be-ex-wife defiantly. “I won’t leave her. It’s not fair to her. It’s not fair to me. I don’t want to divorce her.”
“Matt!” Laura’s face turned red and she seemed to be close to yelling. Her voice was getting louder with every word. “We had an agreement! We cannot, I repeat, CANNOT keep living in the same house. All we’re doing is making Rosy more and more upset. She can hear us fighting, she can hear us talking to the lawyer, she can hear every damn word and THAT is why she’s hiding in her bed. We need to have some time apart or we will not be able to work this out for her!”
The two adults glared at each other for a moment. It was Matt who looked away first, taking another angry sip from his mug. This conversation would continue for a while, and he had no idea who would win the argument. Laura usually won, but Matt was determined in this. He could not leave Rosy when she was lying in bed like a little ghost of the bubbly twelve-year old girl he remembered from just a few weeks ago, before she had gotten wind of the divorce.

Rosy lay in bed all this time, truly asleep for the first time in days. Her hand was curled around the pillow and her dreams were of her childhood, when there weren’t any worries past which stuffed animal was missing an eye and how much the bruise from falling over hurt.

Work With What You Know

Following is the beginning of a conversation I had with my brother this evening.

-Hello?
-Hey.
-Oh, hey, what’s up?
-Not much. You?
-Not much either, you know, just applying to jobs.
-Oh yeah, how’s that going?
-Well, the job I applied for last week – you know, with the hotel interview and everything – I didn’t get that one. But I’ve got an interview later this year I’m really excited about.
-Cool! Where is it?
-Just this place in Washington, a research center.
-Wow, that sounds pretty awesome. I hope you get it!
-Thanks. How’re your applications going?
-Ok, I mean, I’m almost done with the essays – I still have to go over them obviously, but I’m mostly done. Now there’s just the bureaucratic stuff to finish. Oh, by the way, have you heard about the book “The End of Mr. Y”?
-No, don’t think so, what is it?
-It’s right next to me now, that’s why I mentioned it… it’s this cool book I’m reading, it’s got a lot of really awesome references to all these psychological and philosophical theories in it.
-Cool, I should check it out. You know a new Terry Pratchett book came out?
-No! Seriously?
-Yeah, a non-Disc-World novel.
-He writes about something that’s not Disc World? Wow, I didn’t know he ever did that.
-Oh yeah, he’s got a bunch of books that aren’t to do with it.

….My brother and I have fun phone conversations. The conversation continued on to talk about many fantasy writers, the reasons why so many of them are Mormon and some music. I now have homework from him. I need to check out this British show called “Ultra-Violet” and another show by Aarin Sorkin. I need to read this short story called “A Logic Called Joe” and look up “The Hipster Olympics” on Youtube. There will be a test.