8:57 a.m. - 2010-10-27
Undertow
How could a mortal, particularly a "pimply faced adolescent" (as my Dad affectionately called anyone around my age, burdened with a penis) possibly compare? And yet there was a subtle undercurrent with certain boys. A tangible pull to the deep side of the pool. Ill equipped by my Dad's best intentions, I never learned to swim. As a toddler, legend has it that he removed all furniture from the room lest I scrape my knee. Anticipating my every obstacle, he shuffled just steps ahead, making sure the way was clear. I never learned to navigate. Never developed a felt sense of where I began and ended versus furniture, not to mention the rest of the world. Never learned to swim with the current, so as to prevent the fatigue that would eventually surrender my useless resolve to the menacing undertow again and again. The tease of finding completion in the eyes of another. And my blueprint deepened with each hairline fracture of my little girl heart while he watched, helplessly devoted, more and more out of reach.
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