conscious stream with lilly pad edits

My mother says I've got bullets and poison darts in my ears. My father is a tightrope walker. Or maybe we just balance on train tracks together and then inspect flattened pennies.

In families where you're tied by love in ways that cannot be unwound you spend your life watching people grow and change and shift. Dynamics change and my mind is unfolding at the possibilities of what lies before us. I will not always be everyone's little rag doll girl. But I will. I will always be that girl but always as well new doors open and I burgeon and blossom into worlds that are removed from mi familia. I watched as my sister went through this process. It was strange, I thought I was watching her go and change into someone I had never known. But that was a lie, she was only getting married, and now I see more of who she is. It took my brother-in-law to bring out some magical tucks of personality ma soeur was holding in deep, dark hiddenness. We can only imagine what fantastical things I'm keeping secret from all of you.

This morning my parents made their departure from visiting us, their chillins. They drive the 1100 miles between here and there in a hearty two day trip. There was some debate about which route they should take this time.
"Have you made hotel reservations for tonight, yet?" my mother asks my father as they get into the car.
"No. I don't even know where we're going yet, dear."
"Oh...OK, well, I guess we'll call you all tonight and let you know where we are," my mom handles this new style of laissez-faire traveling amazingly well.

When I was growing up these trips were full of Nitty Gritty Dirtband, the Kingston Trio, Chick Corea. Michael Nesmith would fall to pieces. Dave Brubeck would be on time. By the end of my sub-18 years, Johnny Mathis and Carly Simon (not just the "you're so vain" years) were creeping in. And now I can never keep the refrain of "Sometimes I wish/ Often I wish/ I never knew/ Some of those secrets of yours" very far from my conscious. Thanks, Carly.

There are so many reasons to shy away from knowledge. This curiosity cat is trying to learn to hold back this summer. Don't look up where sex offenders live in your area, don't ask every question, don't watch that tape, don't make that move. No more dead curious cats. No more curious cats seeing death.

But do poke your pregnant sister's belly. And do try to be there for the birth. Do watch that sweet face that still has that stubbornness made famous in childhood. That childhood I wasn't there for but learned through pictures. I know how her face will be already, her hands on hips, and her saying, "This child is going to be born, dangit!" In just a few weeks we'll all be falling over doting on this little baby.

I just watched Jurassic Park for the first time. That's all.