I Remember... Challenge

[Teresa]

I remember squatting beside the white picket fence in my front yard, skinny sprigs of grass tickling my bare legs, accepting in warm release the fact that I would never make it to the front door, through the living and dining rooms, through the narrow kitchen and hallway to the yellow bathroom.

 

I remember the peeling yellow paint, picking out shapes when I was bored, my favorite image the cheerful Peanuts bird, Woodstock.

 

I remember the many toothpaste caps I lost in the bathroom sink, the lost drain plug,  the temperamental faucet handles unable to control a chronic weeping that stained the sink like old blood.

 

I remember the clawfoot tub, the saucer-shaped plug on a long chain, my older sister's blurred face, no emotion, as she held me under until I turned a grayish blue.

 

I remember a fraying washcloth, soapy and draped over the side of the tub, my fingers drawing pictures in frothy white suds, writing my name as my mother sat nearby and squeezed the mango-sized red bulb attached to something buried deep between her legs.

 

I remember praying in the only room with a lock, prayers like scratches in flaking yellow paint, begging my mother to come home, negotiating with the promise never to pray anything else, Woodstock trembling with her commotion as the distant front door shook the walls. 

 

 

[Bill Floyd]

Woodstock.  The imagery is flawless, the story difficult, the courage admirable.    

[Mike Handley]

EXCELLENT:

EVERY

SINGLE

LINE

[Angela]

Favorite.

[Sandra Davies]

I keep coming back to read this but whatever I want to say cannot be properly expressed in words, any more than you should have to bear such memories.

[Judy Thompson]

There are no words for this, Teresa.  Only long thoughts on a hot afternoon.