Foggiest of Recollections

Lethargic afternoons numbly reclined in my red room at 797 Penn avenue burned away most of my childhood memories; those hidden cardboard boxes of sepia-tone photos featuring Christmas parties, weddings and renuions where all the women are polyester mountains with snowy beehive caps and the men are surprisingly youthful, strangely handsome, and everyone oohs and ahhs over grandmom's desserts followed by the kids' amusing talent show that is neither particuarly amusing nor particularly talented...

I exhaled and the names and details trickled up from my nose. Hidden boxes of mildew-stained photos still stashed away in the collective attics of our minds. Little details hidden on glossy, fading memories. You can find more snapshots beyond the realm of the black and white, the second dimension. Have a little lazy fun burning them and see what develops in the clouds. So long as you don't get lost in the fog. If you float too deep the ghosts may call your name, scream your name, but lost in the darkroom you'll never know in which direction to look. What's more confusing is when the voice is your own...

Memories of my childhood indeed left me in a fog this past weekend as my family and I reunited for a rousing day of rugby in our nation's capital. A light rain misted the vibrant green trees of rural Maryland as the family (my aunt, my brother, my father and my boyfriend) toured the rolling hills in search of the field where twenty years of unspoken resentments, internalized anxiety, would finally face the overcast light.

My stomach always aches prior to a game. The window of my aunt's station wagon was beaded with water drops, and my breath fogged the interior glass. I wiped it away, and for a split second saw a chubby boy wearing a blue mesh jersey hiding among the trees. I blinked my eyes. He disappeared. My stomach rolled as we crested a hill and I slid down in my seat hoping to ignore the apparition I had seen.

The boy I had been. That sepia tone shatters, padded jerseys in red and blue crunch together with surprising force for the players wearing them are children no older than 11 or 12. Myself in blue mesh dashes forward and slams into a boy wearing red. I see more red. He's attended to by the adults on the sidelines, and play resumes again. The blood thrills me. The adrenaline thrills me. It's the all-star game and my father, my brother, my grandparents, the whole clan (I wish my mom was there) are in the stands. That's all I remember of pee-wee football. I remember I hated all the running. Always running. The asshole coach told my father (who coached the pee-wee baseball team) that I was particularly talented, that I was fast for my size. I made it to the all-star game, although I've always secretly suspected it was only because my father knew the coach...

"You know, Neil used to be so good at football -- "

"Dad, stop, please!"

I interrupted my father as he prepared to regale my rugby mate with what a good pee-wee footballer I was. I write my sassiness off as pre-game jitters, but think it's pathetic that someone can be so fixated with the past, with those old photos. The irony is not lost on me. We unfolded our chairs and spread out a quilt on the damp grass. From the corner of my eye I again spied that chubby ghost-boy in blue mesh sneaking a hotdog off the concessions table. A light fog settled in the pine and oak treetops. Through them, a half dozen buzzards were visable slowly circling, smelling the air for something tasty and red. I try to push him from my mind.

I can't remember the coach's name. He was short with a stocky frame and a pug nose situated above a blond moustache. He wore his ass on his shoulders, walking with it high in the air like he stood in an invisible pair of high-heels. My eleven year old mind couldn't finger it, but I found him strangely handsome. Regardless, even then I could tell a jackass when I met one.

The three of us were standing infront of jackass' home, me, my father and the jackass. He was such a jackass! He wore a whistle all the fucking time! He probably wore that whistle while fucking his wife, ick. (The coach being a jackass didn't influence my decision however.) Jackass and my father stood infront of me. I remember feeling ambushed, brought to the yard of his home. Brought outside the reach of my sometimes vindictive mom. Brought here to give my own answer to the question my father had asked with such persistent enthusiasm for several months.

"Do you want to play another season of pee-wee football?"

"No. . ."

And my father and I stepped into his Pontiac, and quietly he drove me home to my mom's. I never saw jackass again, but driving past his house, even today, I still get an upset stomach. When I visit my hometown, I sometimes see that little chubby boy standing in his yard, in the fog...

My mom and dad had finished a quiet Southern divorce, never any sepia-toned photos or attic memories of those polite, private, unspoken family affairs. Those are the memories we hope to ignore, but never do. Mom's absence from the family reunions and Christmas parties was palpable. The talent show now cut short by the appearance of the girlfriend and frantic calls by the boys for their mom to pick them up early. Which she happily did, her boys.

I charged across the rugby pitch. I ran so fast. I ran and sidestepped an idle opponent. I turned and lunged towards the ball carrier's thighs and he crumpled into the forgiving grass. I crumple the forgiving grass and the fog grows thick...

I dashed forward and actually managed to block a punt that would have cost us valuable yards. My teammates on the side began chanting my name. I hear my name in the fog...

I lunged towards an opponent, he fumbled and weakly tossed the ball to his teammate which I snatched from the air and carried down the field before I, too, was tackled. From beneath a pile of muscular arms and legs, I see the chubby boy in the blue mesh jersey. He is pumping his fist and doing a victory dance and laughing...

An hour later, exhausted, the last person I tackle is my boyfriend on the sidelines. I kissed Bryce's sun-burned forehead before staggering over to the family quilt. My father was the first to congratulate me for playing a great game. And twenty years of self doubt and fear of my father's disappointment floated gently away on a spring breeze. The game was over. We didn't win, but those are the details that never matter. Those are the details you can afford to burn when searching for that greater picture in the clouds.