My Mother Was a Girl

And I was a boy

Photo by on .

You were just a girl. Born the youngest of three. Somewhere in LA. I don’t remember where exactly you were born. Now I realize how little I know about you and it feels like my fault. Names of places pieced together from old conversations. Riverside, Encinitas, Reseda, Oxnard. But these places are yours, not mine. They form a patchwork quilt. I think you graduated Chino High School.

I don’t know much about you. And now I’m crying in the dark with heavy dogs draped over my lap, because I don’t know much about you. I think my whole life I wanted to know you. Now, we are here, far away as ever, and I don’t think it will happen. Knowing, of course, is nothing to do with names or locations. Knowing is —

I don’t know what knowing is. I think knowing is like smelling the scent of cherry or blueberry pie wafting from another room and never tasting it. I’m here, and you’re in the other room. Our family never really knew anyone.

When you’re a kid you don’t think about knowing. Those trips in the car don’t mean anything. You don’t think mom might one day not be there. You just remember that long stretch in the California desert where the miles blurred together and you had to pee real bad. How you came back to the car and told your mother you peed forever, probably some kind of world record.