closer i am to fine

When my mother was pregnant with me, she was walking through Piedmont Park in Atlanta when she found a balloon that had lost its way. It was pink, and read “It’s a girl!” She had not found out the sex of the baby from the doctors—I suppose she wanted it to be a surprise, or maybe it was just that she knew How It Should Happen. Not in a white room while dressed in a paper smock from the mouth of a doctor for whom it isn’t magical. Not like that, but with signs, intuitions as subtle as a kick against uterine walls. Like a balloon blown across your path as you and your unborn unsexed baby walk through the park in the waning summer sunlight.

Fast forward 24 years and my mother’s two daughters are going to Piedmont Park together, for Atlanta Pride. Their mission: to see the Indigo Girls, Doria Roberts, and Michelle Malone for free. We’re not on the lookout for prophecies; there are no pink balloons proclaiming “It’s a girl!” But there are girls. Hundreds of them. Old ones, young ones, butch ones, femme ones, girls with funky T-shirts spouting left-wing axioms and girls without T-shirts, wearing nothing but bikini tops or, in one case, stickers in strategic places proclaiming she had donated to Keep Pride Free. Girls who are parents and brought their children, and girls who didn’t tell their parents where they were going when they left the house that afternoon. And they all love each other.

I stand there watching, wondering what it meant to my mother when she knew I was going to be a girl. What were her expectations? Did she dream of the dresses I would wear, the dolls I would cherish, the heart-to-hearts we would have as I got older? Did she imagine the people I would love in my life? Did she dream of my wedding? Did she have any idea how many ways there are to be a girl, and what kind I would be?

I’m standing in the place where I was first proclaimed female, and now, on the cusp of adulthood, I’m finally able to be proud of it. I’m here mostly for the music, but I’m also here to celebrate my molting: my juvenile feathers, which showed my insecurity and fear, which wished for my body or face or mind to be different than they are naturally, which valued other people’s approval over my own, have flown away. I started crying as they sang Galileo, because it’s been so long, and my soul has finally gotten at least some of it right.

My Newest Crush

Howl from Howl's Moving Castle--Disney has delved into Anime and produced a specimen who's a lovely combination of Justin, Captain Jack Sparrow, and Catwoman. Or Storm. The movie was really pretty (kind of like Moulin Rouge) but also pretty hard to follow (kind of like Ulysses). So if anybody wants to go see it and explain it to me, please do.

Rock of Ages

We've had a sub in Psychology of Diverse Learners all week, while our normal instructor is at the beach with his in-laws. This being a summer course, however, that means this "sub" is teaching us for 25% of the entire course, so I wonder if one can really call her a sub.

She meant well, of course. She led us through guided imagery exercises to get us in touch with our empathic listening abilities, had us role-play student-teacher and parent-teacher conferencing, and told us one too many stories about her own children. And today (her last day) she gave us each a rock.

She passed a basket of rocks around--they were nice rocks, polished, some of them quartzy even, of the type you might find to weigh down a decorative glass vase. We each chose one (later we would find out that actually the rock had "chosen us"). Mine is small, sort of bland peachy-pink, and I don't know why it chose me. Our teacher told us that we were not very different from these rocks--we are each unique. We have our own patterns and textures. We would look very nice at the bottom of a glass vase. Just kidding. We got to keep our rock, to remind us of our own uniqueness.

Now, I love Mr. Rogers. I really, really do. But this gesture seemed to me some strange, twisted spin on "you're the only person in the whole world like you." Mostly because, what am I supposed to do with it? I don't want it; I'm trying not to accrue Stuff. It's a pretty ordinary rock, not a beautiful amethyst geode or anything that you'd want to put on your mantelpiece to remind you of the beauty of the natural world. It would get in the way anywhere I might display it, weigh down my purse, which is already heavy enough, and I figure creating a rock-labyrinth is too sacred a thing to waste on rented property. But this teacher (she's really not a teacher--she's a psychologist, and it shows) endowed this rock with a sense of importance. She made us hold them in our hands, close our eyes, and feel their presence. She equated their rockdom to our humanity. So how can I just throw my rock away?

I'm not sure what I'm going to do with it. I could leave it in the classroom, and maybe someone else will think it's their rock and take it with them. I could suck up the weight and keep it in one of my bags, as a talisman of my own uniqueness. I could take it with me to the park I've found where I walk Susan's dog and let her run free, off the leash, as she trots around devouring more smells than you or I will ever be able to imagine. I might do that. Take it there, throw it in the creek, and let it, through time, burrow into the sand and be washed even smoother by the water. And some small extension of myself will be there too, a tiny weight anchored to the world.