The theme at hand is something you like that other people don’t like. Or you’re afraid they don’t like it. Or you think they think you’re strange for liking it.
Reconcile the past, bank on the future
There are programs to do this for me
and I could use the bank's website to
monitor the account. But on account of
a peculiar night long ago, when a sort
of imprinting transpired, I find pleasure
reconciling the month's records alone
at my desk late at night. Just the way
he showed me.
My week in northern California with
my aunt, my uncle, and their kids -
my cousins younger than I at nine -
had been a swimmingly sunny time
but on the final night my uncle woke me,
had me follow him to their large bedroom
where against the bay window he had
his desk, folding table, and files in his
makeshift first home office.
(They were so young themselves
then, just starting out, and had not yet
moved to the big house where they
all grew up).
My aunt snored lightly in their bed
across the room. The light he set on
the folding table had a short beam from
bulb to bank statement and stack of
checks. He whispered that he wanted
to teach me how to work with these things,
to make sense of them, to have no fear
of them, so I would not grow up incapable
of caring for myself like his "sweetie" --
and he smiled into the dark toward
her blond hair.
MLydiaM ~ January 2011
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