Youth & Laughter

Let's face it,

most Christian denominations

are pretty similar

give or take minor disagreements

over diet and damnation.

Petty squabbles over

interpretation have blossomed

into full blown feuds

over the rightness of their path.

When you're a child

you believe as strongly as you

let yourself believe over

things like faith or

Santa Clause. In my early years

there was a Baptist church

I went to. They were very

kind people, or so I remember.

When we had recess

we would go to the playground

while Mrs.Benevidas

would watch over us. Hard black

rubber was fitted beneath

the merry-go-round, jungle gym,

and swings. There was also

a large hollow tube made

of concrete the color or brick.

It could fit two, maybe three

children inside. My parents took

out of the school when I was

accepted into the Catholic school

nearby. We are Catholic.

This morning I drove by the old

Baptist church and it's playground.

Through the chain-fence

all I could see were the black rubber

mats surrounded by encroaching weeds.

Vacation

We never went on vacation like most other families did when I was growing up.
I never thought about it much as a child. We never took long family trips in the
summer to Yosemite, Big Bear, or any places like that. We rarely ever left the 
suburban sprawl that we called home. Dad worked and worked, he worked two
jobs to get us by. A vacation for him meant having a full weekend without having
to be at either job. Even so, he would still be working around the house, fixing 
things, getting the recycling together, mowing the lawn. We would see our family
every now and then at parties where the kids would hang out together as all the 
men would get drunk on beer and talk about work, money and everyone back 
home. I don't know how much I missed out on, I wonder if it would have changed
me. I rarely ever take vacations, even now as an adult. The times I have taken 
vacations have tended to be working ones. There is too much to do. A vacation 
would only take time away from my work. 


There were a few times growing up when we visited our family back in the home
country, the one my parents left. I never really got to know my father's parents. 
My mother's parents I know somewhat. I want to, I need to. The distance between
here and there gapes wide inside me. The old country is nothing like here, a small
backwoods town in a second world country. The next time I go back it still won't
be a vacation, at least not in my mind. The weight of history, of reconnection is a
necessary task unto itself. That's not a vacation. I wonder how others do it, how 
they can manage vacations and not enter financial ruin. Some of us might be lucky,
others- not so much. 


I dream about leaving. Not just home, everything. Packing up one small bag and 
going somewhere. I would tell no one, I would disappear as best as I could. I'm
sure that sounds selfish, but if I could, I would. It might not be forever, just for a 
time. Time to be alone, to see things as they truly are in all their cruelty and beauty.
There is always much of both. It would mean freedom, freedom of staggering 
proportions, freedom of unbridled anxiety, freedom to flourish and fail as much
as I am willing to allow. I suppose that is my idea of a vacation.