I sit on the single bed
with my mom
looking at memories
spread out on the quilt
my dead grandmother made.
“Come back” her letter said, “I don’t want to store your stuff anymore,”
in her three-bedroom, ranch-style house with the full basement
where she lives alone
after the divorce.
I sit on the single bed with my mom
on the quilt my dead grandmother made
deciding what to take back on the plane
to my single bedroom
in my small, shared flat
far away.
I spread my hands across the quilt,
decide to taking it with me,
warm with remembering
how my grandmother made it for me,
matching the colors in the fabric to the paint samples I showed her –
the only time I was allowed to redecorate my room.
But Mom says no:
it was made for the room,
so it should stay in the room
(and because she likes it).
So I sit on the single bed with my mom,
on the quilt my dead grandmother made
that I will never have,
and page through a grade-school scrapbook,
seeing the memories from a long-ago time:
report cards of excellence (shrugged off when I brought them home),
Camp Fire Girls award certificates,
my first place poetry prize from sixth grade –
and I am almost smiling.
Then I turn the page and see a forest of blue ribbons
speckled with a few red and fewer white.
“What are these?” I ask with a wrinkled brow,
because honestly,
I do not remember.
“Oh, those,” she tosses off with an airy wave of her hand.
“You won those first place ribbons at field days over the years.
I found them buried in your dresser when I cleaned it out
and pasted them there.
We never made a big deal out of your winning
because your brother wasn’t any good at sports and
we didn’t want to hurt him.
We didn’t want to hurt him.
We didn’t want to hurt Him.
Casual words cascading over me
like lava,
burning my heart.
I sit on the single bed with my mom,
on the quilt my dead grandmother made
that I will never have,
staring at a forest of blue ribbons
and it begins
to come back to me.
Remembering those field days,
sunny grade school days of almost summer,
running races, long jumping,
winning with an easy grace.
Blue ribbons and more blue ribbons,
laughingly comparing them to my brother’s compensation ribbons
on the walks home;
bouncing in the door,
excited to show my dad,
her telling me
“Don’t bother him.”
Taking my ribbons into my bedroom
alone,
confused.
Shouldn’t winning feel good?
Finally hiding my prizes in a drawer
along with my pride.
And now I know it was because
we didn’t want to hurt him.
I sit on the single bed with my mom,
on the quilt my dead grandmother made
that I will never have,
staring at a forest of blue ribbons,
righteous anger beginning to bubble.
Remembering going to the schoolyard
trailing behind the cub scouts,
so my den mother mom could teach the boys to play baseball.
Being sent to the outfield to shag balls,
begging and begging for a turn at bat
until the boys laughingly relent
because it was cute –
a girl
playing baseball.
But then I find my swing
and start hitting the balls
again and again –
then getting sent back
to the outfield
because we didn’t want to hurt him.
Remembering joining the intermural soccer league at 14,
practicing, working hard and harder,
loving the running,
loving the winning,
but when the high school soccer coach
asks me to join her team,
I decline,
thinking I couldn’t be good enough,
because by then
I didn’t want to hurt him.
I sit on the single bed with my mom
on the quilt my dead grandmother made
that I will never have,
staring at the forest of blue ribbons,
memories tumbling over one another,
my gut wrenching,
anger bubbling,
and my heart aching
from those casual, cruel words.
And I think
how my life
would be different
if I could have seen myself
as the athlete
that I am.
Instead
I sit on this single bed
fat
and unfit,
having avoiding exercise
my entire adult life.
Because We.
Didn’t.
Want.
To Hurt.
Him.
I rise from the bed
and take myself out of the room,
leaving it all behind
with the quilt
(because, really, who needs to be reminded of this shit?).
And days later,
when my gut unclenches,
my heart stops bleeding
and my eyes stop leaking,
I realize.
I will no longer
hurt ME
to avoid
hurting him.
So Fuck
Him.
I
am joining
a gym.
