Fee Thomas

They were doing that thing. That thing I believe only Minnesotans do: whispering just loud enough so the person outside of the conversation can hear you. It’s undoubtedly passive aggressive, which irks me to no end. But I couldn’t afford to be rattled just then, I needed to focus on getting the hell out of there! Whispering…ugh! My head! It was so loud in my head! “She’s still not stable…” “Needs twenty - four hour care..” “The likelihood of her living a normal life…” Then I heard a chair slide hurriedly across the the shiny sterile floor.  My father’s voice now. “Give us our daughter, we are taking her home.”  “Now.” Absolute silence filled the air like a grenade was held in my father’s hand and he was seconds from pulling the pin. I couldn’t breathe. I was disappearing even though I was trying my hardest to stay present, I was leaving myself and this torturous moment. The angels were calling my name. Telling me to come rest with them. Not to worry about what was happening here. The reality of what was happening here is that the doctor wanted to institutionalize me. He thought I was too far gone to be helped. That I had lost the war I had tried to fight with some type of valor. Now they were saying I was a lost cause. My dad’s voice startled me back to reality “Get my daughter’s stuff, we are taking her out of this place!” I watched through the tears in my eyes as nurses and CNA’s scattered to ready my discharge orders. As we waited for the elevators, me still crying, my dad said, “ Look at me” I could barely see him through my tears and now swollen eyes, “you are not a lost cause.” “We are not sending you away. We are not giving up on you.” I felt like a wounded little bird crawled up in the palm of my daddy’s giant hand. My wings too wet to fly.

Flannel Shirts At Ten -Thirty

We used to talk about the future

Wearing flannel shirts with Marlboros stuffed in the pockets

Our exhaled breath crystalized by the Minnesota below zero air

Feet freezing because although our parents warned us

It was chosen to believe that Birkenstocks were all weather wear

Sure, we talked about the future

Never admitted, but all needing a moment to thaw

Back when the radio played bands

Whose hearts ached as much as our own

Waving our cigarettes against the ten-thirty sky

Before we had to be home at eleven o'clock

Emphasizing points regarding who'd we become

So much promise amid those discussions

All I can ask is, who are we now?

There is something called " the speed of dark."  I love that. There is a mechanism in space that holds up to four hundred suns- can you believe that?! Four HUNDRED suns! And these are the things that keep me around. The fact that these things happen. I feel a sense of sadness for people that lack the imagination of picturing four hundred suns gathered...anywhere. But I can picture it just fine. I remember vividly the day I learned how Buddhist Civil Rights leaders burned themselves alive based on the Spirit of Christ- that changed me forever. How could learning something like that not? It was much like when I learned how St. Peter begged to be crucified upside down because he felt unworthy to die in the manner of Christ. And then I spend a great deal of time (too much) thinking about the grandfather paradox. How would one travel through time without changing a single thing? And as you're sitting here reading this you're wondering what does one thing have anything to do with the other? The next time you think something is impossible I want you to remember the four hundred suns. The next time you think humanity is lost I want you to remember the Buddhist Civil Rights leaders. When you think nobility is dead think of St. Peter. And when the woulda, coulda, shouldas come to visit think about the grandfather paradox. It all happens and it's all linked. Just as it ought to be.