Texas sunset
May. 8th, 2001 09:00 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
threeplusfireI stepped out to check the mail before the sun went down. For a moment, I smelled something so intergral to my life it seems strange I take it for granted. The smell of rain, of Texas dust, of grass, of concrete that baked in the sun all day and is now just pleasantly warm to sit upon. This smell in many ways defines my evenings as a kid.
Something about the light too, about the clouds and the reddening sun. This is the time of day I would stare out my window or stand in the driveway trying to fix the image in my head so as to remember. Because I could not know if it was the last time I would ever see it. I waited in this light in the summertime for years, for different cars, for different people, for somewhere to go. I would dig my nails into my hands, concrete into my knees, because I thought the pain would seal the memory in my heart.
He wrote me a twelve page letter that said precious little about the retreat. A skill of his, writing these letters that never tell me the story I'm looking for. Always something else, some other tale. Not that I am really disappointed. The stories were interesting in their own way. He sent three prayer cards, one of the Infant of Prague, one of Saint Dymphna and one of Pope John Paul II. The pope reminds me of my grandfathers, and often it pains me to see him so frail and carrying on. Reminds me of the way my grandfather's hands shake and how my other grandfather joked so much with his scars before he left.
Something about the light too, about the clouds and the reddening sun. This is the time of day I would stare out my window or stand in the driveway trying to fix the image in my head so as to remember. Because I could not know if it was the last time I would ever see it. I waited in this light in the summertime for years, for different cars, for different people, for somewhere to go. I would dig my nails into my hands, concrete into my knees, because I thought the pain would seal the memory in my heart.
He wrote me a twelve page letter that said precious little about the retreat. A skill of his, writing these letters that never tell me the story I'm looking for. Always something else, some other tale. Not that I am really disappointed. The stories were interesting in their own way. He sent three prayer cards, one of the Infant of Prague, one of Saint Dymphna and one of Pope John Paul II. The pope reminds me of my grandfathers, and often it pains me to see him so frail and carrying on. Reminds me of the way my grandfather's hands shake and how my other grandfather joked so much with his scars before he left.
