We don't even have pictures
Just memories to hold
That grow sweeter each season
As we slowly grow old
Sometime in grade school, I think it was fourth grade, my class's teacher set up a one-mile course on the playground. We could run, jog, or walk, and I don't remember us being timed. I jogged. This is back when I wore shorts when it was warm. Most of you have never seen me in shorts. Anyway, Robika comes up behind me and says, "What's wrong with your legs?" I asked her what she meant and she asked the question again, which was very unilluminating. I offered a "nothing" and Robika said they looked weird. Nothing for me to say to that. I jogged a little faster. And I stopped wearing shorts.
The Fair at New Boston had a Shawun story teller. The second year I saw him I realised he was telling the same stories over and over, and I stopped paying attention to him. Got me some buffalo for lunch instead. But there are a few things he said that stuck. One, it's not turtles all the way down, it's just one turtle. She's not standing on anything, she's swimming; She's a turtle, it's what they do. They're known for swimming. Two, an unexpected gift from someone you don't know is the best gift. Unless it's candy. Kids, strangers don't have the best candy, candy stores have the best candy. Three, don't look at your feet when you walk. Look in front of you, up, to the sides, but not at the ground. Just move.
When puberty hit, I mean really hit, not that early stuff where voices start to change and beards start to grow and crotches start to get twitchy, I mean full-on hardcore adolescence, right around the time I started high school, I became the world-record Most Awkward Human Ever. My legs got tangled in themselves five or seven times a day. But I wasn't looking at my feet, which was maybe part of the problem. Remember that episode of The Next Generation where Data learned to dance? He was fine as long as he watched his feet. If you're keeping score, that's speculative fiction: 1, native folk wisdom: 0.
I walked to high school every day. Sometimes a car would pull over and one of my teachers or classmates would give me a lift. Sometimes someone would throw a pop can at me from the road, and if I was lucky the can was empty. One day I was picked up by, of all people, a car full of cheerleaders. They told me my walk matched the theme to The Addams Family. I wasn't sure how to take that. Still not. I don't recall Gomez tripping as often as I did; Cousin It, maybe.
Things changed by my senior year. I wasn't watching my step, but I didn't need too - much. The whole walk had changed. One night I was having a dinner break before rehearsal started at Wendy's. Jason was in the cast and we walked back to the theatre together. About halfway there he told me, "You've got an awesome walk. You don't lead with anything. And your head just floats there, it doesn't move up and down at all." So, not everyone who saw me walking around was a dick.
Toby was built like me, tall and thin. We ran the streets from Strange Brew to Ferncliff like we owned them because we did, snatch. He said he liked walking with me because I could match his stride. Christine and Jeremy said I had the greatest walk they'd seen as I was coming across Cliff Park at the end of the night. Walking home on from the public library I ran into a punk I knew from around town. He said I'd be walking those streets forever. I was twenty-one, and my walk was the stuff of legends.
My last night on the job in Lubbock, Eric stopped me before I left and said I had the coolest walk in the place. He got to watch me walk out of the door, out of the state, faced straight ahead. I didn't look down.
I just moved.
Just memories to hold
That grow sweeter each season
As we slowly grow old
Sometime in grade school, I think it was fourth grade, my class's teacher set up a one-mile course on the playground. We could run, jog, or walk, and I don't remember us being timed. I jogged. This is back when I wore shorts when it was warm. Most of you have never seen me in shorts. Anyway, Robika comes up behind me and says, "What's wrong with your legs?" I asked her what she meant and she asked the question again, which was very unilluminating. I offered a "nothing" and Robika said they looked weird. Nothing for me to say to that. I jogged a little faster. And I stopped wearing shorts.
The Fair at New Boston had a Shawun story teller. The second year I saw him I realised he was telling the same stories over and over, and I stopped paying attention to him. Got me some buffalo for lunch instead. But there are a few things he said that stuck. One, it's not turtles all the way down, it's just one turtle. She's not standing on anything, she's swimming; She's a turtle, it's what they do. They're known for swimming. Two, an unexpected gift from someone you don't know is the best gift. Unless it's candy. Kids, strangers don't have the best candy, candy stores have the best candy. Three, don't look at your feet when you walk. Look in front of you, up, to the sides, but not at the ground. Just move.
When puberty hit, I mean really hit, not that early stuff where voices start to change and beards start to grow and crotches start to get twitchy, I mean full-on hardcore adolescence, right around the time I started high school, I became the world-record Most Awkward Human Ever. My legs got tangled in themselves five or seven times a day. But I wasn't looking at my feet, which was maybe part of the problem. Remember that episode of The Next Generation where Data learned to dance? He was fine as long as he watched his feet. If you're keeping score, that's speculative fiction: 1, native folk wisdom: 0.
I walked to high school every day. Sometimes a car would pull over and one of my teachers or classmates would give me a lift. Sometimes someone would throw a pop can at me from the road, and if I was lucky the can was empty. One day I was picked up by, of all people, a car full of cheerleaders. They told me my walk matched the theme to The Addams Family. I wasn't sure how to take that. Still not. I don't recall Gomez tripping as often as I did; Cousin It, maybe.
Things changed by my senior year. I wasn't watching my step, but I didn't need too - much. The whole walk had changed. One night I was having a dinner break before rehearsal started at Wendy's. Jason was in the cast and we walked back to the theatre together. About halfway there he told me, "You've got an awesome walk. You don't lead with anything. And your head just floats there, it doesn't move up and down at all." So, not everyone who saw me walking around was a dick.
Toby was built like me, tall and thin. We ran the streets from Strange Brew to Ferncliff like we owned them because we did, snatch. He said he liked walking with me because I could match his stride. Christine and Jeremy said I had the greatest walk they'd seen as I was coming across Cliff Park at the end of the night. Walking home on from the public library I ran into a punk I knew from around town. He said I'd be walking those streets forever. I was twenty-one, and my walk was the stuff of legends.
My last night on the job in Lubbock, Eric stopped me before I left and said I had the coolest walk in the place. He got to watch me walk out of the door, out of the state, faced straight ahead. I didn't look down.
I just moved.
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