She found herself surrounded by a Mexican family, in their living room. She was introduced to them by her fiance, also a Mexican.
They were polite to her but they had preferred she was Catholic. How this became a point of contention was rather interesting. She did believe in God, but somehow bypassed the religion during her stints as a Christian. She’d been born and raised Baptist, then became a Jehovah’s Witness, then Pentecostal, then Non-Denominational, then just plain old Evangelical. Then, briefly, a Buddhist.
Now she was just Susan Hawkins, feeling naked without some religion to buttress the looks of disapproval from Jose’s family.

I found the exact spot I needed for taking my nap. “Taking my nap”–as though someone else had it–as if I needed to yank it from someone. Or worse, steal it back.
And when I took my nap, which is and always be rightfully mine, I ended up dreaming that I stole kisses. The kisses are rightfully mine too. After all, it’s only a dream. Which even if they weren’t, are worth stealing. I went to jail for my doings–in my dream that is. But I gladly accepted my sentence: death by lethal injection. As the plunger of the syringe moved toward the needle, before I could feel anything go into my arms, I woke up. My heart was beating in my chest like a wild animal. I was delirious with relief. Hush up, you old rodent, I scolded my heart before getting up and putting all my naps and kisses back where I’d last found them.

The time came when it was time to begin things. And by begin I mean to start saying “I love you.” I have to start things in advance.
“I” starts with flowers and hand holding.
“You” starts with seeing you, wanting you, thinking of you.
“Love” takes a bit longer to get to. Love takes forever to get to.

Photos of illumined relatives dance across the sky. They are meant to enhance the living room, legitimize it. But all I can think of is: Is that her sister? Is this the son? Or the brother? I’ll also catch black and white photos meant to stylize the family, give it not just legitimacy but a political importance.
The portraits of the the family sitting in wicker chairs is more than enough to get me to go into the next room. Which is the kitchen. The only photos there are of food. In black and white.

They just walked in.. Two women who were plainly dressed. I asked them to leave because I had work to do. This was a lie. I only had my lap top in front of me watching clips of The Breakfast Club.

The two women could clearly see my screen. And they just continued on, into my house.

I was furious. I grabbed them both their hands and rather expertly, I must say, swung them back through the front door.

But there were others. Several men. More women. I was worried.

I thought they were protesters, since I’d seen many throughout the last year, in the town square. But these were on my front lawn. On my porch.

I was so pissed. I told them to leave or I would call 911. Then I thought: was it okay to call 911? Was this an actual emergency?

I went back to my lap and they continued. What I mean by continued, I don’t know. Which is another reason I didn’t want to call 911. I was no longer angry. I was confused.

Sometimes–well all of the time–and I do mean all the time–my angora sweater will tread through the closet on its way to Winter. Fine. That’s a given. But here’s the part that is the Sometimes: sometimes my angora sweater doesn’t arrive at winter, but stops a bit too early, and arrives in late Fall. Or never stops at Winter at all, and lands in early Spring. I’m worried. I’ve asked my angora about it. The answers are never consistent (I get different answers each time I ask the same questions.) Is my angora suffering from dementia? Sweaters have been diagnosed with Alzheimer’s, though admittedly more of those cases involved the cotton-blends sweaters. My next line of question will depend on where the angora lands next. If it arrives at early summer, I will have to come up with entirely new questions. Maybe the answers will have to change too.

Before I’d cleaved into two, I was a part of everything. But this division has focused me.

If there is such a thing as a concise, pithy desire then for me it is this: I want to be here. With every fiber of what few cells I have. I want to be here.Focused.

Hurry up, please. Just plow ahead. You’re walking on my path.

Yes you are. What? What’s that you say?

Fine.If you’re going to walk this slow, you should know that the rest of us will plow around and you’ll get snippets of our conversations and colognes. You’ll miss out on important things too.

But okay.

As the snow began to fall later that afternoon, there was a moment, as I jogged through the park, that I realized it was about to snow. A sense. And then for next few minutes as I jogged along the bridle path, I thought I saw flakes. But I was never sure. I even pointed ones I thought I saw to my jogging partner, who did not seem to believe me. Or maybe she wanted me to run faster (She ran at a faster pace normally and normally complained of my slow one. But didn’t in this case–maybe because it was too cold to complain?)
So when the snow finally began really and truly falling, I realized I’d lost that feeling of anticipation. Snow was just snow. It had lost its wondered. And with that I began to feel as cold as my jogging partner

The park smelled sweet and I was sweet to. I’d been jogging several times a week here for years and my fantasy is always to have an affair. But not the kind you might be thinking–or maybe I’m being presumptuous.
I’m talking about just meeting up with a guy, during or after a run, while still sweaty and the us just stealing away behind a bald cypress and kissing there for just a few quick minutes. And laughing about it. In fact, the kissing would be interrupted by the laughter oftentimes. We’d be laughing because this was just as out of our respective natures, just as much for him as for me. That would be our “thing,” so to speak, that healthy dose of WTF that would send us into peals of laughter before anything more serious happened.

Guilt does makes cowards of us all.
So I just jog and fantasize and then I’m back into my real world, still sweaty and still able to get kisses from my real-life betrothed who isn’t so bad, not one bit actually.

I can laugh about it, actually.