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somewhere over the rainbow (and other stories)

  Exactly two years ago I found myself flying through a corner of a rainbow, and landed in Oaxaca, Mexico. It was the last film festival I traveled to, a brutal and sweet experience in the harshest of realities, trying to wrap my arms around the slipperiest industry and failing magnificently. Surrounded by fresh faces and eager eyes I ran from the rooms and into the street time and again, wandering off with the camera in my bag as a companion. I took pictures of a blind man that sang on the same corner every day, of wedding parades, of an old woman waiting to see the dentist.  Literally somewhere over the rainbow, I met the ugliest answers to questions I had been dragging my feet towards for years. Cramming the most delicious food into my mouth, joking at the nightly rooftop cocktail parties, grinning like the Cheshire Cat it was all coming to an end. Actually, it had ended before it even started though - and on the plane back to New York and finally Moscow the bone-crunching undertow

E's birthday (part 1)

E woke up before me, and began her birthday by playing in the half-light of the kitchen with tiny dolls. A thick white fog hid the city beyond our courtyard and the raindrops dangling outside the window. She told me to be the prince who was coming to her restaurant, and to eat lime jello. I made coffee, and studied her as she shouted out the doll's dialogue. Five, now - which means I've been a father for five years.

We played dolls being pregnant and drew pictures of girls, always girls with wide eyes and long hair. Legs like a giraffe's, necks like swans. We put them on the fridge. Time for her mother to take her as we had agreed, only her mother decided not to come and now we'll somehow go out in the rain and tromp to school, late. And now E is sobbing because she doesn't want to go to school, she wants to spend the day with me and I must somehow get warm tights on her and a skirt, somehow brush her hair a little, wiping hot tears from her cheeks, putting the right dolls in the right bag to take with her.

Downstairs, I realize we should have brought umbrellas.
We go back up, making faces at each other through the mirror in the elevator.

And suddenly, it's the first time she opens her Hello Kitty umbrella outside for months, and we splash in the puddles. I sing to her raindrops keep falling on my head and laugh at the significance of the words.

because I'm free,
and nothing's worrying me.

I wonder if she cries because she wishes she was free. Well, we're free to splash in puddles at least, to march down the street and buy an eclair that she eats slowly, staring out the window. We can go to school late and no one cares for once because today is her day.

She dances up the stairs. The smell of cabbage soup is heavy in the dark hallways. I wonder if she will remember this birthday, this little girl who still doesn't understand what day it is, what month it is. She only cares about summer coming, and singing late at night, about what her imaginary sisters and brothers are doing right about now.


Comments

DWolfskehl said…
Absolutely beautiful.
Annie said…
Happy Birthday, sweet little girl. She's a lucky girl to have a daddy to love her.

What a wonderful view from the window.
Marco North said…
daniel and annie - -thanks for your comments! it is indeed a wonderful view from the window, and every day it somehow seems different.
julian said…
and I am sure your sweet gal was celebrated when she made her "star entrance" at school.
I think those are Polly Pockets your gal is playing with?
Marco North said…
Jojo - actually, E wears Oilily exclusively and has since she was born. i buy all of it, and the salespeople in NYC have seen her grow up in those crazy fashions... As for the kids at detskie sad? some think she looks cool, others make fun of her. ah, terrible cruel 5 year olds!
Annie said…
Ah! That's what my Lyddie wore! But usually second-hand. Very stylish young lady you'll have there...but that's precisely what I'd expect.
Marco North said…
like any true NYer, i never pay full price - between the Oilily outlet, sample sales and the rest i cleaned up (%90 off my last round). it wasn;t pretty - -had to knock shoulders to get some things...so sad this brand has suffered, and is disappearing forever, or possibly coming back in about 2 years. the quality of the clothes is as great as the design. so are in children;swear...
Annie said…
She's a lucky girl; it is a blast to dress a daughter.

My Anastasia could be a model; she looks good in ANYTHING - too big, too small, boys', girls', whatever.....she makes the school uniform look fashionable.

(As I say, you can tell she's not my bio-child!)

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