I enjoy being a...

Thanksgiving is a lovely dinner. It's the only time I've had "dinner" in the middle of the day, save for when I went to visit my great-aunt and -uncle in Idaho. They called lunch "dinner" and dinner "supper" because lunch was always so much bigger than dinner in their home. This Thanksgiving I got to eat at the big kids' table, because it was that, the newlyweds table (more on that later...), or being squished between my sisters and my bratty cousin Christian, whom I've never liked since he poured orange soda on my white dress when I was, like, eight.

My mom is a Weight Watchers' success story, my dad just joined, my aunt is a Weight Watchers' leader, and my grandma is doing...something, I guess...so you can imagine the big kids' dinner topic. That's right--points. How many points is this roll worth? How many points do you think the potatoes have? Do leftovers have more points than normal food? I could have ripped my hair out, it was so tedious.

"All right, this is Thanksgiving. I don't want to hear another mention of 'points'--I just want to eat," I say, finally snapping. Where was the usual family gossip: who's had a baby? when is Aaron getting married? where are Grandma and Grandpa traveling to next week? That sort of thing.

"Someday you'll appreciate how fast your metabolizism is right now," Grandma says, as if the fact that I don't want everything on plate scored means I don't take care of myself. This is not true; I do take care of myself, for the most part. I exercise regularly--I spent an hour and a half the day before sparring my friend, Josh, and teaching a martial arts class. I love food with a gluttonous lusty passion, but I normally don't eat a lot, if anything at all. Why? Because I'm too poor to afford a lot of food. Yes, I have genetics in my favor, and I exercise, but frankly, I'm too poor to be fat.

I bring this up, and make a circle with my thumbs and fingers touching to indicate how much I usually eat, but I don't press it because my mom hates me telling people I'm poor. I think it's shames her more than it does me--I'm nineteen and a college student living away from home--I'm supposed to be poor. Even here at home I don't eat more than one serving, because my stomach has shrunk so far that I can't handle it. Gone are the days that I had an extra stomach in each of my long legs. My protest is enough to get them to stop talking about it for about ten, maybe twenty minutes tops.

So, the newlyweds table--I'm not one of them. That's what really gets my dad, I think. I'll be twenty in May. That's how old my sister-in-law was when she married my brother. I still haven't been kissed, let alone have a boyfriend. I date, as much as there's opportunity for that in Cedar, but guys aren't exactly throwing themselves over me, and I find it rather degrading to have to chase after someone. I don't even like anyone that much right now. My friend Laura says my dad is going to approach me about being a lesbian sometime soon.

The next day, I'm telling my mom about my latest disastrous date, in which the cad ditched me every five minutes to go talk to his friends, I mention that I'm tired of stupid boys. My dad says I should date men, meaning someone worthwhile who's been around the block. I inform him that I've had my fill of thirty-two year olds, that they're not really something to honk my horn about either. He says I have to date someone. I almost tell him that at least I haven't been on a date with a girl yet, but I'm not ready to open that can of worms.

Today at my cousin's wedding luncheon, my Grandpa Radmall, my mother's father that we've rarely seen before these last few years, talks to me about boys. He asks if I date a lot. Dad says, almost passive aggressively, that I'm not really interested in that sort of thing right now. I don't need to take that. I finish the sentence for him, "but my dad wishes I was."

My grandpa says something like "There's plenty of time for that anyway."

My dad, however, caught my tone. He says just snidely enough that only I notice the complete implications, "Rachel's so perfect--she's going to need a pretty amazing guy to ever get married. She'll have to look for a long time." Rachel thinks she's better than everyone else. She'll never be satisfied, and she'll never get married.

My eyes mist up with tears of anger and hurt, but not enough to cloud my vision too much. I look at my grandpa, but I'm talking to my father when I say, "I just need someone who will treat me like a daughter of God. That's all I need."

But even as I'm saying that, I wonder if my dad is right. If there was an uneducated, poor, unambitious young man who treated me like a goddess, I still don't think it'd be enough. I need an optimistic someone who I can talk to, who I can philosophize with, who's dreams I believe in, and who I want to be my best self for. If that's too much to ask for, maybe being an old maid at twenty is the best route for me. So next Thanksgiving, I'll be at the big kids table again, not the newlyweds, and I'll suffer through talk of points all over again, being grateful for every second the conversation doesn't turn to my love life.

Poem #2

How to Read my Mind Via my Clothes

Long sleeve cream sweater and

a pale undershirt with hair straight

means I'm whimsical.

Brown and circus color shirtdress and

amber pendant with hair flipped out

means today I choose to have fun.

Anything black means I washed my

darks the day before.

Anything with my quarter necklace

means I'm feeling lucky.

And if, heaven forbid, I wear ANYTHING

gray, it's quite likely I'm depressed--

and probably wearing someone else's clothes.

***

10/29/08 8:00 A.M.
Meeting with Counselor

Is there anything you don't like?

Of course. Losing. Killing things.
Any grade lower than a B.
Being alone.

Tell me about being alone.

There are 24 hours in a day.
I spend about 7.5 sleeping
alone.
I go home right after school,
don't come out of my room for
1, 2, 3, 4, 5 hours
alone.
Why? I know I hate it. (Secretly,
I think, I still loathe every aspect
of my personality, but we don't
talk about that anymore. Still,
why would I want to be alone
with that?) I sit with the phone next
to me, waiting for someone to call,
hoping someone maybe
won't be busy
won't be in a bad mood
won't be with a boyfriend
won't mind having me around.

Do you think people enjoy being around you?

Yes. I think I am an enjoyable person,
optimistic, fun, and caring
(which is to say, no, I can't imagine
anyone wanting to be around me—
I don't want to be around me.
For those 8 or so hours a day
I'm around people, I wonder if I'm
nice enough, friendly enough, happy
enough to keep them happy. And
some of them hate that. How do I
handle it? What do I do?).

Have you ever tried opening up to people? Letting them see that 5% of the time you're not happy?

Yes. And I set myself up to get hurt.
But it only really hurts after they're gone
again and I'm alone.

Poem #1

I'm pretty terrified, I'm not going to lie. I can read poetry a whole night through, but when it comes to writing it...auhha...

Bath at 2:30

cymbalcrash caress
my shoulders, heavy with
the weight of alarms
that go off at four-thirty ay em

I slip down until my mouth is
covered by bubbles.
The trumpet blows, by some
subtle wind, from
nineteen fifty-nine until it
is calling to me out
of the speaker on the marble counter
across the room,
clear of the hot bath water.

If there were once words
spun along with the piano,
the cymbal, the trumpet,
they were too heavy to
lift on a zephyr,
so all I get is clear,
oscillating praise--
the kind I always feel I deserve
after standing on
my feet for eight hours.

***

They Never Look Up

When you are walking down the hill at the
north end of campus—slowly, of course,
it must be at least a fifty degree angle—
if you should look up and catch a glimpse
of that God-graced blue, pause for a moment;
it won't take long for the autumn wind to
pick the prime yellow leaves from the top
branches of the heaven-grazing trees and
twist them down to you, fluttering, like
marmalade butterflies. Then you may turn
your head back to the ground—sandlicking,
grasseating, dirteye creature that you are—
and continue to your car in the far parking lot.

One of Those Faces

Thursday I was raking leaves with SUU Student Alumni when a girl came up to me and asked me my name. I was confused. She didn't look familiar and we hadn't been conversing, so I couldn't imagine why she wanted to know. "Rachel," I replied, my voice chipper. "Why do you ask?"

"Oh. Well, you look a lot like this girl Brooke, from America's Next Top Model and I thought you might be her."


"Really? Wow, that's so flattering! Thanks!"

This wasn't a new thing to me. I'm used people starting sentences with, "You know, you look a lot like..." One of the most popular endings to that phrase is Piper Perabo from Coyote Ugly.


I also get a lot of, "I have a friend who looks just like you." I laugh and tell them I want a name and a picture so I can keep record of all of these people. The Japanese have a saying that everyone has five doubles of him or herself (or so I learned from Barefoot Gen); I want to see if I can surpass that number.

Not everyone I've been compared to is an actual person. When I was about ten, I went with my father on a business trip and a woman we met told me I look like Kira from The Dark Crystal. I certainly had that exact same hair!


I've also been told that Rikku from Final Fantasy 10 resembles me. Her facial structure is very Japanese, and mine just isn't, but apparently there's a cut scene where she has my impish grin. And you know, I'm okay with that. I think Rikku rocks.


I think on the whole my lookalikes seem to be blond, with full lips and respectably sized ears. I bet there are tons of people who fit that description. There certainly are in my family. My grandma keeps mistaking me for an older cousin, but that's mostly because she's getting a bit senile. A few weeks ago, my little sister was very upset when I was home for the weekend and her friend said we look alike. She hasn't quite accepted the fact that my parents cloned me to get her and our younger sister.


I'm looking forward to see who I'll be compared to in the future. For now, though, I'm just really happy to be me! I think that's pretty neat, because whether I look like a model, an actress, a Gelfling, an Al Bed, a cousin, or a little sister, I'm always going to be myself.


...oh man, that last line was cheesy.