I Saw Myself As She Saw Me.
One day during a long ride in the country, Larry and I stopped to admire a lake. Since it was mid-summer, the place was packed with people running up and down the shores, drifting in and out of the water, waiting in line at the stationary ice cream truck. We were just two bodies amongst the summer crowd.
Larry went to the port-o-johns and I was standing, smoking a cigarette and staring at the water, when a little girl walked past me. She couldn’t have been more than eight years old, happily sucking on a freezer pop, her wet hair still dripping down the back of her orange one-piece.
In her youthful innocence, she reminded me of myself at that age.
As she trotted past me, she glanced up and caught my eye and I gave her my biggest, friendliest smile. The little girl’s eyes widened and she instantly started to cry, transforming her walk into a run as fast as her little feet would carry her – back to her family, back to safety.
I’d scared her.
I’d smiled at her, which terrified her.
Suddenly I saw myself as she saw me: standing in the sand wearing torn jeans and black boots, my hair disastrous, a large black helmet in my hand, skull rings on my fingers, a cigarette in the other hand. I stunk of ash and filth and stale beer; I hadn’t showered in days. I probably hadn’t even brushed my teeth.
On the inside I was still a little girl, toddling down the beach with my popsicle. But on the outside, I was revolting.
I’d spent much of my youth wanting to be a teacher; I so adored children. But I scared this girl without trying. I couldn’t have children with Larry, and I knew that, but I’d always thought I might someday teach. Another dream dropped by the wayside that day.
“Ready, Baby?” Larry asked, reappearing.
“Yeah,” I said.
It wouldn’t have helped to tell him what had happened. Larry didn’t see the world the way I did. He’d been loud and crooked and harsh for years; he probably wasn’t even aware that he scared small children. He wouldn’t have understood why this was a new experience for me. He didn’t understand that leather and boots didn’t fit on a family beach.
On the way home, Larry and I had sex in a cornfield somewhere near Grapeville, Pennsylvania. Afterward I wrote a poem in my head as I rode on the back of the motorcycle on that beautiful summer day.
It’s one of the few poems I can still recite from memory.
“A child ran from me today,”
I whispered to him as we lay
Making love in rows of vegetables somewhere.
“Why?” he mumbled back at me
But I just sighed because he
Ran his fingers down through my long hair.
And later on, out in the sun
I thought I felt that child run
Somewhere in the corner of my mind.
A sign said Grapeville just one mile
I scared that child with my smile
And then I turned away from all the signs.