Miracles

I have a younger cousin named Miles who was born a month or more early. The gray matter in his brain wasn't (and still isn't) completely developed. As you may know, brain cells cannot be regrown after the child has left the mother's womb. They told us that he'd never walk or talk. They spouted off names of scary disorders and diseases: cerebral palsy, dystrophy, severe mental retardation. 

I love his name. At first, I loved it because I started calling him Smiles, which was a nickname that no one else had thought of before I had mentioned it. Then I began to realize how much of a walking miracle that child really is. Now I love his name because it's almost a pun. He's come miles and miles further than they ever thought imaginable. There's a sign hanging up in my aunt's kitchen that says "Expect Miracles". Collectively, as a family, we've learned how to.

Recently, my paternal grandparents have been having health problems. From hips to hearts and other things that just can't be helped, they aren't doing too fabulously. My grandfather, especially. But lately, Miles has been 'stuck' on my Papa. Miles is a repeater. He'll say a name over and over until he gets that respective person's attention or whatever it is that he wants. From the moment he gets up, between asking for juice or to watch Mickey Mouse, he drones on: "Pa-pa! Pa-pa! Pa-pa! Pa-pa! Pa-pa! Pa-pa! Pa-pa! Pa-pa!" for most of the day.

As I lay in bed last night, beside my cousin Ena who had slept over, I couldn't sleep. I texted people until they all fell asleep (or until I lost service). I thought about college, about the future. I thought about my job. I calculated the number of hours and minutes until my next shift starts. I even thought about yearbook and senior year. Nothing was helping and I really didn't want to sleep too late the next morning. So I started praying. I prayed for everything and everyone I could think of. I prayed for Papa; I prayed for Baba. I prayed for my parents, my brother, my best friends. When I got around to praying for Miles, I thanked God for his life. I thanked God that he had taught my family to 'expect miracles'. I prayed that God would use Miles' sweet, innocent nature to cheer up my grandparents through this time. Then I remembered what my Aunt Christine, Miles' mother, had said earlier that evening when she had eaten dinner with us. She spoke about Miles talking about Papa all day, then coming straight in to see him. Papa had piped up then, saying, "He came and sat in my lap for, oh, seventeen seconds." But to Miles, seventeen seconds is a long time. That was Miles' way of showing Papa that he cares, that he's thinking of him. 

Our little miracle is drawn to my Papa, someone who just might need a miracles a few months down the road. Sure, it may just be a phase. Kids go through those; they want one specific person for some specific reason. But what if Miles trying to tell us something? He may not me hinting that another miracle in on the way, per se. He might just be trying to remind us that there's hope in Papa's situation too. Miracles aren't just for the young. We relied so heavily on God when Miles was born and we had never met the child. (His mother's state of health was dwindling too, but still.) Why wouldn't we still rely on Him when there are 67 years of living behind someone else?

Later Days

Peace

H

Happy 4th

The Fourth of July. It's supposed to be about fireworks, hot dogs, watermelon. But what makes a GOOD Independence Day? Is it eating until you can't move? Laughing at the people racing to see who can scarf down a slice of watermelon quickest?
Or is it about celebrating the freedom we have to do such things? Relishing the fact that we live in a land of immense opportunity?
In that case, it shouldn't how many hot dogs we can eat. It shouldn't matter how awful or fabulous the fireworks are.
In noticing this, it's arguable that this Fourth of July was one of the best. I had to work for four hours. Then I watched several episodes of NCIS with my aunt. We ordered pizza and were about to sit down to eat it when we heard a big boom. We went outside to find that the neighbors were setting off fireworks. From then on, the evening was full of neighbors and close-range colorful explosives. Isn't that the way it should be? Relaxing and thoughtful?

Sonic

No nail polish.
Only wedding bands.
Black shorts or pants.
Tennis shoes.
Hair up.
Visor on.
Shirt tucked.
Welcome to Sonic.

2 X CLA
   X+ Li
1 S COKE
3 K SPR
"CHEESE STICKS!"
"THANK YOU!"
1 L GRP SLSH
1    OREO BLST
CONE
"CHEESE STICKS!"
"THANK YOU!"

Sticky shoes.
10 Unread text messages.
4+ hours.
Sore feet.
Messy hair.
Faint smell of limes on your hands.
Odd crease across your head from the visor.
Sleepy eyes.

Here's to summer jobs.

Last Night

Sitting in the armchair with a glass of 

ice-less, watered-down lemonade.

Mom mumbles, "Turn it down..."

so Rachel yells

at Ross

quieter.

A blind fluff-ball rolls off another piece 

of furniture, heads for the door.

Screen door is opened for

the old dog who

won't know

where he 

is.

The inane cat tumbles and rolls, trying

to initiate a game with 

a dreaded roach that slimes

his way across

the floor

again.

The younger of the two brothers is

seated comfortably in a

blue folding chair. He plays

a song once or

twice with

his nose.

An overly large quilted comforter

folded backwards over the end

of the bed. "The Bear" snores;

hibernation's 

a bit

too hot.

A disheveled room, newly painted. There's

a faint orange glow as the light 

goes on, exposing a

cat, so loyal

and old,

who naps.

A long, blonde-ish ponytail. Pictures

to edit, blogs to write until

two thirty in the A.

M., since sleep is

out of

question.

Men are like government bonds: they take too long to mature.

Dear G-ma,
Happy 70th Birthday.
Love,
Hayleigh

Paris, Je t'aime

Paris, je t'aime is a vair, vair lovely foreign film that we started watching in French class today. It's composed of a series of short vignettes centered on love. Each vignette had different actors in it and was directed by a different person. It mentions various types of love: parental love, love and loss, weird relationships that make you tilt your head and say, "wtf?", language-barrier love, the kind of love between a husband who decides not to leave his wife after finding out she has terminal leukemia and re-falls in love with her, and something involving a mime. I've been thinking since I got home about what my vignette would look like if I were to direct one.
~~~~
It would take place in one of artsy arrondissements (boroughs) of Paris. A young woman, pretty. A young man, kind and charming. She's a journalist; he's an artist. Her articles and investigative journals make her content, but art is her passion. They assign her to interview street artists. They meet each other. He looks her in the eyes, genuinely willing to hand her her story. A smile spread across his face as he stops his world to dictate a well-mannered and well-meant "merci". Somehow, all her notes are lost and a follow up interview is arranged. She watches him work. The brush strokes show what he's learning, the colors show what he loves. "He's not perfect," she notices, "the painting lack depth and shadowing levels." But he's perfect to her.
A flashback.
Her childhood: smart, well-liked, pleasant-looking. But inwardly, she has no self-esteem. She classifies herself with people 20,000 leagues under the sea of her potential.
Back to the present.
He fits her.

He finishes his painting and turns to her. She snaps a shot of him with his masterpiece. He stays to talk. They talk for 20 minutes. "Is twenty minutes a long enough time period to fall in love?" she wonders. She accepts that it has to be, that she's crazy, that they're soul mates.
She walks away with a smile.
A day later, his art show. He sees her and the artsy group of people that surround him fade away. In a West Side Story type fading, radiant smiles are exchanged along with a few words. She gets a call from her editor: a new story, another job. She leaves and promises to return, knowing she can't.
A few months later, he contacts her editor, asking for her address. He shows up at her door, packed for a vacation, and tells her he's leaving for America. Art is calling him. To sculpt, to paint, to design.
A silence.
Then a kiss.
A different kiss, not like the kisses in the other vignettes. It's not a kiss of lust, of desperation, of secrecy. It's a kiss of true love. It's a kiss that understands and promises to return. But this kiss, unlike the false hope the woman gave the man, will keep its promise.
~~~~
My vignette would be about a couple who fall in love at first sight. Neither of them really believe in it beforehand, of course. But then, after meeting, they're changed. They stop doing ritualistic single-like things that they used to. They change for someone they may never see again, but that they're in love with.

Later Days
Peace
H

P.S. Is it better to know that someone like that is out there? Or is it better to forget about true love and settle into true like? I think I would rather know. I would rather know even if I could never be with that person. I think I would sleep better at night knowing I did something right, that there's someone out there fighting for me just as hard as I'm fighting for them.