We needed somebody to buy alcohol for us and she needed friends.
Despite being the typical age where one flees the nest, she stayed. Living with her mom, not temporarily.
Her quiet evenings at home were interrupted with trailer park kids having parties at her house.
Everybody was happy for a moment in time. The happiness must’ve attracted more good energy because then she found love while working the layaway department at our local Kmart.
She smoked weed with minors, which may look bad for one’s character. I showed up to her wedding in a skin-tight mini dress because I wanted attention.
She wasn’t mad at me; she didn’t even notice. Because this was a time and place where people met each other where they were and there were no faults.
She and her husband were unmoving, like trees. Us kids were like busy little birds nesting in two sturdy trees for a season. We made a home there, and then we grew up and moved on. The trees stayed. Rooted.
Some of us started families and got decent jobs, and some of us got eaten alive by predators, but the trees just stayed. Unmoving in either direction.
But they were happy. They didn’t need to see the world or own fancy things. They didn’t succumb to a life of addiction and crime either. Maybe that’s the secret. All along they had something the rest of us never will. Enoughness.
