April 27, 2007

"There you could look at a thing monstrous and free..."



Originally uploaded by Citizen Rob.
In a moment of seemingly random generosity, two different readers sent Schuyler items off her Amazon list, and all but one of the items were related to her love of monsters.

One of them blew her mind. I wish I'd had a camera ready when I walked into the living room with a purple dragon puppet (with unseen controls) on my shoulder. I wish you could see her expression when she said hello to it and it answered her.

I had a rough week. I needed that.

For the first time, Schuyler is going to write her own thank you notes.

And life goes on. Perfect moments on a spectacularly imperfect canvas.

I know it's easy to think that because things are going well for Schuyler and for me professionally, there would be nothing but happy times. I can't imagine for a moment why that isn't the case. The world is supposed to make sense, it's supposed to be ruled by logic and a sequence of events and behaviors that are connected and rational, and yet it so rarely works out that way.

When things get confusing like they are now, I run to the only person in the world who has never disappointed me and who never sees me as weak or stupid or ugly. Or broken.

Schuyler and I are broken, but we never see each other that way. We play with toy monsters and leave the real ones outside the door for just a little while. I suppose everyone's broken, really. And like that line in Schuyler's favorite movie, the thing we come to learn about ourselves is our undying ability to destroy the things we love.

One day, Schuyler and I will damage each other, too. But for now, I'm taking her to the zoo. The hurt and the chaos of this grand rough world will just have to fucking wait.

5 comments:

Anonymous said...

My god, she looks so much like Julie in that photo.

Sorry you've had a rough week, Rob.

Trixie said...

What a fabulous way to end the day! Coming home to a surprise package of purple dragons!

How was the zoo? We love the zoo. Now that warm days are coming back and before it gets raging hot, the zoo is a terrific place to relax.

How do you know I'm not Liddy Wales? said...

How I wish I could be seven years old again, and have my whole day brightened by purple puppets!

dtwja said...

If everyone is "a little broken," your assertion that you and she are broken is wrong. Take heart. If everyone is broken, why consider yourself "broken," rather than just having different struggles than everyone else?

tiff said...

But the day when the damage is done to one another can wait.

And wait. and wait.

makes pure and perfect sense to me.