February 28: rivals (25 minutes)

(from The Sun magazine) Readers Write asks readers to address subjects on which they're the only authorities. Topics are intentionally broad in order to give room for expression. Writing style isn't as important as thoughtfulness and sincerity. Topic: Rivals

In fifth grade, they had talent shows. They encouraged all kids to take part. If the faculty liked you, and if the students applauded loud enough in the first assembly, you were asked back to do your performance again in the second assembly, which was not only an honor because it meant you were "good," but it also got you out of fifth period.

I took part in the Ashbel Smith talent shows twice. The first time, I worked on my performance for a month, my mother helped me. She could play piano well enough to get me through "Put Your Hand in the Hand of the Man," and she agreed to take a day off from work so that she could accompany me at both assemblies, if I happened to get asked back for the second one. She worked in the office at JC Penney's, she didn't have an important job, she was happy to have a legitimate reason to take a day off.

We had an old upright piano painted antique green. It was in the middle room on the left side of the house. That room was sometimes my middle sister's room, but when we got the piano, she moved into the back bedroom with our older sister. Momma played through "Put Your Hand in the Hand" over and over and sang along with me, directing me with her bobbing head and pretty voice. When I had the melody down she started harmonizing. I told her she wouldn't be allowed to sing backup at the assembly, that would be cheating, her voice was too pretty.

We came up with some sign language to the words of the song, some I'd remembered from church camp, the rest I filled in, made up on my own, or was given by my mother. I felt confident the day of the performance. Naturally, I was a hit; naturally, I was asked back for the second assembly. There was no competition.

I loved the spotlight, loved the attention, wanted more, more, more. The next time a talent show assembly day came around, I was first on the sign-up sheet. I hadn't even thought about what I would perform, but I knew it would fall into place once my mother and I put our heads together.

But Momma wasn't able to take another day off from work so soon. She wasn't even able to help me put together a performance piece. Maybe she and Daddy were already having their troubles, but I wouldn't know anything about that for years.

I had a long-play record of songs from musicals that truck drivers love. I didn't see the irony. The album cover had the front of an eighteen-wheeler on the front and the back doors of the trailer on the back. SONGS TRUCK DRIVERS LOVE (or something like that) was on the front, and the back doors opened up in the middle to reveal an impressive spread of artwork and song information.

I imagined that I could be a truck driver because I loved these songs, too, particularly the one from the movie I had seen, Oklahoma! I practiced that song over and over, got it down, even came up with the idea of sitting on the edge of the stage with my leg dangling off. I was a shoo-in for the second assembly, I figured.

There was a new student at Ashbel Smith. He had arrived between the two talent shows, he had moved to town after I had become the most famous talent show contestant. For fairness, contestants were called up alphabetically. His last name started with an A so he was up before me. He sang "Flying Blue Angels," a patriotic song accompanied by marching and sign language of his own stripe, mimicking a jet plane flying through the air as the record player (which had no singing on it -- it was early karaoke) blasted out the sounds of a famous military band. The crowd went wild, stood up, cheered.

I gave my music teacher the truck driver album and she put the needle on the proper track. I got in place on the edge of the stage and knew I had made a mistake as the first line came out of my fifth-grade boy mouth: I'm jest a gurl who cain't say no, I'm in a turrible fix... The applause was polite at best. I was not invited back for second assembly and I never signed up for the talent show again, but I was forced to watch my rival month after month as he performed flawlessly patriotic and inspirational songs that always brought the house down.

February 27: light (15 minutes)

1. Tell about the quality of light coming in through your window. Jump in and write. Don't worry if it is night and your curtains are closed or you would rather write about the light up north -- just write. Do for ten minutes, fifteen, a half hour.
The light burns outside, blue-white and yellow. A shadow passes, the neighbor's gray cat. He looks in the front screen door and my cat hisses. Warning! They used to live together, next door, but "my" cat is declawed and got picked on by the other two and started peeing on the clothes, on the desk. The neighbors put him out, I took him in.

The sun goes behind the clouds and the porch rumbles. A fading moving, a plastic seat cushion pulled off and sitting on a trunk out there, faux woodgrain catches the light, a bright white stripe down the left side. The reflection bounces up into my bedroom, the front room of the house. I'm on the bed, a velvety spread red like a not quite ripe enough watermelon. The wrinkles catch light, throw it around. I feel so luxurious on this bedspread, I paid $2.99 for it at Texas Thrift.

The cat is in the side window now, higher up, keeping watch over the compost bin, hoping for a visitor to the bird feeder. He is gray, too, and blots out the pale light that comes from that window almost completely. That light doesn't have a chance, what with the long awning hanging over it (it's like I'm under a petticoat) and the pale green house next door refracting sunlight, soaking it in, taking some for itself before giving it over to me. Here, I'm done with this, you can have the rest, you can have the leftovers.

Leftover sunlight. It's sitting on my front porch, lounging on the broken wicker chair, warming the cat hair covered cushion. There's a cardboard tub I pulled out of the garbage. It has a lid, would make a great container for something, if I had something to store. But I don't have anything. I am not a pack rat. If I could save the sun I probably wouldn't even do that. My ex used to say I'm not sentimental. He didn't say it to hurt me, just as a matter of fact. But it seemed like an insult. You're not sentimental like me; you're not sentimental like the rest of us. You don't care. Ouch!

I think maybe I'm too sentimental. I push things away so I can't be caught up in them, because I would surely be taken down, like a moulin on the south pole, a hole in the ice where melting blue water flows straight down, hundreds of feet (or is it miles?) to the water. That's because of the global warming, the environmental crisis. The sun is the culprit. Or is it us? The sun is the unwitting culprit. Pretty sunlight. What a beautiful day. A sunny day like this---