living amends

You and your mother drove to Lynchburg, Virginia. A place you never expected to see black
people, and yet there was a wedding reception at the hotel where you were staying. The
majority of the partygoers were black, in their Sunday best, it looked like a Hecht’s catalogue
come to life. All the swirling chiffon dresses, huge brimmed hats with amazing feathered
structures rising from on top of coconut-smelling tamed hair dos. Men bounced children on
their shoulders, laid them out like lambs - those that were too tired to dance. The drawling
cacophony followed us into the elevator, and your mother said to you, "Did you see that child
floating?" In a white frothy doilied dress a little girl sucking on her thumb was sleeping across a
man's shoulders. He was dressed all in black, standing in the threshold of the ballroom, all you could see of him was a faint outline that made the child appear to be levitating on the steep rise and fall of sugar from too many glasses of punch.

You two were going to a wedding, the girl who used to live across the street, her name was Penelope too. Standing around nothing to say to anyone, so you did what was suggested for the funeral three weeks ago for Annie Gop. You found the most uncomfortable looking son of a bitch you could find and sat down with him and asked him about him. It turns out all the uncomfortable-looking ones were the people you grew up with. First there was Jim Weintraub, who asked you about your father, if he is still as "anal-retentive" as he used to be? Seriously, what could he expect from you but "almost as tight-assed as you are now..." somehow wrapped up sweetly, like canoli that has gone bad. After subtly suggesting that your father is happy, that yes there is hope for men to find love after 55, but that it usually comes to those who deserve it, you left Jim to talk to his son, Robert. You expected him to be taller somehow. Your mother told you that he's a fireman now. You figured he'd have tons of interesting conversation, that it just took the right prod and off you'd go, exchanging psychosis stories. Not so. Unfortunately, he never did warm up, but was comfortingly complacent and laughed at your cynicism but did not join.

You and your mother were some of the first to leave. She became bearable after her second glass of wine, although seemed self-conscious by asking you constantly if you were okay.

Here's a funny thing about being a woman in a high-society function in a tobacco state. You had to hide to smoke. Cigarettes are cheap, but the great classy southern woman doesn't smoke in front of men, it is still taboo. You followed a friend of Dixie's into some shrubbery behind the ballroom, around from the dining area, on the opposite side of the old country club where the men were roly-poly in their tuxes and bow-ties, suspenders and cummerbunds, smoking cigars, the gentleman's prize; just to smoke a cigarette.

To resist the temptation to flaunt tradition, hide and continue smoking on the back porch, turn the page.
To spit on their sexist conservative bullshit hierarchy, and simultaneously make an ass out of yourself, turn to page 32.

The whole time Dixie’s friend was fretting about where to put the butt, you couldn't flick it into the landscaping! You would have to skulk to the front and try to wallflower our way to the ashtray by the human penguins. So you skulked and had a great time dirtying your ankles in huge dewy hostas with some of the oldest money from Virginia, retiring early, and watching a movie with your mother,

Your next adventure begins on page 35 as long as you keep clean.