Tag: Writing

Upon Seeing The Brilliant White Light…

She wished She could go back in time and tell the angry, foaming-at-the-mouth, anti-Bush 13-year-old version of Herself that there would be a president worse than W. Her head would explode. Better yet, She wanted to tell Her that John McCain, the man She once considered the Antichrist, was the last respectable Republican to run for president and that towards the end of his life, She learned to respect and admire him.

She’d be happy to know that all those people who told Her She’d “lean more conservative when She turned 30” were dead wrong. She knew how She’d feel about who She was now, though. 13-year-old Her had Her hangups. Internalized misogyny was the biggest, and it only got worse in Her 20s.

She hoped every version of Her would be happy to see Her as She is now, free from those hangups and living freely as the person She always wanted to be. Raising a daughter in an environment that will never put her down for her gender or hold her accountable for other women’s perceived sins. She’ll never hear the word “slut” at such a young age and internalize or weaponize it. She hoped Deirdre never saw other girls as competition. Shoped, if Deirdre ever explored spirituality, she joins a coven of loving women rather than a cult dominated by old, women hating men.

She hoped we’d make it to that point more than anything. The past year had been grim. She woke up with more gray hairs every day, and She knew it was from the stress of daily life in America.

In 2025, She had a dream that Deirdre is back in the children’s hospital. She’s lying sprawled out on the bed in a pale yellow hospital gown, wires and tubes attached to her delicate, pale frame. She doesn’t know why she was there. A massive, life changing seizure, maybe?

A noise like an old timey WWII siren starts to play. A man with that old school cadence starts to talk, but She can’t make out what he’s saying. Possibly instructions to seek shelter. Soon, She hears people yelling and screaming. None of it is happening in the hospital, mind you. After a few seconds, She hears Her father’s voice over the commotion, reciting an adage that he used to quote any time they talked about WWII and the nuclear bombs.

Upon seeing the brilliant white light, stick your head between your legs and kiss your ass goodbye.

She turns around to the large window behind Her and sees a fiery mushroom cloud rise above the buildings not too far in the distance. She quickly turns around, picks Deirdre up, and tells her, “I love you, so much.” She holds her to Her chest, and the world turns blinding white.

She woke up feeling a certain way, like the world had changed after having that dream. It was a new, surreal feeling, like She had seen something She wasn’t supposed to. Prophetic dreams ran in Her family, and She’d had a few in her life. That one felt prophetic, as much as She hoped it wasn’t. And despite Her best effort to push it out of Her mind, She thought about it daily.

Maybe, She pondered, it already happened.

Since childhood, when She read books on fringe topics and outlandish conspiracy theories, She held tightly to the belief in infinite parallel universes and the possibility of quantum immortality. It all lined up with Her strange “Mandela Effect” memories. The Berenstein Bears, the cornucopia, Jeff Buckley having died in 1997 when She remembered him being alive and active in the 2010s, or Her cousin who She always knew to have three sons suddenly having four. The mysterious fourth son being the second youngest.

Was it likely? Maybe not, but it would explain the surreal feeling She got when She woke up. It gave Her some semblance of comfort. If it happened and Her consciousness transferred to another universe, She could keep going. Deirdre could keep going, happy and healthy.

But the state of the world cast doubts on Her parallel universe theory, at least in this instance. Trump and Israel were pushing all the buttons they could just short of the nuclear launch buttons. Their lust for destruction and distraction loomed over the anxious human race like a toxic fog.

The worst part of it all was, if it happened, it stemmed from a small group of people’s desires to keep Jeffrey Epstein’s name out of the news and hide the crimes they were all involved in. Human life meant so little to them that they would molest and murder children, then wipe out humanity to cover their tracks.

No wonder aliens won’t talk to us.

Boxed In

The idea popped into Her head while discussing the struggles of finding new home insurance with Her husband.

“I don’t know what the park is going to do if we don’t find insurance soon,” He said, visibly defeated by the events of the past 6 years that led to that moment.

“Well, we could move in with your parents,” she suggested, trying to keep a positive outlook on the ever stressful situation. “Deirdre would love it, seeing your mom and aunt every day. They have two spare bedrooms and a basement.”

“That would be so embarrassing,” He groaned.

“A lot of people our age are moving back home. This isn’t 90s. Nobody in our situation can really afford truly independence anymore.”

He set his jaw and looked around the cluttered, ramshackle trailer.  “My dad would probably only charge us about $500 for rent,” He said, a hint of hope in his voice.

“We could start saving up money,” She added. “The worst would be having to listen to his political rants every day and your mom making me cook every night.”

She turned Her head to see a slender black cat jump onto the kitchen table beside Her. She reached over to stroke the mighty house panther on its cheek, startling it before it pressed its head into Her hand for more affection.

A thought suddenly hit Her, and She dropped Her head to the table in defeat. “Your mom would make us get rid of the cats,” She whispered. “The moment one of them claws the couch or if Mimi pees on something she shouldn’t, they’d have to go.”

She looked over at the tubby tortie sitting on the couch. Mimi had a tendency to piss on soft things left on the ground. Clothes, blankets, reusable grocery bags, even paper and plushies. It was a nuisance and at times brought Her to tears, but Mimi was Her soul cat, and She could never bring Herself to get rid of her for any reason. Besides, it was a good lesson in consequences and keeping a clean floor. The black cat, Boba, was the first cat that was truly Hers, and although Boba didn’t seem to particularly like Her, She still couldn’t just rehome her.

Her attention turned to Merry, the grumpy, sometimes downright mean old brindle dog She’d had for nearly 15 years. She was reaching the end of her life, and peed everywhere inside the house as her geriatric bladder started to give out. Merry hated other dogs, particularly large dogs like Her in-law’s black lab. Merry tolerated Boba and hated Mimi, and there was no telling how she’d interact with the in-laws’ cats. On top of that, everything set that dog off into barking fits that few people could tolerate. And just like with the cats, She refused to get rid of Her beloved angry old rescue dog.

“I’m not getting rid of my animals for any reason. I’d rather be homeless.”

An while later, another thought entered Her mind. She had seen two story sheds for sale online that looked like really houses. Some of them were the same size as the antique bungalows in Her father’s old neighborhood. It would be a tight squeeze, but it would be doable.

“Do you think they’d let us put one in their backyard?” She asked Him. “It would be a temporary building. We could move it after we find a place of our own.”

“Even if they did, I’m not sure how their civic association would feel about it,” He replied. In the past, He said the neighborhood’s civic association was a lot more lenient than a regular HOA, but putting a temporary house or an oversized shed on the property might be pushing their neighborly hospitality.

The simplest solution to their problem would have happened three and a half years prior, when the insurance company dropped them for non-payment. They should have started looking for insurance immediately, but the unfortunate series of events that led to the non-payment prevented them from finding new insurance. The park didn’t ask for proof of insurance in that time, and as a result, they put it on the back burner until they did.

They knew, when it all came down to it, that the situation was entirely their fault and responsibility, and the two insurance brokers who started looking for new insurance for them could only do so much.

He leaned against the counter and hung His head in defeat.

“Stressed?” She asked.

“Overwhelmed,” He sighed. “There’s so much shit we need to get done. Deep clean, get rid of shit, I need to practice before the next show.”

She stood up and hugged him. “You go practice. I’ll take care this.”

“But-“

“Go. Practice.”

Eventually, He relented and slinked away to the cramped spare room where He kept His instruments and computer and Her walking pad.

She made her way to the bedroom, intent on sorting the mountain of clothes that spilled out of the plastic drawers in the closet and onto the floor. She didn’t know what was clean and what was dirty anymore, and those flimsy plastic drawers had become Her worst enemy. They had been a good idea before they had a child. They fit nicely into the small walk-in closet. But they hadn’t held up well over the years, and they didn’t fit nearly as many clothes as She thought they would have.

Miraculously, Mimi hadn’t pissed on anything in the room in a couple of years. There was plenty there to piss on, but these days, Mimi seemed to target things that fell on the living room floor.

She sat on the bed and stared at the squalid bedroom. This was one generational curse She couldn’t break no matter what She did. It would take intense therapy and zombifying medications just to slap a bandaid on that defect, and She couldn’t afford either of those options.

Visions of two story sheds danced around Her burdened mind. She had seen one that looked like a miniature version of an abandoned farmhouse She and Her father had explored in Her youth. Another shed looked like the barn that sat behind it. She imagined their layouts and utilized Her years of experience building houses in The Sims to maximize the minimal space in each shed.

The mini farmhouse would have been the ideal option, with space to build additional rooms as time went on and their family (hopefully) grew. But the mini barn was idyllic. She saw a small plot of land with a little red and white barn style shed. A veggie garden took up half of the yard. A patio with enough seating for all of Her friends took up another portion. The rest was a yard of clover for the children to play in.

Realistically, She knew that they’d eventually get the insurance settled. They’d remain in the trailer park with the owners and managers breathing down their necks for the foreseeable future. The threat of eviction for the smallest infraction ever looming over their heads and the price of lot rent jumping by a hundred dollars every year until they can no longer afford it. 

And somehow, the idea of staying there felt worse.