Dear Penelope

the girl's shift key on the computer is out.
she knows this is a pain, but feels otherwise that she will not write at all.

today the girl feels like a faint rainbow that's about to disappear into the blue sky. she doesn't think anyone saw her but she is assured she is a rainbow nonetheless.

this last week she went hiking and she was staring at a strange man wearing a square backpack that looked like he had been in the wilderness for a few days so as he came down she moved wide to the right to get a better look at him out of the corner of her eye. she passed the man and thought she would say good morning. he said, did you see the rattlesnake?

rude, the girl thought. plain rude. not even a good morning. she did nonetheless turn back from where she'd just walked and there was a young rattle snake slowly slithering into the scrub brush. she could not ascertain if she would have seen it otherwise or how close to her it had really been. it paused and turned back, as if it too, were highly offended by the interruption of its day, but i guess it is better that its off the trail.

the girl proceeded to tell the man that she'd never seen one on the trails before, and he said, annoyingly- yup that's a rattlesnake, look at the rattles.

uh, duh! that was not what the girl was saying.

anyway the girl was not there for that. she was there because her dad's side of the family is crazy, and that a walk in the hills would do her good. and she felt, appropriate too the moment, that she was in a small western, gun-slinging town and the sun was high and beating down hard from overhead... which made her feel uncomfortable and the words, distasteful might fly out of her victorian mouth, about everything up until that moment. and all that she said, was, that started the whole thing- a small blaze anyway, was, "why did so and so hit your dad?"

and then the cousin who was sipping a beer and eating pulledporkbbq sandwich said, what are you talking about? (thwak went the flaming arrow.)

but the girl, who ate with her pinky out, and genteelly sipped her tea, murmured surprise that she knew something the boy didn't know. and very matter of factly told what she knew, which wasn't much. but then the boy got mad after he left the girl and called his father, who said it was true and that it did happen, but this is how it really happened, see... and then the boy who was sick in the gut for his father and his whole life and this awful man who'd hit his peaceful father, called his short-fused trigger happy brother, who despised the man equally for his whole life more than he despised his own father and mother, went over to so and so and gave him a peace of his mind and good talking to- to stand up and act like a man, so that the boy wouldn't do something he regretted. and well words were exchanged and the police were called... but nobody died, which is what would have happened maybe if the boy had gone over there.

and then the boy calls to warn the girl about what she'd accidentally started, and how, he was sorry but he was so angry. and then the boy's brother called and talked about what happened. and then the girl talked to her mother and the day passed into night and then the girl's father called and said, what did you say to the boy! i've got so and so on the line and they're telling me blah blah blah. and use some discretion when you're talking to people and passing things in confidence.

and the girl said, if it involves the truth she certainly wouldn't and the actions and events of a family don't go back to just one moment, but choice after choice, year before years, until you're back at the beginning and saying, you just don't love me that's all. you hate me. why are you a bad person. why are you on drugs. lost jobs, disputes, stolen money, molestation, property exchanged, adultery... and fucking crazy den of evil, rotted vine, and diseased family tree sort of thing--really, it could all be reduced to those things...

and not, what did the girl say to the boy. though she knows her words set off a trap.

she decided though after going up the mountain and coming back down to try and love a little bit more- to her father and the boy and his brother. which she thought, the lack of love, was the root of most of the trouble. and as she jogged a stretch in the road on the way down, feeling mostly safe from the lions and watching closely for snakes, her lungs felt free and her body barely tired at all. she thought she could just keep on walking into the wilderness forever.