Downward

 

Eyes downward at three years old. My loose legs, which have dangled slightly inward at the knee since I was small, hang limp in the air between me and the ground. The dirt is the colour of dust in this photo, though in my memory it’s light chocolate, balding like my uncle. The grass has been worn from under my feet by hours of wandering, back and forth, back and forth, the swing-song singing. I’m taking pleasure at the aching sound of the chains rubbing against each other, at the sound of weight moving, weight moving in the quiet air. The fairness of it. That when there is a cause for sound, a sound exists.

So small and knowing, I sat on a dusty swing set already wrapped in silence. All ready. In a little bikini that sagged under my girlhood, showing a nipple far from ripe on the right side of the frame. My feet didn’t reach the ground so I threw my weight forward and back to get some momentum. I let the speed cool and as I slowed, it rocked my feelings to the surface. I liked how the randomness of the swing jostled my body.

My small hands were hanging on, for real. My grip over-zealous. I was looking down to make sure the ground didn’t disappear on me during brief moments of skyward sight. I remember the particular smell of cold metal, the blueness and the smell of my hands as it warmed. How it would pinch sometimes, and twist. My bare feet were so vulnerable and I held on tighter, shoulders all hunched up before dropping my weight back onto the ground, still trusting the air as I felt my body slide off the swing.

My feet weren’t flat then. It seemed to me they were almost round like bubbles, fat bubbles caught in mid-air. Little claw toes, though, trying to scratch at ground. Slap, slap, slap my fleshy feet on linoleum. Slap, slap, slap kicking up dust, bare on dirt and happy.

Later, there would be things to remember about these parts of me – those small feet and hands, the suspension. How I didn’t reach and I didn’t wander. My loyalty was firm. There was a silence to my body that felt uncommon, as I became surrounded by the shrieking looseness of other children. I sometimes sighed at myself and wondered what inspired this composure.

My mother, who is especially invested in silence, will tell you with pride that I was always this way. Composed and dignified, un-child-like, her little monk. But silence is built like houses – requires a firm foundation, years of decisions and effort. The watchful are especially vulnerable. What if I never cried because I didn’t believe in the likelihood of rescue? But that’s a bit dramatic. Yes, perhaps.

On the swing, my calves sliced through fresh air like sickles, like I was afraid of moving from the knees up. Highway to the danger zone, my thighs stayed glued tight to the seat while I pumped the air. It felt like I made that air, changed it into something more breathable. At that speed I wasn’t limp and I wasn’t small. I was changing: There’s a moment in me blooming, I’m bigger than I thought. My feet skid against the loose dirt ground, worn into a fine powder and rising up like music around me. This small change is power. The wind whistles through the underused parts of my heart and I sigh, happy to trust myself with feeling.

My longing was like the weather – a grid of feeling as hard to reach into as the passing sky. I squeaked out innocence in a shy whisper, needing to speak. I was low to the ground, trying to work it out. My neck bent backward and my mouth opened as I looked up to my mother’s example. As years grew on years, I became shrewd with words and doubtful of my intelligence. There was so much I didn’t understand – should I have been more worried?

 

As my feet grew closer to the ground each spring, I got more used to half-thought thoughts and the loneliness of perception. Born awake and prone to waking, I felt much more alone than I actually was. I had some sort of conscious wall around me to protect what I knew and had to keep. But: bare feet, bare arms, long unkempt hair, absent-minded singing. I was too alone to be afraid.

There were days I threw myself belly-first onto those swings. Baby spider, the small breath of concentration. Though my chest was tight under my own weight, I watched the ground in earnest like measured progress, tracing long luxurious sweeps across the dirt. The triumph of touching ground, an easy smile on my face. My feet scuffed the silky dirt and it was like combing pretty girl-hair. Patterns emerged. I had a friend.

Later, the lines of the sidewalk became my markers. I would walk with my eyes down, staring at the sidewalk ticking by, one roughened concrete slab after the other. Neat lines and wide borders. I was tucked inward and down and 12 years old. Tucked in at 12 years old, and my light blue eyes would water at the sun. I was nervous and smart with livewire focus.

At that age, I made polite gestures toward girlhood and wanted to make friends. As a beginning, I liked pink and shiny things, but I was too firm. So, I hitched up my shoulders like clothing and tried my best. Being a quick learner was to my advantage, but somehow I seemed better off alone. Loner was less tragic because I had so many names.

The arrogance of belonging was well-used against me. A genealogy of girlhood built from the first days of school. I quarantined new girls and kept them to myself, hoping they would be immune. But they were gradually folded in, the recipe calling for it – a saga swinging back and forth over solid ground. Small decisions.

The rounded corners and innocence expected of me was easy. I politely relinquished control because I heard it being asked of me. But then I faced the hygienic cocoon of girl to woman lost. It’s not easy to be so clean. I watched girls like dance steps.Mouthing one, two, three, four (a bit contrived). I felt no rush despite the importance of belonging. None of the classroom urgency in seeking what seemed a natural language, a loose kind of fluency. What if I laughed loud and meant it? Could I still be a girl?

My loneliness was directionless, so I folded myself inward and practiced the music. Counting one, two, three, four. I was willing and eager to please. I didn’t mind so much, I just wanted the dignity of knowing what was coming.

I know you take one look at me and worry: I am watchful and open. I look scared and eat honestly and answer what is asked of me. I thought all questions were just bare words. And even still, my innocence was a startling patchwork: sparse in some spots, but a mossy forest floor, too, strangely flourishing. My urge to sing was strong, strangled back for classroom dignity and the sake of appearances.In song, the warbly sound I learned from trees, I began to listen, to reach beyond the diorama of lies that I saw spread before me. Song was movement, and the strong smell of god. It went beyond fear and the stale exhaust that crept into the backseat of the car, though the real weight of it sometimes kept me from swinging. My heart was loud and over-crowded, drawing a line between what should be and what is, shedding memories with lightning speed and clenched fists.

If I were to look up the word pendulum, it would describe the movement that inhabited my childhood and the thoughts I carried with me. A body suspended from a fixed point so as to swing freely under the action of gravity (seeking and finding freedom by moving from a fixed point, surrender). Commonly used to regulate movements (like clockwork). Something that alternates between opposites (such as kindness and regret, or the mechanical up and down of a teabag pinched tight between finger and thumb). The need for a fixed point to move from. Hub, moon, hot water, sun. Surrender or allowance – a strange kind of trust.From the height of childhood, this gilded heart. I craved the feeling of being both free and good, and puzzled out reason in the back and forth balance of sun and shade. Swing up and into the sun, swing back and under the broad arms of trees. Swing up and under the safety of believing in the worst – fear is what shadows are made of. That baby spider thinks faith is a nasty habit. Better off opening the door before it’s knocked off its hinges. But is that defeat? Honestly. I felt so ashamed of how accommodating I was.

There’s an acid to knowing you have chosen to believe in the worst possible outcome, though there is less fear when you’re its cheerleader. Made your choice: swing back and under the broad arms of trees. Hold your breath, icy breath of shame that cuts into your weak places and makes you regret what you have said and done and what you haven’t and who you are and what you want. All of it is criminal. All of it was criminal.