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2005-01-05 || 11:47 p.m. || in fullerton, 1996 || when he crossed his legs and folded himself up into a wheelchair on the bad days and on the bench at the bus stop on the good, his calves and ankles in those white cotton socks seemed to stretch out from the hem of his pants and it looked like if you grabbed the feet of his orthopedic shoes, reluctantly purchased by my mother at the drug store down the street, his legs could be pulled like taffy. he was convinced all the ladies on his floor were in love with him. some days he called my mother by her mother's name, sometimes he called me by my mother's name. he told war stories that never happened, and the one time i brought my grandmother to visit him he told a story he most likely heard secondhand concerning a prostitute. he got a purple heart for being hit by shrapnel while sitting in uniform in a dentist's chair overseas. the day i brought my grandmother to visit we went out to lunch afterward and in the parking lot she clutched the sleeve of my coat in that desperate child-like old person way, the skin of her hand creased like paper and dark in parts like ink was slowly pooling beneath the surface, and she put her face to my chest and cried that it was unfair her husband was dead and that he was still alive there across the street. guestbook || notes || archives || profile || photos || d-land |