Objects in Mirror
June 15th
New Moon remains in Gemini
The Lovers…
I have this memory …
When I was a child for Christmas or maybe a birthday.
Someone got me this microphone set and a toy guitar.
The microphone set had this transmitter in it and my dad could tune to a frequency on his sound system and it’d broadcast over the speakers.
I remember… playing the guitar and screaming and singing over the radio until the point of proper exhaustion.
My mother and father jubilant and replete with laughter.
It’s one of those memories where when I view it in my mind, everything is just overflowing with light.
The feeling of exhaustion I felt as that … three or four year old child echoes that of the exhaustion I feel after a proper outing on the bike.
There was another christmas or birthday, I received a similar gift.
This one an am/fm transmitter not only with a microphone, but with the ability to play cassettes.
I could host my own radio show.
There’s two things my father has owned for as long as I can remember…
A 10-speed Miyata and his sound system.
I hadn’t thought much of the similarities although they’re somewhat obvious.
Looking forward is what made them much more clear.
I got caught in the rain riding bikes with daughter yesterday evening and while everyone is scrambling for shelter, clearly irked by the unexpected rainfall.
She’s gleefully singing and proposing that we race around a little bit longer.
“Dad, I’m gonna be faster than you.”
I wish for nothing more.
I wish for nothing more than you to surpass me in every way possible.
A bike leans against the boxes of records in a home filled with the sounds synthesized by my daughters and I.
On our bike rides they point out Porsches and whistle tunes from Moodymann.
Another memory I often sit with…
It’s spring of my senior year…
I’m sitting in the car with my mom outside of my high school
“So you really wanna go to Hofstra? And not Brooklyn College?”
Accepted into both schools
I would have studied music management at Brooklyn College…
Not pre-med.
“Yeah.”
“Okay…” trying to be enthused but with a clear underlying disappointment…
The idea to be a pre-med major influenced only by the pursuit of profit.
It occurs to me that in my mother’s position, she knew I was acting outside of my nature but…
what is one to do?
How do you get through to someone who thinks they’ve got it all figured out?
Parenting …
An odd thing.
The joy of watching your child do something they love sincerely…
The gifts that you share with them knowing the joy it will fill both you and them with…
The memories created…
Disposed by …
crushed by the …
boot of … “supposed to”
Toeing the line of allowing one to be autonomous but saving them from their immature self.
But …
Parenting…
The faith in yourself…
and knowing that you did a good enough job for it to all pan out just fine in the end.
Wishing for nothing more than they surpass you in every way possible.
The gift you share knowing that they’ll serve as tools to remind them of who they are and what they come from.
The joy just a bonus.