give up

lost vagueness just came on my playlist. i love tripp's movie that he made to this song. it makes me think of richmond, of last semester, of last year. it makes me think of a different time in the millican's life. in the days when tripp was in richmond and he and i were a bit more intolerant of our parents and their love for us. now i feel like he and i want a lot more for our family, for my parents, for us. or maybe not that we want more. maybe it's just that im more acutely aware of my family's mortality. im sure tripp must be, too. it isnt pleasant to think about.

i talked to mom today and i'll be going with her to iowa over spring break to visit my aunt and uncle. their health isnt so great. my father was going to accompany her but i dont think he was all that enthused, so im going. i think it'll be fun. i havent been to iowa since i was in first grade, and i wonder what it looks like now. im not sure if we'll be staying around the house mostly or what, but there are a few things i remember from the trip in first grade: we flew piedmont airlines, and they gave me a pin with wings on it. like i was a 'junior pilot' or something. they also served honey roasted almonds or maybe peanuts. and my mother and i drank tomato juice. i used to order 'virgin marys' a lot as a child instead of shirly temples. i thought it was cool because mom implied that it was (which was probably just her way of getting something healthy into me…and it worked: just this morning i had two glasses of V8. i still love marys, though i prefer the bloody kind now). when we flew into minneapolis, we had to drive to mason city to my aunt and uncle's house. when we were close to the state line, my aunt said "look, we're in minnesota but you can see iowa." i also thought that was cool. and dont laugh. i was in first grade. then, when we were there, we ate at some restaurant that was in a grocery store. it was like a real restaurant, not a cafe, and it had waiters. i thought that was cool. i also remember that everything was flat. super-flat. riding bikes was easy there. no hills. and there were sidewalks everywhere. i thought that was cool. it meant i could ride my bike to the elementary school playground or we could get to the pool easier than we could at home in virginia. one day, we went out and bought a bunch of gummy candy and jellybeans. i got gummy things that looked like coke bottles and tasted like coke. i thought that was cool. and i also got various flavors of jelly bellies. i dont remember how cool i thought that was, but im sure i thought they were pretty cool. and since my favorite flavor was watermelon back then, i probably bought most everything in watermelon. later, we went to my cousins' wedding and i dont really remember that. except that we played all of these terrible wedding pranks on them and i just cant believe all of things we did. as a kid, i thought it was fun b/c we had something to do the whole time we were there. but if anyone fills _my_ car with wrapping paper or my shoes with rice on my wedding day, im not really going to find it funny. im going to be worried about getting places on time and even though i shouldnt be angry about something like that, i probably would be. also, i remember that we saw llamas somewhere in iowa. i also thought they were cool. i guess i was at an age that i could be impressed by most anything. and i was.

going out there this time will surely be different. but it'll be nice to see mason city again…for now it exists only in my memory of childhood.