An intimate relationship between two people is void of nothing - especially bodily fluids. Now, I'm not necessarily talking about those kinds of bodily fluids; not the glue that holds your thighs together post-sex, but the less appealing ones. Let us take, for instance, snot.

I will make a wild assumption and claim a majority of Americans (note that while I would normally add other areas of the world such as Britain or France, I refrain from doing so here because I am not as familiar with their people's cultural views on spit, snot, shit, semen, etc..) take bodily fluids for granted. I, myself, am in that majority, especially with regards to spit. Having spent six years of my life in band, nothing triggers my gag reflex more than the thought of a brass instrument player emptying his/her spit anywhere near me. The sounds of fuzzy horns moist with the spit of a brace-faced pre-teen and the fear that arose when my band director asked the French horns, who lined the row behind me to empty their "water" haunt my subconscious. However, I do realize that saliva, no matter the number of revolting qualities, is essential to the bodily function of a human being. As is snot. If anything, mucus provides more protection from bacterial and viral infections than any other bodily fluid. Oh, I'm sure you're thinking, "yeah - sounds all fine and dandy until you're trapped in an inevitable snot-scenario," and I'm here to tell you: you're right. However, instead of discrediting mucus because of its less-than-amiable qualities, I will share my journey of acceptance.

As a child I was fortunate enough to be in good health. Save for a few cases of strep and one nasty encounter with the flu, the only ailment that struck me on a regular basis was chronic nosebleeds (thanks to genetics). Ironically, I can attribute my nosebleeds to the lack of mucus in my body. Otherwise, I caught the occasional cold, and suffered no allergies until I turned 18 years-old, when, for some reason unknown to me, I developed seasonal allergies. Obviously this sudden toll on my overall health was jarring. I had spent my entire life in the Texas Panhandle - capital city for pollen-and-other-allergen-exchange via the regional wind trade - void of all allergy woes. The results were devastating. Without fail my sinuses begin to drain and it becomes impossible to sweep the floors at work without my nose producing a waterfall with every change in season. Thankfully, my boyfriend shares my quarterly misery, so instead of feeling like a nasty snot-monster, I know I am accepted among the one peer who counts.

My boyfriend is the shining star in my life who managed to solidify my appreciative attitude towards my own snot. Q. is the first man I have lived with, and hopefully the only man I will ever live with. According to cultural trend, when a man and a woman move in together, new stresses pose threats to the relationship. Q. and I, however, never genuinely felt any of the pressures we expected: the two of us are equally docile, and do not enjoy fighting. This isn't to say we don't fight at all - but I can confidently say we have never called one another names, and cohabiting has been the easiest living situation we have ever been in. Our relationship is void of fights regarding who needs to clean the bathroom, or do laundry, or who is responsible for taking care of the cats, and the less-than-agreeable habits we possess are, in every sense, tolerable. In fact, one of Q.'s worst habits is one of the funniest things about him. One night, about a week after we moved in to our apartment, we hopped into the shower after a long day at work. Q. and I have a nightly ritual of hot-boxing our little bathroom before our shower, and this night the strain was particularly pungent, causing an intense case of the giggles. Midway through our shower, right before Q. washed his face, he interrupted his shower routine, folded his hands together in front of his face, and blew his nose.

I will admit, I was visibly alarmed. He opened his hands, full of snot, and ran them under the shower stream, snotty water splashing on the shower mat right next to my feet. Both of us watched him rinse his hands, and looked up to make eye contact after we were both sure they were clean. He saw the look of bewilderment on my face, and the both of us burst into a fit of giggles. After managing after several gasps of air to ask the question, "What was that," I learned that this is something he usually does every shower. Apparently the steam from the shower softens his sinuses, and blowing his nose becomes much easier. The shamelessness was evident, and I loved him all the more. Gross as it may have been, he did not apologize for the action that relieved his discomfort. After his explanation, I looked him right in the eyes, folded my hands together in front of my face, and blew my nose. Every night since, we, as a united, shameless couple, blow our snot-rockets in the shower. 

Sometime in the past I happened to come across a sweet soul. At that sometime I became friends with this sweet soul: I would kiss this sweet soul, I would cry with this sweet soul, and I would try to fix this suffering, sweet soul.

Our sometime together was short, however. Most of it was spent at one of two churches (I say "two churches" to emphasize two types of churches, not necessarily two separate religions); for one church, non-denominational Christian, hosted a plethora of not-fully-religious-or-not-religious-at-all preteens and teens with a thirst to socialize and share angst. The other church, Baptist, was almost entirely the opposite, and we tried our best to connect with it and the supposed Holy Spirit it housed; yet, I know for me anyhow, religion never settled well with my soul.

Sometimes the hard, tragic things in life must be discussed - not for closure's sake, but for the sake of the spirit the hard, tragic thing stifled. Even I - at an age much too young -could sense the tragedy awaiting this sweet soul. I could feel his weight as we bowed our heads and wrapped our arms around each other's shoulders in hopeful prayer. I can remember the tears that built up in his eyes anytime I mentioned an ex-girlfriend, or a long-lost friend, or his uncle (who, from what I hear, laid the groundwork for the tragedies to come), and I could see his dark obsession with things that are forever out of reach. I knew then I could not fix or save him, although (foolishly) I believed someone might.

Sometime not too long ago - in fact, around Christmastime - this sweet soul sacrificed his life for peace of mind, and left me with a hard burden of sorts. A mind clogged with confusion, and sadness: but, for that poor thing, I will gladly take this confusion and sadness, as long as his sweet soul may be free.

I will refrain from writing a poem

Because poetry is not in my blood -

I will write in scattered lines

Which will be scewed as verse.

Poetry is not in my blood

As the color red.

Prose is in my blood

As the color yellow.

Amarillo is an identity,

A grounded state-of-being,

A walk through buffalo grass

Thriving under the sun.

Of course littered about lies garbage,

Tainting the golden crust,

The identity, and the sun -

However, that, too, is part

Of the whole of the identity.

Yellow is not just a color

That brings vibrancy to paintings,

Represents anxiety,

Or highlights the words of those

Whose genuis

We should hold most dear -

But the place that I was born.

Born, raised, and shaped

Under the brazing sun,

The 80 degree weather,

And the crunch of dry, yellow grass.

Amarillo and yellow:

The words are one in the same.

They are colors, anxieties, identities -

I am they and they are me

An intimate relationship between two people is void of nothing - especially bodily fluids. Now, I'm not necessarily talking about those kinds of bodily fluids; not the glue that holds your thighs together post-sex, but the less appealing ones. Let us take, for instance, snot.

I will make a wild assumption and claim a majority of Americans (note that while I would normally add other areas of the world such as Britain or France, I refrain from doing so here because I am not as familiar with their people's cultural views on spit, snot, shit, semen, etc..) take bodily fluids for granted. I, myself, am in that majority, especially with regards to spit. Having spent six years of my life in band, nothing triggers my gag reflex more than the thought of a brass instrument player emptying his/her spit anywhere near me. The sounds of fuzzy horns moist with the spit of a brace-faced pre-teen and the fear that arose when my band director asked the French horns, who lined the row behind me to empty their "water" haunt my subconscious. However, I do realize that saliva, no matter the number of revolting qualities, is essential to the bodily function of a human being. As is snot. If anything, mucus provides more protection from bacterial and viral infections than any other bodily fluid. Oh, I'm sure you're thinking, "yeah - sounds all fine and dandy until you're trapped in an inevitable snot-scenario," and I'm here to tell you: you're right. However, instead of discrediting mucus because of its less-than-amiable qualities, I will share my journey of acceptance.

As a child I was fortunate enough to be in good health. Save for a few cases of strep and one nasty encounter with the flu, the only ailment that struck me on a regular basis was chronic nosebleeds (thanks to genetics). Ironically, I can attribute my nosebleeds to the lack of mucus in my body. Otherwise, I caught the occasional cold, and suffered no allergies until I turned 18 years-old, when, for some reason unknown to me, I developed seasonal allergies. Obviously this sudden toll on my overall health was jarring. I had spent my entire life in the Texas Panhandle - capital city for pollen-and-other-allergen-exchange via the regional wind trade - void of all allergy woes. The results were devastating. Without fail my sinuses begin to drain and it becomes impossible to sweep the floors at work without my nose producing a waterfall with every change in season. Thankfully, my boyfriend shares my quarterly misery, so instead of feeling like a nasty snot-monster, I know I am accepted among the one peer who counts.

My boyfriend is the shining star in my life who managed to solidify my appreciative attitude towards my own snot. Q. is the first  man I have lived with, and hopefully the only man I will ever live with. According to cultural trend, when a man and a woman move in together, new stresses pose threats to the relationship. Q. and I, however, never genuinely felt any of the pressures we expected: the two of us are equally docile, and do not enjoy fighting. This isn't to say we don't fight at all - but I can confidently say we have never called one another names, and cohabiting has been the easiest living situation we have ever been in. Our relationship is void of fights regarding who needs to clean the bathroom, or do laundry, or who is responsible for taking care of the cats, and the less-than-agreeable habits we possess are, in every sense, tolerable. In fact, one of Q.'s worst habits is one of the funniest things about him. One night, about a week after we moved in to our apartment, we hopped into the shower after a long day at work. Q. and I have a nightly ritual of hot-boxing our little bathroom before our shower, and this night the strain was particularly pungent, causing an intense case of the giggles. Midway through our shower, right before Q. washed his face, he interrupted his shower routine, folded his hands together in front of his face, and blew his nose. 

I will admit, I was visibly alarmed. He opened his hands, full of snot, and ran them under the shower stream, snotty water splashing on the shower mat right next to my feet. Both of us watched him rinse his hands, and looked up to make eye contact after we were both sure they were clean. He saw the look of bewilderment on my face, and the both of us burst into a fit of giggles. After managing after several gasps of air to ask the question, "What was that," I learned that this is something he usually does every shower. Apparently the steam from the shower softens his sinuses, and blowing his nose becomes much easier. The shamelessness was evident, and I loved him all the more. Gross as it may have been, he did not apologize for the action that relieved his discomfort. After his explanation, I looked him right in the eyes, folded my hands together in front of my face, and blew my nose. Every night since, we, as a united, shameless couple, blow our snot-rockets in the shower. 

"I don't know what the fuck is up with my dad," he said.

"I'm sorry," she replied.

"I think he's having an affair."

Silence.

"I'm so sick of being around my family," he concluded. "I just need to get out. I don't even really live there, anyways, I'm just there, you know?"

"Yeah, I really don't live in my house either," she mused. "It's my parents' house, not mine."

"Exactly. I don't even like any of them. I don't respect them, I don't like them, and they feel the same about me."

"I've come to terms with them."

"I thought I had come to terms with them, but now I'm dealing with this bullshit and it's just making me realize how little I actually matter in that house. That surgery my niece had? I didn't even know until yesterday."

"My whole family is kind of like that. Not really knowing or caring what's going on with anyone else. We all live divided under one household."

"Fuck them all."

"I dunno, I kind of respect my mom, you know? She has a rough, emotionally tolling job, and even though I can see how exhausting it is for her, I admire her. She deals with people who are truly fucked up, you know? Not just people who act like they're fucked up, but children and victims who have real problems. My step-dad, on the other-hand, I don't get."

"What'd you mean?"

"He goes out for two hours a day, takes some photos, comes home and sits on his ass photo-shopping all day, and then claims he's exhausted. The life of a free-lance photographer. But shit, it's like he runs the whole household even though he really doesn't do anything. His OCD just dominates. You know our washer and dryer? I can't even use specific settings on those because he taped over all of the options and wrote "NO" on the ones that use too much water. And when he goes out of town he tapes all of the lights that need to remain on the entire time so the house looks "occupied" and his camera equipment won't be stolen. If they come home and I've turned one of the lights off it's as if I've committed some heinous crime."

"Yeah, dude. I dunno, we just deal with the same bullshit."

"Yeah, we do."

Silence.

"I'm not really satisfied with any of my relationships. All of them have just become so shallow, especially at school. Just all a bunch of fake friendships based on connections."

She pondered this for a second, thinking surely he didn't mean their relationship, as well, and replied, "I dunno what we expected going into college. I dunno what I expected, especially. I really haven't gained any new, notable relationships. Not even from the group I went to Italy with."

"That must have sucked."

"I didn't really mind. I like being alone, you know. I thought I was being smart by not 'clique-ing' myself like everyone else did and try to have an experience with everyone, and it worked to an extent, but people still turned on me and made assumptions about who I am. What else is new?"

"Yeah, there's really no winning with people."

"I thought I had made some good friends there, even the group of kids the adults called the 'frat kids' - "

"Aw, fuck them. Fuck that. They're all just shallow fucks and you know it."

"I know it now, but then they actually made me feel accepted. I went to dinner with them one night, and one of the girls actually said, 'You know, it's really cool you decided to come with us,' and I believed them."

"What happened?"

"I went off with them on our last day in Rome to eat lunch before we went to the Vatican. Around the walls of the Vatican, there are museum guides asking tourists if they intend to go into the city, and giving out directions. One of those men approached us on our way to a Turkish kabop stand, and one of the boys in my group said, 'Hell no, I'm not going into that place, I got excommunicated years ago!'

Saying 'excommunicate' next to Vatican City is like saying 'bomb' in an airport. The museum guys got pissed and started cussing us out, calling us 'fucking wanker-Kentuckians.' I didn't really know what to do, but I was as offended as they were, so I asked the group to be a little bit more aware of how serious and sensitive that area is about their religion."

"They won't listen to you."

"I know that now, I didn't know that then. Right after I said it, they all ganged up on me and said it was my problem I let the cussing get to me, not theirs. I thought they'd understand."

"You shouldn't have."

"I get that, but I did. I'm so different. Why am I so different? Why is it that when I say or do something, it's always rejected immediately?"

"Because that's just how we are. It's better this way."

"Is it?"

She choked up, and looked out the car window.

"Fuck this," he said. "We're much too sober."

And with that, she loaded a bowl and passed the lighter.

Although viewing young children as sexually charged young beings is for most people uncomfortable, unnatural, and an utter nightmare one only finds in Aldous Huxley novels, early sexual development among children is not entirely uncommon.

When I was about six years old, I deciphered on my own the act of sex. Despite my small error in mistaking semen for urine, I was very aware of both the functions of the male and female body, and once I had this revelation, I became nothing but curious. I vividly remember playing "Truth or Dare" with the seven year-old boy who lived next door, and while most children dare one another to eat worms or climb to the very top of the monkey-bars, we jumped straight to the Rated-R version of the childish game and, by the end, were poking each other in the nipples, giggling.

I had my first orgasm at the age of seven. Of course I didn't understand what had happened to my body, but I certainly knew it was abnormal and wonderful; however, since I could see the abnormality of my actions, I felt embarrassed and guilty, and contained my sensual experiences to the solitude of my bedroom after-hours. This concept of privacy, like sex, seems to be just as natural.

Since I had been pleasuring myself from a young age without knowing it, the actual act of sex, itself, proved to be disappointing for the first couple of years, and it wasn't until two years after I had lost my virginity that I discovered I had been having orgasms all along.

I am not at all ashamed of my close relationship with my sexuality, yet I do not express the full extent of my experiences because I am aware of the odd nature of my early development.

Every single impactful lesson I’ve learned in my short life has been taught through seemingly coincidental and ironic situations. My first dose of this learning process came to me when I was four years-old, and this particular story is by far the one that has made the biggest impression on my life.

Each child’s dream is to be blessed with the newest toys and games to consume all of his or her days. At that age, one does not have care of the ways of the world; clothing trends do not exist, the separations between boy and girl, rich and poor, and black and white become the last things in mind, and horrific pictures of war are merely noise on the television that mommy and daddy watch and call “old people tee-vee.” The summer of my fourth year was meant to revolve around one thing: our brand new trampoline.

•••

My brother Jerrod and I were more than ecstatic when my parents bought us this gift. We had finally moved up in the neighborhood from the only kids who did not own a trampoline to the kids who invited everyone we knew to spend the day at our home and have water wars. This, back then, was important. Within the first few days, Jerrod and I had spent more time trying to reach the sky than sleeping.

One afternoon, about a week after our first night with the trampoline, my brother and I were out playing while my Nana, who was baby-sitting us at the time, stayed inside to “watch her stories.” As we were doing flips and tricks, we thought of a new fun game to play: charades. The rules were simple: pick a character on television or a person that we both knew, and imitate them until the other person guessed the correct answer. The only effect that made it more fun than regular charades was the feeling of anti-gravity the trampoline provided, and after a few hysterical rounds, I got an idea.

I hopped up when it was finally my turn, crooked my left leg under my butt and began to bounce on one leg. I didn’t even have to add a voice or dialogue before my brother busted up laughing and shouted out, “GRANDMA HELEN!”

•••

I should probably have mentioned before the previous paragraph that my grandmother, Helen, was an amputee above the knee, and had only one leg. Now, I know making fun of her seems cruel, but she was an awful good sport about it all the time. I remember my father putting her on the trampoline, and on see-saws, and it didn’t matter how much she screamed and hooted and hollered, she always laughed after the playful torture. To me, poking fun at her was normal, but I suppose the universe did not agree with me that day.

After I did my “classic Grandma Helen” impression, my brother stood up and began hopping on one leg with me. Now, my brother was quite a bit larger than me- he was five years older, twice my size, and when his weight hit the trampoline, I would spring into the air as if gravitational pull didn’t exist. At the time it was a ball. Jerrod and I were full of squeals and laughter, jumping with one less limb in a circle, and reaching new heights with every bounce. Then, with a blur, everything shifted from joy to intense pain.

I still to this day don’t really understand the physics of it all. I was mid-air, looking far down at the backyard below, and it just… snapped. It’s not as if I landed on it wrong, or fell off the trampoline- my leg simply snapped while I was flying six feet above my brother’s head. Most people tell me the force of the trampoline exerted on my leg before lift-off must have caused it to break, but I honestly believe karma is genuinely a cold-hearted bitch like superstitious people always say. I’ve never felt so much pain. I can’t remember what it felt like exactly, I just remember not being able to breathe, and then waking up on my kitchen counter with my Nana’s worried voice asking me a whole bunch of questions I didn’t have the energy to answer, and that says a lot because I’m fairly certain I ate two sugar-doused bowls of Lucky Charms earlier that morning.

Of course, being the theatrical little four year-old I was, my parents didn’t believe me when I told them my leg was broken. They kind of shrugged it off and thought it was a possible sprain or a pulled muscle, so the emergency room wasn’t our immediate resort. My dad wanted me to try and be active and walk off the pain, but I just crumpled to the floor and yelled at him because it was excruciating. I don’t completely blame my parents for not taking me to the ER. I did over-exaggerate a lot when I was that age, and the break was not visible to the outside of my body. After a couple days, my parents took me to the hospital, and I went in for an x-ray. They bought me a stuffed Dalmatian to accompany me just in case the machines scared me- which they did. Sure enough, the results showed a small break beneath my right knee. I gave my dad hell for it, too.

•••

Immediately following my ER visit, I had a little pink cast put on. I adored it. My dad airbrushed this really awesome sun and rainbow on it, and I couldn’t wait to show everyone during preschool the next week. But, seeing as I was very young and small, the doctor couldn’t find a set of crutches for me to hobble around with. This is where irony comes back into play, as if there wasn’t enough already. I was supplied with a tiny walker identical to the grown-up walker my Grandma Helen owned, and my parents, who can be very cynical people at times, decided it would be absolutely hysterical to fashion them with little green tennis balls on each leg, turning me into a mini-Grandma. The parallel was undeniable: one leg, a walker, and those damned green tennis balls. My Grandma Helen and I became one in the same.

I remember the embarrassment more than I remember the laughter of my family as I was presented at game night. My hot cheeks, stinging tears and utter contempt towards my broken leg blurred the mocking tone and twisted faces of my cousins and my aunts and my uncles. But there was one thing about that night that wasn’t washed away in embarrassment, and I can see it as clearly today as I saw it fourteen years ago: my grandmother’s face. She was laughing her beautiful laugh, and smiling as wide as ever, even though she knew my injury came from making fun of her. Although I didn’t realize it until I was older, that moment defined her in my life as the strongest woman I will ever meet.

•••

She died last July. She was so scared to die, but she shouldn’t have been. I don’t know if it was the thought of being judged by God, the possibility of Heaven and Hell, or the knowledge that she would soon be leaving the family she loved more than anything in the world because they were all she had that caused her fear. Helen Hinders lived a long and hard life, and in my heart I know she died a rewarded and happy soul.

If you believe in God and Heaven, she is most certainly there piddling around in a beautiful home with her husband, and playing card games with other former amputees while laughing over the largest southern feast you’ve ever seen. If you believe in reincarnation, she will re-enter the world as pure and brilliant as before, sharing joy through laughter as she did before, and loving everyone around her unconditionally as she did before, but this time she will have everything she ever wanted. And, lastly, if you don’t believe in anything, if you believe that when people die, they die and nothing comes after, then the atoms that made up her body will reform and create the most beautiful wild flower garden in the world, and millions of people will find peace and love in it every single day.

I will never forget my grandmother. I will never forget her contagious laugh, her timeless wit, or her jet-black hair, and I certainly will never forget the love and strength I saw in her the time that I broke my leg.