X: 10/10/02

Work Diary, 10/10/02

Birthdays in my family were typically celebrated in a restaurant beyond
our means and perhaps with a cheap, sugary cake, our names decorated in
the sprawling cursive of a high school dropout.

The morning of our mother's thirty-fifth birthday was unremarkable: I
woke in the morning, dressed, combed out the rat's nest of my younger
sister's hair, and we went to school. Unlike me, my little sister was
blond and olive-skinned, the product of a tryst between my mother and a
married doctor. My father had disappeared prior to the pregnancy. He
and my mother weren't getting along and, besides, my aunt had shot him
in the foot with his own gun after she'd walked in on him beating up my
mother. He returned to a newborn who shared his last name but who
clearly was not his.

At any rate, our father was again out of the picture by the time our
mother turned thirty-five. My sister and I went to school like we
usually did, planning to meet afterwards so we could figure out what to
do for our mother's birthday. We were fairly confident that she would
make an appearance for the occasion. Of course, having dinner in a
fancy restaurant was also a nice possibility, though somehow we weren't
placing any bets.

When school let out, we joined hands to cross the hellish city streets
of Houston and headed for the supermarket, a low concrete building
where we grocery shopped on weekends. We had an old cart for those
Sunday trips that my sister could climb into; she felt the wiring of
the cart was much more comfortable on her bare feet than the sticker
bushes and broken glass along the street. Also, the extra weight in the
cart made it easier to maneuver over the uneven terrain beside the
road.

The supermarket was also the place where we did a great deal of
shoplifting. One might think that the employees would notice the same
two kids going in and out without any shopping bags, but we were white
children in a mostly-black neighborhood. Latter day racists who gently
deny the advantages of pale skin should try spending a month on my old
stomping grounds. I'd lay odds they'd be singing a different tune at
the end of their stay.

We decided to get birthday cards for our mother, one from each of us.
Naturally we had no money, but both of our coat pockets were slit on
the bottom, ready to receive whatever we hurriedly shoved down. We
stood in front of the card rack for several minutes, casually looking
around and forcing ourselves to not look suspicious. Once finished, we
strolled out of the supermarket with a practiced gait that said there
was already an adult waiting for us on the other side of the automatic
doors.

"I got this," I said, producing a glittery card with the word 'Mom'
printed on its front. "What'd you get?"

"This," said my sister, handing me a card that featured a droopy-eyed
bloodhound standing in a field of too-green grass. I opened it, and
this is what it said:

"HAPPY BIRTHDAY, UNCLE"