A Denim Jacket and my Face Wiped with Spit

Looking through a small pile of old photographs.

I'm a little kid.

4. 5. 6. So on.

I remember that house.

That coat.

My sister is so small.

I am so small.

I remember that day. Standing outside the gymnasium before the first day in a new school.

Sun shining in my eyes. My mother fussing over something on my face.

Wiping spit on me.

Kids staring as they walk into school.

My father was leaning against the car.

"Kick some ass bud" he says.

"You're going to be fine. You'll make lots of new friends and have lots of fun," my mother says.

I could piss I'm so nervous.

I remember the camera flash.

And I look back at myself over almost three decades of new schools, new friends, and lots of fun.

Right?

Funny, now. Thinking that then I felt so aware. So old already.

I was going to be a scientist.

A lawyer.

A Ghostbuster.

I nail hoses to the road.