beats me

Why do they always portray white people like that? They're in these manicured clothes, women with dresses that measure their waists into a tight hourglass and too much makeup on their faces. Their red lips look like a talking tuna steak. All the men wear glasses framing their expressions like permanent parentheses. And the rooms are a wood paneled extension of the manicured lawns outside. No speck of dust or bright colored throw would find safe haven there. Not in those living rooms, not in the 60's.

Is this what my parents were going for? Is that what that velvet furniture, that huge tropical image papered into the living room, the tiles on the floor and wood paneled walls were over? I see that in those photos so old the reds are starting to fade out. The pictures had my parents with dark hair and my older sisters as babies holding brand new toys. I never lived in that decade, not even as a thought. I arrived later, after the walls had marks and scratches, after the velvet faded. After the purity and new smell wore off. After the toys had turned into bedraggled hunks missing half their stuffing, they were handed off to me. Just as good. After the parents had their hair greyed and the love beaten out of them a bit, well I wasn't any bit the wiser.

But don't scratch your heads, sisters. You left me nothing but to be the beatnick.