I was...a zebra

I was...a zebra

(Part I)

Painting by Yisu
Words by Mo

The doctor gasped. “But, but...”
“What?” The new mother’s face turned swiftly from red exertion to ashen fear.
“Ten fingers? Ten toes?”

“Yes, but...”

Dr. Morris shook her head. She had never seen anything like this in all her years on the maternity ward. She looked at the new mother’s face. She couldn’t meet her eyes, so she just focused on her mouth instead.

As she delivered the news, two deliveries in such a short span, the mother’s lips formed a perfect o. She screamed as Dr. Morris lifted her baby’s face into view.

***

Ellis was at least as nervous as any other kindergartner on his way to school for the first time, maybe more. He looked around his familiar kitchen; a table laden with breakfast foods lovingly prepared by his mother. There were scones with currants, creamy butter and blueberry jam to accompany them, there was muesli with milk, and even a perfectly poached egg resting in his favorite little egg cup.

The egg cup had been his grandmother’s--a relic from another age. He examined its familiar lines, the curve of the lip, the zig of white atop a zag of black which patterned the cup to its little rounded feet. His grandmother must have bought it somewhere exotic, and its animal print pattern seemed incongruous with what else he knew of her personality. She was such a proper woman. Ellis’ father still referred to her reverently as “Mother”, and the other items inherited from her collection of china were quite prim, really. Tiny flowers on bone colored porcelain, a thin strip of gold leaf inlaid among pin-sized cobalt spots.

But zebra print? On a lone egg cup? It was odd.

For obvious reasons, the egg cup was Ellis’. He loved it because it was so like him. It was one of those perfect coincidences in life, one lone moment of alignment in Ellis’ few years on earth.

Ellis was not hungry, in spite of the spread of favorites before him. He wanted to curl back up in bed and never get up again. He had been dreading school since the beginning, and this first day of it was bound to be the worst of them all.

How would he survive it?

As he hung his head even lower and let out a big sigh, his mother came into the kitchen. She had a lightness to her step that Ellis envied. She didn’t have to go to school. She didn’t have to face the humiliation, the shame of it all. She got to stay here and care for the goldfish, take Rumba for a walk, cook dinner. It just wasn’t fair.

“Good morning, sweet thing! Are you ready for your first day?”

“Oh Mom, I don’t think I’m ready for this.

Maybe I should just start school next year.”

His mother looked unfazed, like she had known he would say this.

“Ellis, you know it’s time. You’re five! You can do this. It might be hard sometimes, but I know you’re going to do just fine. The first day is never easy,

but soon you’ll be excited to go to school!”

“I don’t know about that, Mom.”

As Ellis’ mom placed a jug of juice on the already overflowing table, Ellis caught a glimpse of his reflection, a reminder of all he was up against as he went out into the world. He saw a tear run down his black and white cheek, and his long thick tongue reached instinctively out of his horsey mouth to catch the saline driplet.

His mom came over and gave him a reassuring hug, but it didn’t really help. He felt as miserable as could be. Ellis walked dejectedly over to the chair by the door where his sneakers were waiting to be put on, but he could hardly see to lace them through the cascade of tears that wouldn’t stop welling up in his big black eyes. His fingers, usually so nimble and able, were practically useless, and in the end his mother had to come tie his shoes for him, patting his pink dimpled knees as she finished up.

She passed him a tissue, and he loudly blew his giant velvety nose, promising himself not to cry anymore. He breathed in deeply, grabbed his orange backpack,

and marched out the door.

“Bye Ellis,” his mother said quietly, “I hope it goes well.”

She had done all she could to prepare him for this day.

Now all there was to do was to hope.

***

The walk to school was easy, he just turned right out the door and went straight until he reached the fire station, where he and his dad would go and watch the firemen polishing the trucks on Saturdays. Once there, it was just another right and then a left until he reached the big building teeming with kids. When he saw the crowds heading to their first day of school Ellis started to feel queasy. The other kids wouldn’t understand, how could they, I mean he hardly did himself. To be born with such a condition, such a crazy fluke of genetics and fate, there was no way anyone would ever accept him.

Ellis looked down at his body. Everything he could see looked just like every other kid walking through the school gates. He wore sneakers, shorts and a red t-shirt. His arms were tan from a summer of swimming at the lake in Maine. His knees were a little scraped from when he had fallen over last week, but lots of kindergartners had skinned knees. No, his real problem was not his body. It was his head.

From the neck up, Ellis was utterly different from most boys his age. From most boys any age, really. Just like his egg cup, he was zigged and zagged black and white. All the way down to his shirt collar, he had a mohawk of black and white coarse hair. All those years ago, Ellis had made medical history when he was born with the hitherto unknown, and therefore unnamed, condition Zebritis. He had the body of a little boy, but the head of a zebra.

His nose quivered and tears threatened to spill from his large eyes, but he inhaled again and steeled himself for his grand entrance into kindergarten. He could do this.

So he did.

Virginia - while the sprout hatches

' How The Turtle Got Its Shell'

In the style of Rudyard Kipling's 'Just So Stories', in loving memory of Bopee

Painting by Yisu

Words by Mo

Long, long ago, Best Beloved, turtles were not nearly as slow-pokedy and drearily drably sluggish as they are today. Turtles, although few and far between, were able to zip and zoom around in the Great Blue Sea just as fast as tiny fishes and brown furry otters. This, O Best Beloved, is because they were not encumbered by big, barrelsome shells. When turtles were first made, they had only their naked wrinkly skin to swim around in, which got very chilly in the night sea, and left them very easy prey for scary sea creatures. The Queen and Mother Of All Turtles was as big as a house, and as long as an island, and her name, O Best Beloved, was Regania. All the baby turtles, and mid-sized turtles, and largish-but-still-smaller-than-The-Queen-and-Mother-of-All-Turtles turtles ‘multaneously afeared Regania, and respected her, for she was their mother, and took good care of all the turtles in the Great Blue Sea.

Every spring or so, Regania went to the beach, just as perhaps you do O Best Beloved (but of course not for the same reason), and laid one million and two eggs, which she buried into capacious—that means big, Best Beloved—holes in the sand. Every spring, the other turtles wanted ever so desperately to come with Regania on her journey across the Great Blue Sea, and every spring Regania told them ‘No!’

‘But why,’ asked a tiny turtlette named Virginia during the spring of one particular year. ‘Oh please cannot we come?’

‘No!’ bellowed Regania in a booming voice which made the waves turn to dunes of foam. ‘This is a privacious, and unwieldy mission. No one may know where I go, or what I must do in order for the next batch of turtlettes and turtlings to hatch. Now, go brush your teeth, and don’t ask me again!’

Virginia most ‘jectedly scooted off through the Great Blue Sea. (And she even brushed her teeth, in spite of being angry at Regania, for she afeared and respected her ‘normously.)

Regania shook her wrinkly withered head and went to bed, for she needed her best rest, because tomorrow was the day she would go and hatch the turtlings and turtlettes. Early the next morning, Regania stretched out her long crinkly-wrinkled arms, and her long wrinkly-crinkled neck, and swam off across the Great Blue Sea to the ‘Gantic White Beach (which looked an awful lot like a ‘gantic pile of mashed potatoes, O Best Beloved) where she was to lay her eggs full of turtlings and turtlettes. What Regania did not realize, and here’s the sneaky part, was that little Virginia, the tiny turtlette, had grabbed a hold of her tail, and been dragged along over the many leagues and miles and kilometers of the Great Blue Sea to the ‘Gantic White Beach.

When Virginia saw the gigantic mounds of sand, with the tide rushing in, her eyes grew wide with wonder, and she almost forgot to hide so Regania would not see her. She scooted away behind a reef just as The Queen and Mother of All Turtles turned her ‘normous head around to make sure her privacious mission was still privacious.

When Regania was sure that she was alone, she waved her turtley arms, and flapped her turtley legs, and did three flips, right in a row. Then, to the amazement of Virginia, the smallest turtlette there ever was, she swam ashore, crawled up to the beach, and dug a capacious hole in the mashed potato sand. Regania then began to lay her eggs, one by one, until the capacious hole was nearly full. She used her ‘normous flipper-arm to cover the hole with potatoey sand, and left. She swam through the water, a much lighter Queen and Mother of All Turtles than she had been before, and passed right by the rock behind which Virginia was hiding. She was so full of glee because of her accomplished mission that she didn’t notice the tiny turtlette trying to grab a hold of her tail. Regania’s tail slipped right through Virginia’s little flipper-hands and away Regania went, out into the Great Blue Sea.

Virginia was petrified! (That means scared, O Best Beloved.) She had no idea what a stranded turtlette should do, having been left behind all the way across the Great Blue Sea, and the only solution she could think of was to swim to the beach and explore the capacious hole of eggs.

When she got there, and it was quite a struggle for the tiny turtlette to get ashore as you might imagine, she plopped her small and shell-less body on top of the capacious hole of eggs, and fell quietly asleep.

Little Virginia did not wake up for days upon days, and when she did it was because of a rustly-bustly feeling underneath her wrinkled little body. She crawled drowsily off the pile of eggs, only to behold many many tiny heads poking out from many many tiny shells. The newborn turtlings and turtlettes, after peering up at Virginia quizzically for a moment, made a mad dash for the Great Blue Sea, scooting their arms and legs just as children do when it’s hot and they want to swim.

The strange thing was, O Best Beloved, that attached to each of their tiny backs was a piece of their eggshell. The newborn turtlettes and turtlings were finding it difficult to get to the shore, and instead of zooming along like all turtles before them had, they had to move slowly because of the shells stuck to their backs. Virginia followed the new turtles into the water, and followed them where their instincts were taking them, to The Queen and Mother of All Turtles, Regania. When they arrived, it was quite a sight to be seen. One million and two turtlings and turtlettes crowded the ocean, but no one, not even the Great Mahluu Fish whom they passed along their way had seen anything like these turtles before. For over the course of their journey from the beach (which looked an awful lot like a pile of mashed potatoes, don’t forget Best Beloved) the pieces of shell stuck to their backs had hardened into shells much like we see on turtles today. They could poke their heads in and out of their shells, and when they were scared, as they were of the Great Mahluu Fish, they curled up in their shells so tightly you might think they were a piece of wood. (That is, if you didn’t look closely enough.)

Regania, The Queen and Mother of All Turtles, was very perplexed (that means confused, O Best Beloved) as to why the newborn turtlings and turtlettes were so different than normal turtles, but as soon as she heard Virginia’s tale, she understood (since she was a very wise and all-knowing Queen and Mother). When Virginia had fallen asleep on the turtle eggs Regania had laid, she had put pressure on the eggs, making the shells stick to the small unhatched turtles.

At first Regania was very angry at Virginia for following her, but she soon forgave her, since she realized that Virginia had actually given the new turtles a wonderful gift. She had given them each protection against the scary sea, and she had given them each a home of their own. When Regania became older (and she was already almost as ancient as the Great Blue Sea itself), she proudly handed down the title of Queen and Mother of All Turtles to Virginia, who became a wise and wonderful leader to all the future generations of turtles to come. And ever since the generation of turtles who got shells because of Virginia, all turtles have been born with shells of their own. All turtles carry their own homes wherever they go, and are always protected against the sometimes scary Great Blue Sea.

And that, O Best Beloved, is the true tale of how turtles got their shells.

Virginia was a turtle Queen

As wise as ever wise could be

She gave new turtles brown and green

A new home as great as ever there could be.

A shell is great, a shell is hard,

There’s nothing like it near or far,

Knock knock, who’s there?

A turtle hiding, that’s who!

The sprout touches the earth

“I’m freeeeeeeee!”

The boy yelled into the wind from the top of a hill overlooking the bluest stretch of sea he’d ever seen. But in his stomach, in his tummy, his child’s soft underbelly, he was afraid.

This moment was long awaited, coveted for years, hoped for and dreamed of, but still.

The real thing had come at last, and now he was alone on a hill feeling full of everything lost.

Earlier in the day he had bid his mother farewell, and she had begun her long drive south. They would see each other again in a couple of months, but still. This was new, to say goodbye and not mean later in the day, later in the week, later soon. He had met new people already, had been smiling all day. Now that he was alone his face fell grasswards. The corners of his mouth curled under, his eyes turned into the deep dark pools of puppies left alone in a pet shop window. His throat joined the club, and threatened to close its doors to any incoming swallow, but the boy forced the feeling away, taking a deep drag of his cigarette. He would not cry.

He had done this before, had been doing it in some form or another for most of his life. But this departure was a little different. He looked across the field and thought about all the places he had come to know during his lifetime of moving. There were some moves he had been too small to remember--the move to China as a toddler for instance--but there were some moving days that smarted just to think about. How had he ever managed to get on that plane leaving Hong Kong for the last time as an eighteen-year-old? To leave home takes a special kind of pluck, especially if you love the place you’re leaving.

Even LA, though he couldn’t believe he was thinking this, was hard to leave. It had only been five years, but the place had slowly grown on him, like a soft coating of mold, and now it had a hold on him he couldn’t fully shake. How does that happen? You live in a place long enough, always waiting to leave, and then the day comes and it’s suddenly real. No matter how much you hate the place, you’ve still grown there, changed there, soaked parts of the place into parts of yourself so embedded you don’t know where they lie, until something happens and everything comes back. You smell a certain flower and you’re back in Mom and Dad’s garden.

Now there was a new place to grow into, new friendships to develop, new everything. Now it was all about him, learning to be on his own, trying out a new style of living, and he had no idea where to start. Of course the place was set up for this--newbies arriving and meeting and awkwardly trying to stave off the fears common to them all. Old hands walking around with utter confidence, hardly conscious of the fact that just a year ago, or maybe two, they were the new ones, they were the ones who had stood there trying to look like they knew what was going on while their mother made their bed one last time. Her hospital corners had never been so crisp. The bed would never be made again.

The boy stood atop the field, breathing with the wind, and thinking back to the time he visited this place with his sister. They had driven up for a whirlwind college tour weekend, when coming here was but a possibility, a hope. The field he now stood on belonged to someone else back then. Now it was his. The whole campus was his for the biking, trying, learning, living. And this thought was exciting, not scary. But still. He was here. He had done it, made it, left everything else far behind.

“I’m free,” he said quietly to himself. “I’m free.”

a seed

A seed is the beginning of something new, something as yet unborn. Sometimes it's tangible, you can feel its potential, its becoming. Other times seeds are just there, below the surface, growing roots invisible to the naked eye, working silently.

At the beginning of our time here, communication was hard; there were no channels, there was no flow. The two of us spoke in sign language, we used lone words, simple sentences at best. We had tea together, and our mutual newness held us afloat. We were both a little scared, unsure of what we were doing there--was it the right decision to come to India? We were both so foreign, from this new country, from each other.

But the day we had tea, when we looked at photographs (her, pointing, "Mom", "Friend." Me, "Oh, nice! Pretty."), a seed was planted. A basis for friendship. For a long time the seed stayed hidden beneath a cover of smiles, behind a barrier of languages we didn't have in common. But over time the seed grew roots. Shared experience, a learning of words, idioms, pronunciation, cooking, sadness, laughter, all of it helped this sapling take hold on earth.

Now it's as if it's always been there. How could it not be? But once the seed was just a seed--it could have dried up, it could have been blown away, it could have just failed to grow. Instead: treedom.