intersections unhinged (revised as new information is brought to light) photographic_memory mythology from the meta to the personal years of tv flickering by old war planes with symbols of hate death holocaust because that was what we were up against mushroom clouds juxtaposed with walking skeletons never again my grandfather was a machinist. the kind of working class tobacco stained alcoholic who made the golden age of america. who literally made parts for little boy and fat man. who died with at least three kinds of cancer and said nothing until six days before he died. who was chased out of his job as the chief of the fire station for drinking in the 80s when they threw retirement parties instead of scandals for men who drank on the job. he hated the japs (and every other ethnic and racial minority) until the day he died...martin luther king jr day 2001 dramatic_irony no/more less. my father having no war stories of his own to tell several months too young to be drafted himself perpetually catholic perpetually guilty always bragged on my grandpa's outsized role he made the parts! the mushroom clouds the man i watched eat on holidays made the parts the melted people's skin off he hardly every spoke to me and even less cared until the day i decided to interview him about making the parts for a school history project because my dad pointed out proud but no one outside our family believed me when i said my grandpa made the parts! mushroom clouds he didn't actually answer any of my questions every last one 'thats classified information' press training? but one of the only times i ever remember getting my grandfather to smile 250908 ... unhinged so these days it seems like a united front taboo for my privileged voice to be centered in the dialogue but the hierarchy of whiteness still exists Isabel listening to my german grandma call my mother a dumb polack to her face while watching my usually raging father sit quietly by was a formative experience when humans can't divide each other by easily visible characteristics like skin color ancestry will do even though the census no longer cares whether i am irish german polish my grandma did that was enough 250908 ... unhinged at some point i started using a japanese method to teach the violin. the only man i ever introduced my parents to, thought i might marry, was so mexican, we were quietly but surely refused service at a restaurant in downtown milwaukee and he was so used to the racism he was ashamed of the scene i made when after almost an hour without even a glass of water we decided to leave. the rest stop in indiana it's like that y'all 250908 ... unhinged my father the union steward started hating democrats in the 90s when the rust_belt became apparent i started hating democrats in the 2010s when lobbying the state capital for workers rights and literally had the door shut in my face by a democrat 250908 ... unhinged my photographer hunter father loved ansel adams he couldn't explain to me why the same why my art school dropout mother could was it the subject matter? was it the technique? it was definitely the black and white and then my parents came to visit seattle and we saw the exhibit of adams' visit to a japanese concentration camp the only human portraits by that artist i had ever seen documentary unflinching black and white my normally raging father standing quietly by as we both read the exhibition placards the slurs that usually fell do easily off his tongue silent what i later could recognize as his unexpressed grief in the cemetery on his own deathbed he couldn't say it i wouldn't say it maybe i took his hand maybe we both smoked a cigarette 250908 what's it to you? who go blather from