childhood_asthma raze anyone can breathe into a spirometer until they think they're going to pass out. no one tells you what to do with your lips when they're touching something more responsive than a tube connected to a machine that's too eager to tell you what you already know. so listen to journey. listen to one of the albums no one cares about, from before steve perry joined the band. listen to gregg rolie sing about everything being all right on a saturday night when it's friday, and it's not even dark yet. play "linus and lucy" on a brown upright piano, in a house that isn't yours, for a girl who has the straightest blonde hair you've ever seen. spend the rest of your life wondering what her name was and why you were there. maybe your dad knew her mom and they thought the two of you might like each other. he won't be able to remember what the deal was there. all you'll be left with is a face without a name, pulled down at the corners, making you think the mind behind the eyes understands more than any twelve-year-old should. playing "heart and soul" together, hip against hip through a thin layer of denim. making her smile. sitting on the cool grass in her backyard. watching the fireworks. the way her bangs cradle her forehead. that's it. that's all there is. after a year and a half of breathing in gusts of spring-loaded nothing and holding bitter dust in your lungs until you feel faint, you'll only be sure of one thing: you are uniquely equipped to derail any relay race. "pass me the baton at your peril," you say. and still people hand you that hollow cylinder, thinking maybe you'll know what to do with it. because they haven't got a fucking clue. 220113 ... tender_square it was third grade and i had been invited to stacy’s birthday slumber party. i packed my caboodle full of makeup for makeovers and brought my new kid’s on the block tape that had “happy birthday to you” to play for her. i tried to organize the other girls into activities (a softer way of saying i was being bossy) and no one wanted to listen to me, they carried on giggling and pillow fighting, or fawning over stacy’s new kitten. the cat was really cute, but she was making my eyes red and watery. we eventually went to bed but i couldn’t stay asleep. i was struggling to breathe. i woke stacy up and asked where her phone was, i needed to call home. i worried she thought i was one of those kids who was too homesick to stay, when that was the furthest from the truth. she told me there was a phone in her parent’s room, if i cracked open their door at the end of the hall, it would be on the dresser without having to enter their room. so, i tiptoed down the hall and nudged her parent’s door open, but when i reached for the phone, it crashed to the floor, waking both of them up in the middle of the night. i told her mom i couldn’t breathe, told her i needed to call my mom. by that point, i think i had woken up the rest of the girls when i had to pack up my sleeping bag and head home. mom brought my puffer to me when she picked me up but it wasn’t working, i was still struggling to take in breath. we went to the er and i was admitted. the hospital kept me for a week. mom would come to visit me every day with brea, and maybe candi and terri and dad came once, too. i spent my days walking down the hallway of the children’s ward and looking at the mural of cartoon characters. i’d watch “loving” and “all my children” in the early afternoons, pretending that i was at grandma’s house with her. i hated the food at the hospital, i ate what i could. my classmates sent me a gift basket that had candy bars and a foil balloon that said “get well soon” and it came with a little white bear that had a big pink heart stitched across its chest. i slept with that bear for the remainder of my time, even though i was told myself i was a big girl who didn’t need it. i hated how loud the hospital was when i tried to sleep, how the night nurses woke me to check my vitals. my classmates had created a big card for me on one of those huge classroom notepads and everyone had signed it. stacy was especially sorry, thinking she had caused me to get sick. it turned out i had a severe allergy to cats that we hadn’t known about, and the allergy triggered an asthma attack. on the day i was set to be discharged, the hospital disconnected my cable early, and i was left alone in bed with nothing to do. mom was running late. she'd told me she’d be there by one to get me, and as i watched the minute hand make its rotations i started to cry, thinking i would never leave the hospital. when she arrived, fifteen minutes later, she saw my pruned tomato face and hugged me as tightly as i held my white bear. 220115 what's it to you? who go blather from