follow_the_yellow_brick_road ovenbird My memory hardly needs any prompting to transplant me back to the days I spent on the stage in my grade school gym playing Dorothy in our production of the Wizard of Oz. I’m eleven years old, wearing a knee length blue dress with my hair in pigtails, every line of the script embedded firmly in my brain. On the day of the first performance a classmate tells me I look like a ten dollar hooker and I don’t know what that means, but pictures bear out that some teacher was very heavy handed with the blush. I sing Somewhere Over the Rainbow while clutching a wicker basket containing the stuffed dog that is standing in for Toto. If I could view the ancient VHS tape tucked away in my closet, I might be able to see this version of me, just on the brink of adolescence, skipping down a yellow brick road. I would likely recognize the mix of elation and loneliness on her face. Time is a wormhole. I step off that stage after my final bow and find myself in an uncomfortable folding chair, aged 30 years, watching my children perform in their own production of the Wizard of Oz. The hands gripping the edges of this program are developing a few small age spots and it’s hard to believe they’re mine. My dry eye condition is acting up and I wish I had eye drops. I’m sitting next to a friend I’ve known since we were pregnant with our boys and she’s fanning herself furiously and grumbling about hot flashes. I’m not quite sure how we got here. It sometimes feels like the best adventures are already over and all we have left is to watch our children live out theirs. I don’t really know how to be middle aged. I don’t know what I’m supposed to do or how I’m supposed to act or what it means to be grown up. I definitely don’t know where to buy clothes or what a skin care routine is. When the whole school sings Somewhere Over the Rainbow during the finale I tear up. There’s a wrenching earnestness about all those little faces singing together, but I suspect I’m grieving too–for the child I once was, for the futures that will never be, for all the years that melted faster than a wicked witch doused with a hastily flung bucket of water. 250603 what's it to you? who go blather from