Cut from "Airs Above the Ground"

Lydia settled on a scrapbook, scissors, three packets of stickers, glue and a rubber stamp all neatly enclosed inside an attractive plastic container. She hoped that the recipient of her “DreamMaker Set” would be happy, but they probably would not be. The guardian at the children’s center would probably remove the scissors, rendering the gift useless. What kind of person would give scissors to a child?

            The type of person who didn’t have children, obviously. The type of person who believed that severence was the most important step in art. It wasn’t until she finally admitted to herself that she wasn’t any good as a rider that she discovered photography, and painting. She’d felt whole again, less nervous. She’d felt in control.

            She paid for the DreamMaker Set (forty-seven dollars. She would have preferred to donate cash) and walked across the parking lot with her brazen pastel gift bag. Control. Control was something she’d been robbed of. And she didn’t see a future in which she got it back.

            In the car, Lydia fingered the gold tassell hanging from the pendant around her neck. She’d put on a pair of black wool trousers for the party, an eggplant blouse made of glossy silk, black heels. The heels were patent leather, shameful. This outfit wasn’t her. Several months ago, she wouldn’t even have been able to have worn it in her car. The upholstery would have been (matted with) horse hair, stray pieces of hay, dusty horse blankets thrown in the back seat and crumbled leaves on the (foot carpets), dead flies on the dashboard. Everything was nice now. Clean smelling. Hoovered. She could go to fancy parties now, all dressed in black.

            Lydia gathered herself. Ran her hand down her pant leg, seeking stray hairs. Thirteen years of dressage training had prepared her to be a mourner. Takt:

rhythm and regularity: you keep working, you show up when expected, once a month, you call your mother, you say yes to parties. Versammlung: straightness and collection: you keep your hair clean, you listen to talk radio while you eat your dinner to make up for the absence of that other voice, you put a hot water bottle on his side of the bed. On social days, you force yourself to reach for the mascara and the broken cake of blusher, and once a month, usually after speaking to your mother, you take a bath with water that is too hot and in this too hot water, you cry in the tub.