Spring 2005
In those days, Chitra
saved everything. Not like the hoarders
of later television infamy, but she did enjoy being surrounded by books, family
photos, and the occasional bedraggled member of her stuffed animal
menagerie. Add to this, though,
indulgent parents who saw the possibility of genius in every science project,
and Chitra was leaving her twenties and coming into a new relationship with
plenty of evidence of former lives in boxes and bags all around her.She is
forcing herself to be ruthless… Gerry’s place is bigger, sort of a gift to
himself for his recent city council win, but it’s still not big enough for all
of her leftover lives. She tosses t-shirts from high school and half-finished
art, but she has not rid herself of her mental baggage,including disappointment
that her candidate in the council race lost, and a melting but persistent certainty
that she couldn’t imagine herself with the name “Chitra Poindexter”. She opened
a box of paperbacks, not so much just books for her teenaged self as dreams in
paper covers. She rifled some pages, and as they fluttered against her hand,
she marveled at the time she used to have to imagine things.Time, to read and
daydream, like sleep, full meals, and volunteers, is one of the things
political people learn to live without. It was hard not to burrow into some of
her old favorites all the same, but she just read the back covers and put them
in the Donate bag.
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