Sunday, November 28, 2010

There was a little girl and boy who went to the church I grew up at. Hannah was the girl's name, I do not remember the boy's.

I was struck any time I saw them, especially the girl, at how I never saw an expression of pleasure on her face; instead, there was a nearly perpetual worry knit into her brow. On top of that, her whole family had something odd about the shape of their heads, in that they appeared somewhat large, due to the flatness of their faces, while in actuality one could even consider them small, as far as heads go; it really came down to a natural optical illusion of sorts. They also had proportionally abnormal length in their torsos, while their legs erred on the short side. I took note of these features every time I saw them.

Now it is years later, and I have seen Hannah wandering around the streets of downtown a number of times (or what appears to be wandering), mostly on Monroe Center. Her torso has grown even longer, and she has gained some weight in her hips and thighs, while her shoulders remain daintily small, and her head seems even smaller, like someone had their fist around it and kept it clamped tight during puberty while the rest of her developed. Or maybe she is a sandbag and someone picked her up by the head, draining some of the sand that was there into lower compartments.

She has sad hair. It is a strawberry blonde, cut in a simple style, falling just below her shoulders. The same style, in fact, as I remember her having as a small girl, only then she had it shorter and it appeared to be an appropriate cut for a small girl. It seems now to be a reference back to lost childhood. The few extra inches cause it to hang in such a limp way. I have seen her occasionally with a silk flower pinned on one side, in the style of vintage fashion, but even that only lends a chic quality to her sad aura.

Some times I see her with a cup of coffee in her hands, otherwise she half-heartedly holds them in front of her in a squirrelly way, as though she just doesn't know where to put them and is a little embarrassed about it. The look in her eye is the same one of worry and sadness, but too as though she could be just about to say something and can't quite find the words. I wouldn't be surprised, however, if she did just open her mouth and utter some strange phrase, out loud, to no one.

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