At Bard, lining up for something outside. Grace, whose arms had dark hair on them. I felt a little sorry for her, because the other girls would joke about it. I was jealous of her name, because I felt she must be elegant with that name.

And Allison and Elizabeth and Eileen at recess, climbing across yhe top of the long ladder monkeybars, so serious and adult and unknowable to me. With my skinned knees and apt but humble name and getting in trouble with the boys b3cause i forgot my comb on picture day. Hoarding the precious black comb they gave out to me. I don't remember happiness at that school. I would restlessly pace around at recess, waiting to be told to line up to go back inside. Daydreaming alone on the bleachers withmy book, praying to become smurfette with her raspy voice, longing for Dorothy's tornado to suck me up and set me down in a big green overcast field. The longing stronger than the loneliness.