Help I'm Stuck Inside A Bubblegum Factory

My Internet has been off for a week now and I feel like a kidnapped victim who goes through horror, rage, grief, and finally acceptance. Wow, that's a horrible comparison but you know what I'm saying. I'm writing this post on my cellphone which I can only use one finger to type on because that's the kind of person I am. It should be back on today, at least that's what I am told, I have long stopped believing anything the people at Time Warner (my Internet connector) tell me.

Anyway, I can't say it's all bad having no connection, I've actually been reading, which is nice, but I'll be glad to get back to my regular routine. Here's an old post from my summer scrapbook.

Fools In A Car

We all used to sit in the backseat of the car with no seatbelts, sometimes as many as six kids back there in the summer. I liked to get in the way back bucket seat and lie on my back with my legs in the second row. Looking up I could see glittery trees turn to blue sky, turn to glittery trees turn to stop light hanging on a wire. It was like a slow motion strobe. How did anyone drive with so many kids in the car: screaming, pinching, crying, sometimes as many as three little arms out the window catching waves of air. I liked the back bucket seat even long after I was too big because at least it felt calm back there. Occasionally all the kids voices would get quiet and I could feel hands tickling towards my shin where someone would try to pull out a tiny hair. Usually this was relaxing, soft little hands doing a spider walk, not strong enough to hurt me, but a couple of times my leg would jerk and connect with someone's upper lip and then all hell broke loose. I know it didn't happen this way, but in those times when everyone was blaming, arguing, bleeding, I have in my memory that the car swerved in S shaped swoops, sometimes leaning on the side with two wheels in the air. I remember once my Uncle Dylan turned the radio up to full scratchy volume and "everybody plays the fool" by the Main Ingredient was on. At the time there was so much rage in that one small gesture that he may as well have slapped me across the face; I instantly felt ashamed and fully to blame. He divorced my aunt not long after that summer and it wasn't until many years later that I realized his blasting of the song had nothing to do with me.