i want to see fireflies. i think i've read at least three references to them in the past week, and the whole experience just sounds so dreamy to me: sitting in blackness when a spark of light flutters above your head. one spark becomes many and pretty soon the sky is gently buzzing and glowing.

you don't know this about me, but i think somewhere deep inside me is a country girl. i have dreamt of sitting somewhere grassy by a babbling brook, running through corn fields playing hide-and-seek, or playing connect-the-dots with the millions of stars in the sky. i often long for wide, empty spaces. i imagine wearing summery dresses and frolicking, yes, frolicking.

i don't frolic enough.

did i ever frolic?

i think i did. maybe when i was a gangly girl running gracelessly across the lawn.


summertime memories: swimming in my backyard all day long, playing marco polo, making synchronized-swimming routines, pretending i was a mermaid; buying bathing suits and not caring about how my body looked -- just being concerned with pretty colors and patterns; climbing the fence, walking past the dumpster and down the alleyway to stop-and-go so i could get an icee, half cherry, half blue raspberry; piling up in kim's big red chevy whatever the hell that car was to get thrifty ice cream; standing right in front of the air conditioning unit in the corner of the house and letting it blast my sweaty, skinny, little body; sitting on the driveway under the streetlamp until it got dark, and then begging my mom for 15 more minutes because i felt so cool sitting up with my brother and his girlfriend, pretending i knew what they were talking about.


and now: the wind blowing through my hair as i drive down the 101; falling asleep on my sofa with a book beside my head and all the windows open; digging scoops out of the ice cream carton and spooning them into a mug; compiling songs for the perfect summer's day mixed tape -- in my head; seeing lots of kids everywhere and all the time wondering why they're not in school; walking down to the shops and bars and restaurants a few blocks away from the beach, thinking, "oh yeah. i live here."