December 3rd

My mind is peculiar, at least I think it is seeing as I don't have the ability to look through minds of others but still I don't think people think the way I do.

Sometimes I sit across from my dad and wonder what it must of felt like for him to have the life he has. It 's no ones dream to be a middle aged widower with a genius gay son. Not many people think about their parents and their past and how their lives were shaped because of something they or someone else did. For example, how my father never let me cross the road alone when I was little because that was how his cousin lost his leg. I use to grow angry feeling as if he couldn't trust me to be responsible enough to look both ways but there was genuine fear in my father's eyes. I did still get angry often but I always kept it to myself, there was no point in bringing more fear than the lingering left after my mother's death. Sometimes, still I see wariness when I cross the street to quickly. My father must have been close to my cousin but I never got that story.

Today was Sunday and like every Sunday I packed the picnic basket and made my route to the cemetery stopping only to grab a small bouquet of daises. It was sprinkling as I road up the curving road but it did not bring the typical wave of depression but instead made me wonder. How did the homeless survive the rain in the winter? If some place wasn't wet it was too cold. How did they survive? Where were their parents? Dead like my mother? The thought made my heart clench slightly as I turned the heat up in one guilty motion.

A few cars littered the sides of the road as I worked my way up it but as I got higher it became less and less. It was a known fact that I visited my mother every Sunday, small town and all, if I didn't It was found I went a bit crazy, some called it compulsion but I called it habit. Not many people liked to be up here when I was seeing as I wasn't very well received in my town. I've heard people comment about the 'weird Hummel boy', at least in plain terms that's what they say, but I don't see how I'm the weird one when they spend their time talking about a sport made of men tackling each other and smacking the others butt. I once told my father that I would join a sport so my sexuality would be excepted but my father told me that no, that was not how America worked. I was baffled for a short time trying to understand how smacking ones butt was okay but me loving some one was not but my father told me it was because they were realistically straight. I'm still puzzled by this concept and have done studies on it but have yet to come to a conclusion to why that is still acceptable.

Today was typical, I had started out early so the rain heavy clouds were still rather dark as they hung over the drab looking fields decorated with gray headstones. I avoided this place at first not understanding how being where my mother's body was would hold any significance seeing as my father claimed us to be religious and religion said she was no longer on earth but then I realized I did not care for religion seeing as they in return did not care for me. I then came into the habit of visiting and although I never felt that spiritual presence that others spoke of when visiting the passed, I did find that the idea of having some one hear me was appealing. My mother loved me, it showed in the home videos my father showed me, and I suppose I just needed to be nearer to that feeling. I never really felt it but I could pretend to. That was enough for me.

The grass sloshed under my shoes as I made my way up the dampened surface. A gardener had been here recently, I could still smell the sent of fresh grass under the scent of rain. My pea coat clung to my body as my skinny jeans did very little to lock in my body heat. I did not enjoy wearing these pants but I knew it pained my father to see me struggling in the real world so I attempted to look normal. From the look on my father's face when I get dressed I know I have not yet succeeded but I keep trying. All the fashion magazines have told me what looks good but I suppose small town Lima doesn't quite know that yet.

An object catches my attention from the corner of my eye but on further observation I find that I was mistaken and it is not an object at all but a person, a boy. This confused me. I am use to solitude based one peoples wariness of my intelligence and yet this boy has found the nerve to wander upon my hill. I am not offended or angered just slightly taken back by the thought of spending my morning with another person so close.

I retrieved the blanket I had packed from the basket and carefully laid it out, one eye still inspecting the stranger as I work. He hasn't moved, he just continues to stare at the headstone as if willing the dead to life. My tongue wets my lips as I busy my hands with putting the daisies in their respected hole, not bothering to put water seeing as the container already seems half full because of the rain. The wind tangles the brown curls together until they are unruly and begging to be combed but the boy takes no notice and I wonder if he has been made aware of my presence but I push it to the back of my mind. I wasn't here for people watching, I was here for my mother and so I returned to the headstone. I began my talk in a low voice,trying to keep my business between me and the dead, but with such a high voice I wonder just how well of a job I'm doing.

"..And I keep telling dad I won't leave Ohio if he doesn't begin eating right because if I leave I don't want to have to put my work aside to come back when I am requested to look over his funeral arrangements." That is not really the reason, in truth I am afraid. There are very few people in my life whom I can trust and the main one would have to be my father. If he was to die I have no knowledge on how my emotions would respond but I had a feeling my mother could tell in the after life and so there was no use in voicing emotions out loud.

A noise draws me out of my thoughts and my eyes are soon connecting with the look from the boy just two plots down. He is confused by my presence which answers my earlier question. My distance keeps me from reading his face but the large eyebrows on his face are expressive enough to see just subtle motions. He moves back to look at the headstone before turning back to me and offering a bleak smile. I study him with a furrowed brow causing the smile to slip off the face nervously. I am not sure what I'm suppose to do now so I just offer my own take on a friendly smile but I am not sure if it comes out that way or not seeing as there aren't many people I have practice on. The boy raises himself up and I can finally see that he is wearing what looks to be a school uniform which confused me. His eyes trail once more to the headstone before connecting with mine once again. A hand comes up in a feeble attempt of a greeting which I return just as awkwardly. We both spend to much time studying the other before the boy moves wordlessly down the slope to the bike I had not noticed before. I am left alone and suddenly it isn't enough any more. The presence of another person had taken the security of loneliness and not soon after I made the same trek down to my awaiting car.