Machineries of Human Curiosities

Tonight I hear them upstairs, my partner and my son: Brendan chattering in order to avoid sleep. Ricky patiently waiting for the shift from awareness to slumber.

I am downstairs uploading digital photos into backup folders, storing various memories on a cable which sends images into a server somewhere in Colorado or California, maybe even Washington State, somewhere other than here, this house where the recollections germinate, intricate instances of my life seeking to become immortal— at least in terms of electronics, social networks—

A year’s worth of images: twelve months worth of five folders moving across the terrain. All of them showing Brendan’s slow transformation from toddler to young boy. Transitioning overnight into his own identity, his own willful sense of self.

There are times I feel a severe disconnect with my son. Either from my anger or his rebellions, even as a three year old, his independence runs strong in his mind.
The short arctic freeze, which fell southward this week, fades. As if it never existed. Some plants did not survive the ice and cold rain showers. Even the plants I covered overnight, now seem without the former strength.

47/ Some nights, when insomnia drowns him into awareness, Pan goes into his basement, and in the halflight, tinkers with the inner mechanics of radio parts, retro machineries of human curiosities, music boxes, and rusted grandfather clocks. He rummages through forgotten necessities looking for his power to sleep. To dream.

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