Response II/Assignment I

He always put it in the medicine cabinet before bed. That is where I always saw it. My father's watch was engraved with the initials of his grandfather, his father, and his own. They were not my initials, nor my younger brother's but every night I traced them over and again and I know my younger brother did too. I think I was the only one that wore my father's watch, though, each night, and saw as it fell down my wrist and forearm as I brushed my teeth. Each night, my father would point at his watch and tilt his head to peek out behind his wrists, but it was a stern peek, and it was his way of telling us it was bedtime. He did many actions, just as this one, cute ones, but done sternly.

The watch went to my older brother after my father's death, as he shared his initials. Years later, my brother lost the watch in India or in Spain, in Russia or in Scotland, I do not remember. We never saw my older brother much after my father's death. Though when we did, my younger brother saw the watch and in it the same stern looks of bedtime. My older brother tried awkwardly to fill them.

Response I, Assignment I

My first memory is of my mother snapping a tight rubber swim cap over my ears. And I looked up at her with a mix of anguish and delight. I love that feeling. You are all at once contained in neon rubber, your hair soft and dry. But your head is in open water—a river, a sewer, a dunk tank. A shark could nibble on your digits, but the tops of your ears would be unharmed.

What’s the best thing about being underwater? I think you decay faster in fresh water. I like to sometimes sit on the bottom of the pool and close my eyes and imagine my particles and pieces mixing with chlorine and blue tiles. Everything could turn to dust, everything except what is tucked beneath my rubber cap. They would find me there sixteen weeks later, nothing but bone, gristle, and bright pink latex pulled tight over brown curls.

Assignment I

Exchange photos found of strangers on holiday on the English Channel / La Manche and respond with a story.