She worries about my ink and the extra bling in my ears, and nose, and navel, while fretting with the solitary Swarovski gems adorning her 00 gauge, stretched out earlobes. Arched, over-engineered brows punctuate her displeasure.
She pooh-poohs my Black Dahlia lips, her blue morpho butterfly wing lids fluttering in fear. A tremulous rebuttal declaring dyes and ochres, kohls and rouge are not alterations, they are enhancements.
Lavender, she says, isn’t a natural hair color. With sardonic mirth, I point out that neither is blonde. Highlights she explains, something the sun already supplies. I nod, shaking my purple pate in indulgent humor.
She speaks in chapter and verse until she doesn’t. Ignoring words and phrases, paragraphs and passages that don’t fit into her narrow mind. I speak of unicorns and satyrs. Fairytales she says. Man-eating whales and floating zoos are real she says. How do you know the difference, I ask.
Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John are oft quoted. My homilies come from Buddha, Dalai, and Gandhi. She never hears the similarities, only sees the heathens. I do unto others, she collects stones.
I love my brothers and sisters, and brothers and brothers, and sisters and sisters. She hates the sin. I believe in until death do you part. She is on part three, minus the sackcloth and ashes. I am grateful for the time I have, she wants 15 more.
I ask if cherries are her favorite fruit.
Thin spiral notebook 
Everything about this was lyrical. You say tomato and I say…well you know.
But living with both pronunciations is the goal isn’t it? I wish more people could live that way. That last paragraph is brilliant. It embraces the world.
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Oh, the contrasts you draw, and the way you draw them, are brilliant from the very beginning. As a Christian, I’m sad to say there are Christians like this, but it was a pleasure to read.
I don’t know if I’m particularly thick today or something, but I can’t for the life of me figure out what you’re talking about in the last two sentences. 15 times? 15 lives? Minutes? What is the significance of cherries? A euphemism?
But I love the “part three” thing. Genius play on words, there.
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Yes, the “15” refers to 15 minutes of fame. That some people respond to world events in a way that puts the emphasis on them and not the real issue. The “cherries” refer to “cherry picking,” specifically choosing only certain biblical verses, or parts of them, to justify their bigoted beliefs.
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Such gorgeous descriptive writing
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