Demon Copperhead

by Barbara Kingsolver

“It’s in vain to recall the past, unless it works some influence upon the present.” Charles Dickens, David Copperfield

Keeping secrets from young ears only plants seeds in between them, and these grew in my tiny head into grislier deaths than any I was supposed to be seeing on TV at that age.

To be clear, me and Mom were no kin of theirs, so this was not one of those family trailer pileups. Those shabby type of places show up on reality TV a lot more than reality in general, I think for the same reason people like to see copperheads where there aren’t any copperheads.

It hit me pretty hard, how there’s no kind of sad in this world that will stop it turning. People will keep on wanting what they want, and you’re on your own.

The thing about school you don’t realize is, everybody’s moving towards something. Even if you’re one of the screwups, you still participate. Okay kids, let’s get through this lesson, this unit, this grade.

it. I told Angus my mom being dead wasn’t something I pinned exactly on my birthday. “It’s more like this bag of gravel I’m hauling around every day of the year. If somebody else brings it up, honestly, I’m glad of it. Like just for that minute they can help me drag the gravel.”

The Pappaw stories were mostly along the lines of: How awesome was that, us busting our asses. Whereas the Mammaw stories leaned more towards, not awesome. Getting your paycheck in fake money that you had to use in the coal company’s stores that charged you double. Breathing black dust all day, coughing up black hunks of lung all night. Husband and sons all dying in one day in a shaft that blew up.

A dead parent is a tricky kind of ghost. If you can make it into more like a doll, putting it in the real house and clothes and such that they had, it helps you to picture them as a person instead of just a person-shaped hole in the air. Which helps you feel less like a person-shaped invisible kid.

Like the dreams you wake up from with your heart on fire because some dead person you cared about was alive, and then by noon it’s just vague nonsense.

Their last words amounted to inviting one another to go to hell. He said half of him was sorry over it, and the other half wasn’t, so now he would stay cut in two forever.

Every make of person now has their proper nouns, except for some reason, us. Hicks, rednecks, not capitalized.

“Certain pitiful souls around here see whiteness as their last asset that hasn’t been totaled or repossessed.”

Ms. Annie said getting this contract was a break that doesn’t come along every day, and if it were her, she’d want to meet the challenge with a clear head. Aka, I should quit the dope. Easier to do without the dopehead friends. They were polite, but still. Saying love has to come from a strong place, not just grabbing whatever’s in reach. You can’t choose your family, but a partner is your shot at a decent do-over.

The wonder is that you could start life with nothing, end with nothing, and lose so much in between.

The day itself was cruel, a blue sky to rip your damn heart from your lungs. Trees in bud, yellow jonquils exploding out of the ground, dogwoods standing around in their petticoats.

I always think about April 2017

a good story doesn’t just copy life, it pushes back on it.

Age-old heartbreak of this place, your great successes fly away, your failures stick around.