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9 September 2002 (Monday): the ex-girlfriend's engagement party

She wore a bright yellow sundress, her smile equally luminous; he was quieter, more demure in dress and in speech, but glowing nonetheless. Soren said later that he'd often tried to picture what the man would look like, and that other than a few inches of height, he matched the image exactly.

The word butterfly came to mind as I watched her weave a looping path around the huge room, from couch to buffet table to balcony, picking up babies, crouching down to chat with toddlers. There were children everywhere. "What have you been up to?" Soren asked one friend he hadn't seen in years. "Breeding, mostly," he replied, chuckling. In another friend's arms a five-week-old girl lay quietly with clenched fists, eyes as round as marbles. Soren touched his index finger to her hand and she curled her fingers around it, an automatic reaction. I thought of scale, orders of magnitude; fragility.

posted by enjelani @ 06:36 PM PST