Poetry by Mi Ok Song Bruining (Winter 2020 issue)
Betty, my adoptive mother loved
sharing the story
of how much I cost my parents.
My adoption fee was $ 1500
in 1966: The same price
as a brand new 1966 Ford
Country Squire station wagon.
This dream machine was fully loaded,
white, with simulated wood side paneling,
complete with blue pleatherette
bench seats and the third row jump seats.
Betty lamented
that she and my father had to wait
until the following year
to buy their grand vehicular achievement.
The year after I arrived,
now a full-fledged member of my white,
Dutch American,
upper middle class,
suburban family,
I rode in that station wagon,
tortured
with car sickness.
I was living the American dream,
with nausea and vomit
each time I rode
in that land yacht,
to relatives, church, the mall, on errands,
and to our New England summer home,
four agonizing hours north
of our New Jersey residence.
I remember that station wagon
with glazed and watery eyes,
a cold sweat and green complexion.
Eventually, I grew out of car sickness,
yet sill break out
into a cold sweat,
every time
I see a Ford Country Squire station wagon.
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