The little girl that moved from France always wears a blue ribbon, a large royal blue ribbon, tied in her hair. Other kids at the school make fun of her behind her back. Nobody is friends with her. She sits alone in art class, on the other side of the room, directly across from you. So you always feel like you’re staring at her when you look up. But you aren’t trying to. You just keep looking at that ribbon.

You like the ribbon. Not because you like ribbons, necessarily. On the first day that she came to the school, you saw her out the window of your class. You weren’t looking for her. You didn’t even know she existed. You were waiting for your friend Matt when you saw her Mom, a tall woman with the kindest face, walk her up the block. As they reached the front of the school, her Mom pulled the ribbon out of her pocket and tied it in. It’s been there every day since.

You know that some day the French girl won’t have the ribbon her hair. Some day one of the mean kids will make fun of her for it, or her mom will do something different, or she’ll just get sick of it herself. But for now, you can’t keep your eyes off of it. There’s something really happy in that ribbon. Like with any superstition, you don’t tell her that you like it. You don’t want her to know. So you don’t talk to her at all. Because you think that the moment you talk to her, the moment that she knows that you like the ribbon, she’ll take it from her head and no one will ever see it again.

Except for Tuesday.

On Tuesday and Tuesday only, your Mom drops you off at school. The windows on her Ford Kuga are tinted, but she still wears the darkest of sunglasses. She always seems preoccupied as you climb from the seat. Today you decide to watch if she watches you, thinking maybe you’ll wave from the top step.

She doesn’t wait. But, after nearly racing away, she parks halfway down the block. You hide in the doorway watching. In a few minutes, Mrs. McCallister pulls up and lets out Sandy, Allen and Jake. They start to great you as they enter the grade school, but you put a finger over your lips and pull them aside. Mrs. McCallister hurriedly drives down the block and after she passes your mother, the Kuga shifts into drive and slowly idles out of the parking spot.

Your mother is following Mrs. McCallister.

What a mysterious life she lives.

Your Dad wears a tweed suit and a plain tie. His hair has just started to turn gray at its curly ends. When he smiles, he flashes an uncorrected gap on the left side of his top row of teeth. He drives you to school every morning and every morning as you pile out of the back seat, he asks, “Do you have your lunch?” even though you are always holding it in your hand.

You imagine as you run up the steps to the elementary school that your Dad always waits at the curb watching until the faintest shadow of you fades into the doorway. But your Dad doesn’t. He usually drives away as soon as he sees the back of your head. He pops an old tape cassette into the stereo. He leans back in the seat of the family Volvo and turns the volume up. He takes a small sip of coffee from his travel mug and says to no one in particular, “Oh yeah. This is the funk.”

This is what your Dad calls funk.

(Thanks for Casey Cochran for his guitar.)

Recorded for my friend Bloyd Thompsol.