A Drama in Three Acts

The man behind the counter at the hardware store looked at me doubtfully as I laid the two pieces of what had been a brand new axe before him. It had taken precisely one swing to shear the blade clean off, otherwise it was pristine.

"One swing?" he asked again, and I nodded.
"No sales receipt?" he asked again and I shook my head.
"Well," he pondered, "I'll have to get the manager." I shrugged.

The manager appeared in good time and looked at the axe cautiously, as if the pieces might suddenly leap back together again. He touched the blade with one fingertip and ran his hand down the length of the handle.

"Never seen that happen before." he said and I agreed. "Oughtn't to have broke like that." he said and I agreed again. "I'll get the owner." he said and I sighed. I knew better than to risk a glance at my watch.

The owner examined the axe briefly. "I'll be damned." he said and I felt a stirring of hope. He picked up both pieces and threw them into a nearby trash can, wiped his hands on his apron. "Get her a new axe." he said and my heart soared.

"Wood," he said with a shake of his head and a sorrowful expression, "It just isn't what it used to be."

Love Letters

Junior had fallen in love, hard and hopelessly, with a girl from "the States" and she didn't love him in return. Each morning on his way to work, he picked flowers and left them at the door of her rented cabin. Each evening, he changed clothes, splashed on aftershave, slicked down his hair and parked across the road, hoping for a glimpse of her. He courted her with love notes, telephone calls, boxes of chocolate, an ID bracelet. He began looking for a house to buy and put his precious savings into a fishing boat of his own. He shaved every day and began attending church on Sundays, gave up drinking and learned to dance. He traded his battered, old, practical pick up for a bright red, two door Chevy and housebroke his old retriever. He even got his teeth fixed by a dentist on the mainland and began smoking store bought cigarettes. He was in love and he was serious about it, determined to win her heart and hand by summer's end.

As June faded into July, there were dances and movies and long walks in the warm evenings. He meticulously painted her name on the stern of his new boat and the islanders shook their heads in unison and in resignation. At supper one night, Nana looked at him sternly. Mind me, Albert, she said quietly, She'll break your heart. But Junior laughed it off and gave her a quick kiss, No, m'am, he said with an confident grin, she'll come 'round. But she hadn't by the time of the Sunday School Picnic where he outbid everyone on her box lunch and she hadn't by the time the scallop fleet arrived just after the 4th of July and she hadn't by the time he went to the mainland in search of a ring.

As we came into August, it was common knowledge that she was seeling a scalloper on the side, a tall, good looking and very married scalloper who came to her cabin late at night and stayed til dawn. The dim lights and soft music that drifted into the night air told a tale that everyone understood and was saddened by but Junior's love allowed him the luxury of blinders. He don't mean a thing to her, he told friends generously, she'll come 'round. He carried the tiny diamond ring securely fastened in his shirt pocket, still brought flowers every day and wouldn't hear a word against her. The fleet left in late August and having regained what he considered to be the upper hand, he redoubled his efforts. He wrote almost daily letters filled with rough poetry and passion, he left gifts on her doorstep, he pleaded his case from her porch through the closed door, he wove wreaths of wildflowers and wild grasses tied with love knots and hung them on her windows. As Labor Day approached, he took to spending all night on her porch swing, smoking silently and staring out to sea. Sometimes she would join him, lean her head on his shoulder and they would talk softly, conversations that stayed beneath the wind and stayed private. Sometimes he spent the entire night alone.

Then it was September and one morning the cabin was empty. She had packed while he slept and slipped out at first light, early enough to make the first ferry crossing. She had several hours head start and there was no chance of him catching up with her but he went anyway, pushing the Chevy to the limit over 60 miles of gravel roads until it gave out just outside Annapolis. The final pursuit had left him shaken and disbelieving and when he eventually came home, he'd changed - he was quiet, solitary, distant. He fished alone and spent this time alone, turning away the efforts of anyone who tried to get close. Leave him be, Nana advised, he's been left behind. He'll catch up in his own time. But he never really did. He picked up his life where he'd left off, he went back to making a living as best he could, but he never spoke her name again, never talked of that summer, never married. He'd given away all he had and was never to get it back.

Currier & Ives Memories

My grandmother Ruby once told me that the width of a cat's whiskers tells it the width of space that it can safely navigate through without getting stuck. Too bad only cats have whiskers, she told me with a wink. This bit of homespun wisdom was the result of my getting stuck between the spokes of a wagon wheel, luckily unhitched at the time but just far enough away to be out of hearing range of the house. Ruby heard me when she came out to feed the chickens and had to drop her apron full of seed to make her way up the rocky incline to the pasture and free me. I expected, at the least, a strong talking to if not a trip to the woodshed, but what I got was a lesson about cats and small spaces and a mild pat on the backside.

I was a city child and the farm was like a never ending adventure to me. Each day was a chance to explore and imagine and discover - the hay loft was a sweet smelling, secret wonderland where sunlight filtered through the cracks of the roof in narrow beams. There was light enough to read by and listen to the sounds of the cows in their stalls. Uncle Byron had them all fitted with cowbells which were attached to wide leather straps around their necks and the bells jangled and echoed with their movements, making slow, sweet music as they made their ponderous way to and from the barn. The old workhorse had a stall to himself - all manner of harnesses and reins and bits were hung on the walls - there was a comforting, leathery smell to the stall and to the patient old horse who was happy enough to let me pretend he was a gallant steed and sit on his back for hours, face buried in his mane, legs hugging his sides and dreaming of races to be won. The woods surrounding the farm were patchy with moss covered rocks and they smelled of sunshine and shade and Christmas and except for the constant chatter of the birds, they were as silent as still water. I would sometimes hear the rustle of a small animal in the underbrush but never caught sight of one no matter how quickly I turned or how quiet I tried to be. I was a trespasser in the woods and tried to step lightly so as not to disturb or frighten the creatures who lived there. Even the pigs in their pen fascinated me - they were pale, oversized animals with muddy snouts, corkscrew tails and small, greedy eyes and they had a sharp, sour smell that carried heavily on the air.

It was years before I realized that there was another side to living on the farm, a side made up of hardship and hard work, sacrifice and struggle. There are no days off on a farm, no hired hands, no sleeping late, no quick runs to the corner store for a quart of milk. All the things that I remember as almost magic - the vegetable gardens, the animals,
the hay wagon, the old cast iron stove - they meant work to my family and although Ruby told me that work was it's own reward, it didn't lessen the labor.

My daddy said it was the best growing up you could ever have.

$20 and Change

The $20 had been stuffed into the pages of a textbook and there was a note. It read, "Several years ago I stole from this bookstore and now that I have my life back, I want to make amends." There was no signature. My young cashier looked at me, a puzzled expression on his face. "Why would someone do that?" he asked. "To clear his conscience,"I answered, " and to make something right."

Despite programs and rehabs and interventions, the sad truth is that the majority of addicts and alcoholics never recover. They die addicted and sick, abandoned and alone, in pain, confusion and denial. It was a bright moment to receive that $20 - it meant that someone had made it through to the other side, strong and well enough to make amends for a past transgression. It was a hopeful sign and a reminder to me to stay optimistic and positive. Giving up requires so little effort that it's easy to be seduced, easy to resign yourself to misery and martyrdom. It's almost comfortable to throw up your hands in defeat and live half-dead. Fighting back is harder. Addiction is like a chokehold on your emotions and spirit, it spares nothing and will not let go until it gets it's way. It offers a dark place to hide from yourself and loved ones and drink or drug your way into nothingness. You close your eyes, give in, and the pain goes away. Reality, when you come back to it, can be fought off with another drink or another pill and the cycle can go on for as long as you live.

The $20 was new and crisp and to me it meant that someone had let reality and light in. It meant hope.

Tale of the Mama Mouse

"Mice don't move their young." my husband pronounced with a certainty that he assumed would not be challenged.

We were sitting on the newly finished enclosed screen porch on a late summer evening. The last of the sun had just gone down and the crickets were beginning their songs. Sarah Jane, the calico cat was grooming herself in the shadows, Sugar Bear and Willie were curled up together asleep on the old braided rug we'd found at a garage sale, and the dogs were playing near the edge of the woods outside. The night before, we had discovered a nest in the eaves and there had been four baby mice nestled inside. Now there were only two. "Then where did they go?" I asked reasonably and he shrugged. Magic, my best loved and feisty black cat, appeared around the corner and jumped lightly into my lap with a soft meow. "Maybe," my husband suggested, "One of the cats....well, you know." I scratched Magic's ears and he began to purr so loudly it vibrated. "Don't even think such a thing!" I told my husband. He shrugged again.

We continued to sit and enjoy the peace and quiet and the warm summer air. A slight breeze made the pine tree branches sway and I think we may both have been very nearly asleep when we heard the scratching. Magic lifted his head, Sarah turned toward the sound, and Willie and Sugar Bear both woke up and focused on the eaves where a small mama mouse had appeared. She was calmly watching us, apparently not at all bothered by the four cats intently watching back. She made her way to the nest, tiny little nails scratching the fresh wood, and picked up one of her babies by it's little neck, then surefootedly made her way back to the far corner, slipped under the mesh and out of sight. She was back in a very few minutes and repeated the process. Without even looking at him, I could feel my husband's glare and concentrated all my energy into not laughing out loud. "Must be a trained mouse, " I finally managed to say neutrally, "Maybe an ex-circus mouse." I could sense the glare lessening until it was replaced by a rueful half-smile. "Right, " he said seriously, "Cause any fool knows that regular mice don't move their young." A wolf howled from somewhere on the other side of the mountain and the cats went to rigid attention while the dogs stopped in their tracks, sniffing the air and listening. We called them inside and they came a little slowly, reluctant to leave the sights and smells of the outside world behind. You just never know what the next hour might bring.

The English Gentleman

He was dressed all in black, wore spectacles and looked like a kindly grandfather with an elegant British accent and a touch of mischief in his eyes. The standing room only audience was enchanted with him.

He didn't so much play the guitar as caress it, fingertips moving delicately across the strings with ease and grace, hands in perfect synchronicity. He was one with the instrument and it responded to his touch with a cultured and soft voice. It was like watching poetry, notes flowing and blending one to another, like a river or a very gentle waterfall. It was music without lyrics, without flaws, and without pretensions.

In between, he spoke in soft tones of England, of his children and grandchildren, of his wife from Wales, of the origins of the music. His mouth moved in the direction of a smile without ever fully arriving but his eyes, peering over his glasses were alight with laughter and love. His humor was dry, well educated and soft spoken but true and it rippled through the small room without effort. His facial expressions reflected wisdom, satire, good naturedness, tolerance and affection. He was a musician's musician and he shared his gift with a roomful of strangers openly and without reservation. His music was well bred and beautiful but it embraced us all. During the break, I listened as the crowd marveled at his performance, He looks like a chubby Keebler elf, I heard a local artist remark, but he plays like he has magic in his soul, and from another photographer, If Fred Astaire had been a musician instead of a dancer, this is how he'd have sounded.

The gentleman from England had won ever heart in the room.

Butterbean and the Tomcat

He came around the corner of the shed, tail held high and walking with a casual elegance. He was a mackerel tabby, with dark stripes and he was enormous, even for a tomcat. The small brown dog saw him at once and froze, head cocked to one side in curiosity, one paw raised. He was easily three times her size and the standoff lasted several seconds until he resumed his nonchalant way across the yard. At the fence, he paused to look over his shoulder at her and then slowly slid under. She hadn't moved but as he disappeared she turned to look at me with a bewildered expression which seemed to say "Was I supposed to chase that?" She's a brave little dog, but she's not stupid. I called her to me and scooped her up. "Smart move, kiddo," I told her, "He'd have cleaned your clock."

She is a smart little dog and she knows not to take on more than she can do. She knows this instinctively while I have had to learn it through trial and error, suffering the consequences of my own behavior as I go. I have finally gotten the hang of picking my battles and I have the scars to prove it. And the most significant lesson has been that when you let go, things have a way of working out. The other thing the small dog has helped teach me is to get over it and move on. The instant the tomcat was gone, she forgot him and moved on to other interesting things. She never dwells on her failures or her successes, never lets hurt feelings last, never nurses a grudge.

Someone recently sent me this anonymous bit of wisdom, "Sorry looks back, worry looks around, faith looks up."
I've pretty much managed to let go of sorry and worry but I'm finding faith takes a lifetime of practice.

A Matter of Opinion

Recently one of my very favorite people in the world - a popular and well known writer and humorist whom I have always looked to for wit, satire, and extraordinary good sense - wrote something that was hurtful to someone I care about. I was caught totally off guard, both by his writing and her reaction to it. While it went straight to her heart, it simply passed over me like a whisper because this is something she lives and I only observe. "Nature," my hero wrote, "is about continuation of the species, in other words, children. Nature does not care about the emotional well-being of older people."

True enough, I thought to myself, not rocket science, but true enough. He then went on to make a commentary on the less than desirable effects on children that will be brought about by gay marriage. Now, I have never suffered from discrimination except the playful teasing about my height ( I stand a proud but unremarkable 5' ) and that born of stupidity ( a woman can't possibly know anything about the workings of a camera so get me a male salesperson, please ) so I was distressed to read this from a man I've adored for years. I expect such things from the so called Religious Right - their arrogant certainty and determination to endorse and encourage intolerance is so flat out wrong that it's common - and their self righteous swaggering abouf there being only one path to God is too revoltingly un-christian to even contemplate. However, to hear it from a voice that has never brought me anything but comfort, a smile, and gentle music - well.

I've never given much thought to sexual preference one way or another. I consider it a private matter between consenting adults and a subject to share only as they see fit. It does not define us and it certainly has no morality attached. It's a product of genetics, no more significant than blue eyes or brown. We are who and what we are meant to be and I believe that sexual preference is as much God's design as gravity. That we routinely deny same sex couples equal rights - marriage, divorce, health insurance, inheritances, children, social and religious acceptance and economic opportunities - is, to my mind, the act of a less than civilized society. Whether we do this through laws or satire makes little difference.

Secondly, "mixed gender" marriages from "back in the day" may indeed be traditional. There was no easy way out then which is a far cry different than being happy. Did they produce better, happier or more well adjusted children? I doubt it, just as I doubt that extended families will produce, lesser, sadder or badly adjusted children.
Broken families do not automatically breed broken children. And even broken children heal. So to my beloved writer, I say shame on you and to the one he hurt ( and angered ), I say don't listen to his radio show.

Seeing Things Through

People remember my daddy's good looks, charm, and kindness. But mostly what they remember is the sadness in his eyes. Like death and taxes, it was always there although he never spoke of it.

His marriage was a burden and a heavy weight that he carried without complaint or comment for the better part of 40 years. He kept his unhappiness to himself, believing, I think, that his responsibility mattered more than his personal troubles. He had chosen unwisely but it had been his choice and he would see it through. He never saw the point of pouring out his heart to his family and spreading the bitterness. He never blamed my mother and he never considered abandoning her. He saw himself as an honorable man and honorable men don't jump ship in rough seas - they sacrifice and ride it out. In a way, I suppose it was admirable but it was also foolish and wasteful. It was a mistake that could've been corrected.

Instead, he shared his love of life and quiet ways with others that loved him back. My cousin Linda, my friend Iris, and their friends were welcomed into his life. He spent precious time with his brother's children and his own cousins. He comforted strangers who had lost loved ones with a gentle touch and a soft voice. He played music and read as many books as he could find and in the end, chose a life of seeing others through difficult times while silently coping with his own. He didn't look back.

It was only right that after some 70 years of living for others, he should find his soulmate. It's never too late to learn to dance.

A Little Madness

We might have noticed Elizabeth going mad but for the fact that she was distinctly odd to begin with. No one was sure exactly how old she was, just that she'd been around for as long as any of us could remember. She lived alone in a shack just past the old breakwater and she came and went
at odd hours of the day and night, a small, crooked figure with yards of white hair and a pronounced limp. She was a collector - twigs, shells, discarded plastic wrapping, string, pebbles, empty pop bottles - it was all placed carefully into the basket she carried over one scrawny arm and then covered with a raggedy red checkered napkin. She was nearly toothless and her skin appeared to have been thrown onto her but not fastened. As a general rule, she only wore one shoe - whether it caused or compensated for the limp, no one seemed to know. She had fiercely bright blue eyes,
wickedly unnerving in her haggard, white as death old face and her chin whiskers had grown out a half inch or so. If she had chosen to wear black, she would've made a classic and unforgettable witch.

She seldom spoke as she made her rounds, preferring the company of whatever went on her mind to actual people, but she smiled often, cocking her head with an open mouthed, gum displaying grin. People gave her spare change, candy, bits of kelp or dried fish, a Jersey Milk bar. She would nod her thanks and carefully stow each treasure in her basket then continue on her way. She ate quite a bit of grass and often would have green stains on her chin and fingers and I used to see her frequently on the beach, kneeling in the incoming tide and drinking salt water from her cupped hands only to vomit it back up a few minutes later. She didn't seem to mind.

She was a cheerful, old eccentric - the product of an incestuous union between her mother and brother, people speculated, both of whom were products of older such incestuous unions and as she was harmless and not likely to procreate herself, she was mostly overlooked and left to her own devices. Neither she nor her brother Willie were a threat and most of the time they weren't even considered nuisances. A little madness was considered routine and they were cared for and watched over by everyone. In the winter, Nana said, she moved in with Willie - she had once set a fire on the floor of her own shack and nearly burned it to the ground.

She went round the bend the summer I was thirteen. One of the Sullivan boys had come upon her on his way home from the factory, half naked and blue with cold, walking out into the passage on a pair of stilts. She was carrying her basket in her teeth and singing and the waves took her under three times before he could get to her. The next day she walked to the edge of the breakwater, opened an umbrella and before anyone could stop her, jumped. She survived but had broken both legs and was taken to the mainland hospital for recovery and would never return. Madness had overtaken the little old woman at last and some said she'd recognized it, seen it coming but wasn't strong enough to outrun it.

The Woman From Away

Bill Albright lived in a ramshackle, old two story house that you could barely see from the road for the wildly over grown hedges. There was gingerbread all along the overhang of the veranda roof and the second story featured a turret and a widows walk plus a wraparound balcony. The driveway was so choked in weeds and shrubs that it was barely passable and Bill liked it that way - he was a legendary bootlegger and he valued his privacy. Ain't gonna make it easy for the revenue man, he would say from his rocking chair as he cleaned his shotgun, they gonna hafta find me 'afore they kin catch me.

There were other bootleggers on the island but nobody could outrun and outflank the revenuers like Bill. He was in his 60's by then and his hair had yet to turn gray. He had a ruined, leathery face though, eyes sunk deep and always a little melancholy. He kept his black beard cropped close, favored the traditional flannel shirts and black fishing boots under his overalls and was never seen without a pack of Players cigarettes in his shirt pocket. He could light a match using his thumbnail, an ability we very much admired and, to his delight, were always trying to imitate. He taught us all how to play cribbage and dominoes, shear a sheep, harness a horse and fish for eels. He told us stories of great ship wrecks and the young men taken by the sea, stories of being a merchant seaman in his younger days, stories of finding sin and redemption in the same ports, stories of the revenue man and his endless search for Bill's well hidden and well protected whiskey stills. From his front porch rocking chair, he taught us sea songs his grandfather had taught him......Farewell to Nova Scotia, your seabound coast, may your mountains dark and dreary be .....for when I am far away on the briny ocean deep, may you never hear a song or a wish for me .....
and others we learned but had to promise not to repeat. He taught us that life, if lived well, could be a great game and a great adventure even if you were only known for whiskey making.

One June, Bill made one of his frequent trips "up the valley" and returned missing two fingers on his left hand. He had met, so the story went, a widow woman with a somewhat dubious past and someone had passed a remark that left him no choice but to defend her honor. No one ever mentioned the fate of the man who had made the remark and when Bill brought his bride home the following year, a pretty, young brunette with green eyes called Katie Rose, considerably younger than her third husband and inclined to be flirtatious, not a word was said. Katie Rose would bury Bill some twenty years later after a long and successful marriage. Even my grandmother attended the service although she had always been of the opinion that Bill was a no account and a damn fool who's luck with the revenuers would one day run out. Mind me, she said as we left the church, I don't hold with whiskey making but I don't much hold with revenuers either. Katie Rose had the still leveled the day Bill died and had him buried in the whiskey soaked ground without so much as a marker. When Nana asked her why, she shrugged and said that they'd never caught him alive and that she'd be damned if they'd catch him dead.

That was the day the villagers stopped calling her "the woman from away".

A Place in Heaven

I knew something was wrong in the time it took me to walk from the bed to the back door. The small brown dog was dancing at my heels and the cats were circling around my ankles and crying for their breakfast but there was no sign of the black dog. I found her lying in the middle of the living room, not moving and looking a little dazed.
When I reached to pick her up, she yipped sharply and snapped. I got her to her feet but found she couldn't put weight on her back leg and was carrying it at an angle. I hurriedly tended to the other animals and then packed her into the car for yet one more emergency trip to the vet.

Doc saw her at once and determined that she had dislocated her kneecap. He gave her an injection and gave me some reassurance then laid her on her back and stretched her legs. After some pulling and massaging - and some serious resistance on her part - the kneecap popped back in. Common as dirt, he told me, happens all the time in smaller dogs. She was already better enough to growl at me and bare her teeth at him.

I have to confess that there was a moment - just a fraction of a second, really - when the house was quiet and the cats were freely walking around, no chaos, no noise - when the thought crossed my mind, Why treat her? I could get used to this. It was a shameful and selfish thought and I immediately felt guilty but not guilty enough to avoid the follow up thought, maybe it's hip dysplasia at last.

It's not that I don't love her, I do and dearly, but she has been a trial. She's hyperactive, dangerously agressive,
fiercely jealous, and more stubborn than a pack of mules. She chases the cats relentlessly and once took a chunk out of Nick's tail when he was sitting in my lap. At the slightest sound from outside, she explodes with panic and goes into a fit of hysterical barking. She's a fear-biter, anxious, tense, demanding, possessive and manic. She's been through three sessions of obedience training, every training collar made, every diet and every available drug. The final diagnosis has been brain damage from her year long fight with a condition known as puppy strangles. Any owner with a lick of sense would've had her euthanized years ago, still I can't let her go. It feels like punishing her for something that is not her fault, like killing her because she won't behave properly and I can't bring myself to do it. So we go on. She breaks and mends as does my patience and my love for her and there are days when I feel we are both assured a place in heaven.

Smoke Signals

The tiny battery powered alarm clock on my bedside table read 6:54 - six minutes before it's sharp warning would sound, before the dogs and cats nestled around me would leap into full and immediate wakefulness and begin the morning campaign. But it was still dark and everything in me wanted to close my eyes again and pretend I hadn't seen the small digital dial, that I had still had several hours before morning and before another Monday dawned. Several sets of eyes were watching me to see which direction I would take but none would stir without a signal. Six minutes wasn't worth it, I decided, and crawled out of the warmth. A half dozen or so assorted small animals accompanied me and each beat me to the back door and the food bowls. The morning had begun.

The language of signals is universal in many aspects. Without even remembering when we learned, we all understand traffic signals, handshakes, a tipped cap, brake lights, directionals, salutes, any circle with a slash through it, a nod, a padlocked door, a gesture to sit, flashing lights on an ambulance, a finger to the lips. The more subtle signals we send and receive, especially the ones we're not completely aware of, is a trickier area. A wink, a warning glance, tears, a smile, being routinely late, what we choose to wear, posture and body language, a raised voice, dimmed lights or
even something as simple as a held door - these call for interpretation and too many times what we see or hear is not what is or what was meant.

Not all of us have hidden agendas or ulterior motives. My friend, Tricia, is a direct sort of person. She usually says exactly what she thinks and you can depend on her to say exactly what she means. She believes that if you are at A and want to go to B, you need not visit C, M, and X along the way. She struggles with the indirect among us frequently, I think because those of us who know her, know that we can pass her the buck and kill two birds with one stone - she will go to the source instead of to someone else and she will tackle whatever the problem may be directly. She is
something of a rarity in this with most people we know. She will not, as she says, join in the circle of passing it on to the next person. If she receives a signal she doesn't understand, she is far more likely to ask than am I. It's not exactly bravery although I often see it as such, but more a built in curiosity combined with common sense. If she were a crow, she'd fly straight - I doubt she'd be able to help it.

The Wood Splitter

The barbeque place was little more than a falling down shack at an intersection in an area of town where poverty is in charge. The signs were lettered by hand with little care for spelling or grammar and the lot was littered with cast off
machinery and trash. A rickety picnic table sat off to one side along with the huge smoker and a haphazard woodpile. White smoke rose from the chimney and I could hear the sounds of wood being chopped. On the far side, a tall, powerfully built black man in ragged jeans, heavy workboots and no shirt stood over a stump with an axe. Though it was early in the morning, sweat ran over his shoulders and down his back from the effort of wielding the axe and he paused often to wipe sweat from his eyes with a faded bandana he wore 'round his neck. He worked gracefully, moving with the axe as if they were one and in a steady, flowing motion. Once split, he easily moved on to the next piece of wood, split it in one or two fluid movements, and moved on to the next. I felt as if I had slipped back in time and been unexpectedly transported to The Whistlestop Cafe and I half-imagined that Idgie Threadgoode might suddenly appear with a plate of fried green tomatoes for the wood splitter's breakfast. On the other side of the intersection, rundown shotgun houses lined the street for almost as far as I could see and in a vacant lot just behind me, a group of seven or eight men had gathered under a shade tree. They were playing cards on shabby makeshift card tables and drinking from the comfort of battered lawn chairs.

The light changed and a little reluctantly I returned to the present day although the images stayed with me, perhaps because they were so stereotypically old south. I remembered Boston's hate wars and race riots vividly - they were limited to the inner city and dealt with harshly. Racism is not defined or limited by geography but at times the way it's expressed seems to reflect the culture in which it lives. Tolerance is not always what it appears to be on the surface and racism can be as equally well taught by genteel, well bred voices as by shouting, illiterate ones. A cross burning in Mississippi is not so very different than setting a school bus on fire in Massachusetts - emotions born of hatred and fear cannot help but be destructive.

Later in the day I passed the same way again and realized I'd likely driven by the little place hundreds of times and never given it a glance. It had caught my attention that morning only because of the wood splitter and the images that his labor had evoked. It was now almost dusk and his work had been done. The little barbeque place had returned to being no more than it was, a broken down rib shack in a broken down, poor section of town. The woodpile was now neatly stacked, the card players were gone, and the sun was setting over the row of shotgun houses.

No Sad Springs

The air is beginning to be green with pollen and there are buds on the magnolia trees and azaleas. Another spring is just around the corner, impatiently waiting its turn in the cycle of seasons. From my windows I can see roses in bloom, crepe myrtle waking up, and a front yard littered with fragile dandelions that float away in the breeze. The Saturday morning sounds are now lawn mowers instead of leaf blowers and shirtsleeved neighbors are at work in their hedges and gardens. Sunshine streams though the blinds of the sunroom in the morning, patchworking sleeping cats and making patterns across the carpet. There is light and warmth most everywhere.

I have had, that I can remember, no sad springs. Other seasons bring reminders of friends no longer here, of endings and hardships, burying a beloved cat or dog, of people who have touched my life and places that I may never see again. Spring brings hope and optimism, the promise of newness is in the grass and the sunshine and the extended light of early evenings. It's a time to dance in the town square, picnic by a river, pick flowers and take Sunday afternoon drives in the country. It's a time to listen to music on outdoor stages and drink sweet wine on covered patios at expensive restaurants. It's a time to revel and rejoice for each breath we are given.

Time is a gift, precious and far more fleeting than we can ever imagine. Spring will be a shortlived season and I will give thanks for each and every day.

The Short Life of Secrets

Pete Smith's '57 Chevy was parked in the shadows of the dance hall and cluttered with kids, drinking, laughing and just hanging out. Inside the dance was nearly over, a few couples lingered on the floor and we could hear Merle Haggard on a scratchy old 45 singing about lost love. Inside the Chevy, Pete was pouring orange juice and vodka into plastic cups and passing it around. He handed me one and I looked at it doubtfully before tasting it. It was my first drink and nearly my last - the orange juice was warm and bitter and the vodka's acid taste burned my throat. I made a face and handed it back and Pete laughed and announced that I must not be my mother's daughter after all. Out of nowhere, Johnny appeared in the darkness, hauled Pete out of the car by his collar and leveled him with one quick and accurate punch. For a moment no one said a word, then Pete got to his feet, checked his jaw, and turned to me saying I was outta line, kid, sorry.

Secrets don't last long on a small island and I had just discovered that my mother's drinking habits were no exception. Johnny put his arm around my shoulders and we left the dance, walking slowly along the Old Road in silence. As we rounded the curve at Gull Rock, the lights of Westport appeared across the passage and I could see the church spire on one end and the lighthouse at the other. The water was calm and dark, unlike the islanders it did not give up its secrets. I shouldn't have hit him, Johnny said, He didn't mean anything. I leaned against him and said nothing. He smelled of aftershave and new leather, a tall good looking boy with defined, rugged features and kind eyes. Everybody drinks too much now and then, he told me gently, It's nothing to do with you.

We walked on til we reached the New Road and then crossed over the strawberry field and down the driveway to my back door. Crickets chirped and the clouds were bright in the night sky as we sat on the side steps with moonlight everywhere. Johnny smoked and talked of his dream to go to the mainland and find work on the tiny newspaper, a dream he would turn into reality for a brief time though we didn't know it then, about fishing with his dad, about being the first in his family to finish grade twelve, about having ambition in a limited world. He was getting around to it in his own way and finally he talked to me about my mother. She and his dad had been friends, drinking buddies, some would have said, for years and Johnny had been through many of the same things I had. Pete Smith, he said,
was a loud mouth and a drunk himself, so I was to pay no mind. Sticks and stones, he reminded me, shake it off.
Her shame, and he said this clearly and slowly, is not your's. And he smiled, kissed me, and said It's our secret.

Cabin Fever

My friend Iris and I have known each other practically since the womb. We are now in our late 50's and have old bones, several of which she broke in a recent fall and as a result is wheelchair bound. The condition, although only temporary, has several unpleasant side effects for her - lack of independence for one, and cabin fever for another, which I fear, judging from her recent emails, is reaching critical mass. Her home and privacy have both been invaded by medical outsiders and she's been forced to rely on others for the simplest things. On the bright side, she works from home and mainly by telephone so her work has suffered minimally. Still, confinement is confinement and her back porch while it brings her close to the outside world, doesn't bring her into it. Worse, she lives in New England and the temperature on the back porch is hardly ideal for this time of year.

She tells me that people admire her attitude and the way she's handling the accident and I began to think about how much our attitudes are shaped by happenstance. Disasters happen, temporary disabilities happen, emotional hardships are with us thoughout our lives. We live with loss, distance and rejection but they're all tempered by gains, closeness and acceptance. Do we choose our attititude or are we forced into it by circumstance? I think it may be a little of both with a hint of destiny thrown in for flavor. Like my friend, Aj, I believe that everything happens for a reason. Life can become so routine that we stop paying attention and need a wake up call.

So, my dear wheelchair bound friend adapts and adjusts though she hates every minute of it. She will go from chair to walking cast and eventually back to being vertical and carrying her weight as she was before the fall. I think she will be a better person for it, with a sharper appreciation for mobility. She rejects my advice to "become one with the chair" - she is stubborn and will fight her way back to walking no matter what it takes. I hope I would do the same.

A Thank You Note

The untold damage of Katrina has brought the movies to our small town and every now and again, I get to meet a celebrity. If I'm very fortunate, I even get the privilege of taking their picture as happened this past weekend. It's hard not to be impressed by their fame, charm and good looks but it's outright impossible not to be impressed by their spirit of generosity and grace. Bill Sadler is just such a person.

I didn't know his name but I recognized his face and his work instantly from "The Green Mile", several episodes of "Law and Order", "Kinsey" and a multitude of other film and tv roles. He took the stage at the house concert in blue jeans and a tee shirt, having come directly from work. With a winning smile, blonde hair in slight disarray and a borrowed guitar, he sat and played and sang - from satirical nonsense to gentle Irish love songs, all original work and sung with humor and sincerity. Other local musicians and folk singers shared the stage with him in a last minute jam and those lucky enough to have stayed after the scheduled concert of Beth Wood and David Lamotte were treated to a very special evening.

Maybe it's the intimate atmosphere of a small studio or the warmth of the crowd, or just making music in a roomful of people who love music, but actors are just folks making a living in front of an audience and I was very grateful to be a part of it. Although it's going to be hard to see Bill Sadler as a villian anymore - he's way too nice a guy.

Last Chances

She was several years younger than I was but no longer looked it. The past few months had aged her, there were dark circles under her pain-filled eyes and her worry lines had deepened into creases. She was worn down with fear, uncertainty, guilt, anger, with motherhood itself. "How" she asked me in a shaky voice, "Do I let go of my child?"

The child in question was in her mid-20's and claimed to be living on the streets of a nearby town in Texas. She had no place to sleep or shower, no car, no food, no money and no prospects except her mother's already drained savings. She had farmed out her six month old son to his grandmother and her common law husband was back in jail for possession with intent to sell, grand theft and larceny. Her own sister had turned her away because of her history of drug abuse and the collateral damage - a lifetime of lies and deceit, broken promises, half hearted attempts at rehab. She'd finally used up her last last chance and her mother was was at her wits end - torn between the welfare of her child and her need to break free. Her illusions were shattered, her hopes for her daughter in pieces, and her own well-being was compromised. She didn't want to prolong the cycle but didn't know how not to.

We tend to look at addiction as either self-inflicted, in which case we spare no pity and leave the victims to lie alone in the beds they have made for themselves, or as a problem which love and sacrifice can overcome. When the ones we care for turn to self-destruction, especially our children, they will drag us down with them, knowing we will not abandon them. We refuse to see that every rescue, every bail out, every bit of money sent provides them with their next fix and our next heartbreak.

"How do I let go of my child?" she asks and I answer from experience, "With as much love as you have left."

Day Pass People

The old lady made her way off the bus and headed in the direction of the store. She was dressed for the weather with her boots and gloves and a long coat with a fur collar. She wore a knitted hat pulled over her ears and carried a cane with three prongs on the end, an evil looking thing that I thought might double as a weapon although I knew it was meant for stability. When she reached me, she paused, leaned on the cane and demanded Ya'll sell fireplaces? Her thick glasses had slid down her nose and I could see her bright eyes ringed with makeup and intent on me. It wasn't all that unusual. A variety of interesting people were always wandering around the parking lot and though the sign clearly read "Photo Supply", we got asked all kinds of questions. No, m'aam, I told her, We're a camera store. Her eyes narrowed with suspicion and she raised her cane, jabbing it at the window display which featured a paper mache fireplace and a stuffed Santa Claus in a rocking chair. That's a fireplace, she announced with a tone that suggested the entire matter was settled. Yes, m'aam, I said and hesitated before adding But it's not a real one. She glared at me and raised her cane and on reflex I took a step backward, a move which made me feel instantly foolish and defensive. Well, allright then! she snapped and abruptly turned and began shuffling her way back toward the bus stop. I let out a breath I hadn't even known I was holding and snubbed out my cigarette.

One of the many sides to retail sales is the customers. They come in all shapes and sizes, all kinds of moods, all with some manner of expectation. They can be pleasant or threatening, polite or rude,
friendly or hostile, curious or condescending. Some are articulate, some are not. Some are arrogant and some are looking to be educated. And some are just out on day passes.

Running the Show

All of life, I believe, is one extended control issue. We fight for it as children, fight harder for it as teenagers, and will take on the world for it as adults. Every human interaction is, at it's root, a struggle for it, all human dynamics are based on it, wars on every scale break out over the lack or excess of it. The reality is that the very idea we have control at all is a myth. Want to make God laugh? so the old saying goes, Tell Him you have plans.

Still, we find ourselves needing to run every show. We don't delegate very well because we know in our hearts that no one will do it the way we would. We see delegation as surrendering control to the hands of another and that becomes a threat. Besides, we know that we'd just have to do it all over again to get it right. When we teach, we leave out small but critical details in order to ensure that no one will be able to do our job and this helps keep us indispensable. If we set up systems, we practically encrpyt them to keep them secure so that no one else will be able to make sense of them. We fear loss of control, are threatened and made defensive by it. We are team players only as long as we lead the team.

It's exhausting work especially when we have to spend so much time denying that this is how we are. But controllers recognize other controllers as if there's a sixth sense at work. Perhaps it's the inevitable conflict or just that our threat detectors go into high gear, or maybe we fear disclosure.
It's really all just so much wasted time and energy and it almost always results in additional labor, labor that could be far better spent.

We all need to feel that we have some say over our lives and circumstances and the choices we make. We just need to learn that it can't extend to the lives, circumstances and choices of others.
Letting someone else run the show may result in mistakes, disorder, even chaos and clutter but in the end we'll be better for it and no harm done.

Season To Taste

"Let me clear about this," I told him for what must've been the thousandth time, "I have no personal grudge against pepper. I just don't like it."
"What's happened to your spirit of adventure?" he asked jokingly.
"My spirit of adventure is just fine," I said a little more sharply than I"d intended, "Just please don't put pepper on my steak."

The agument that followed was, of course, not entirely about pepper, although pepper had almost come to symbolize the growing distance between us. He liked it and refused to care that I didn't. I felt dismissed, waved off as you might a pesky insect or a bothersome child. My likes and dislikes were unimportant to him and he would make no concessions. I felt that we were not in sync - he liked to tell me that he knew best, that there was something wrong with me if I didn't like something he did and the sheer arrogance of his tone had become a gnawing at my nerves. In passing, he had once mentioned having voted for George Wallace and I'd been stunned into a dead, dazed silence. Originally, I had thought that we were on the same road - with a shared love of animals and music, that we had similiar ambitions, values, and dreams, but as the years passed and his drinking worsened, our closeness evaporated. We were endlessly on each others nerves and would often go for days without a word passing between us. The silence was dreary, heavy with guilt and seething with unvoiced rage. I hated it even more than the fighting and always thought it was far more damaging. It was from exactly such a silence that the end of the marriage would eventually come.

Meanwhile there was the matter of the pepper. With a defiant gesture, he roughly set a plate in front of me, saying "I"ve improved it." I looked at the steak, black with pepper and pushed the plate away. "You've ruined it," I said evenly, "Give it to the dogs." And the argument flared again until in defeat and frustration, I left the table and went to bed.

There is a time for seasonings and a time to pass them by.