Old Friends & Autumn Days

It was a chilly morning and he walked slowly keeping a firm grip on the leash and stepping carefully over the debris on the sidewalk. He wore a scarf and viser cap, gloves, and oversized sunglasses. Long white hair flowed over the collar of his jacket and his beard was tucked under the scarf. He was old but the dog was ancient, heavy on his feet and walking nose to the ground, his belly swaying with each step. Some variation of beagle, I thought, but with a lot of years on him. The wind was strong and against them as they made their way down the old neighborhood street and both leaned slightly forward, heads down and balance at risk. The old dog paused at an old tree, sniffing and reading the scents, and the old man waited patiently, leaning on his cane and gazing toward the next intersection. Traffic was light but each passing car created a wake and swirled the fallen leaves in mini whirlwinds and both the old man and the dog watched these small leaf storms with interest. A boy on a bicycle passed them and waved and the old man raised his hand to wave back while the dog gave a half hearted woof. The mailman passed from the opposite direction and stopped long enough to pet the old dog and shake the old man's hand.

There are a great many such pairs walking the broken sidewalks and littered streets of this town. Old men and old women with old dogs on frayed leashes, out each morning and each evening in all kinds of weather. They walk the sidewalks and the parks, familiar with each other and comfortable with their individual territories. They trace well worn routes and travel the same paths, like old friends out for a stroll on a pretty autumn day. They know each other well, always looking both ways and staying inside the crosswalks. This is the autumn of their lives and they treat it gently, respectfully. They know their time is coming to an end but will not alter their routines. They are loyal and formidable, well known sights in their neighborhood, their endurance comforting.

The old man comes to his house, a small bungalow with a fence in need of paint and an untended lawn. He and the old dog go through the gate and up the walk to the front steps where they sit side by side in the early morning sunshine and watch the world pass - two old friends enjoying the early autumn days and each other's company.

One Small Life

Ask any cat owner. The sound of a hairball about to be expelled is singularly unforgettable.

I put down my makeup and ran to the kitchen for paper towels, then following the sound, dashed into the half bath in the guest room. Murray was crouched on the bathroom floor, tail switching, yowling in that full bodied and earthy tone reserved for projectile vomiting and trips to the vet. He was glaring at the corner of the vanity and the wall, fiercely intent and aggressively postured. Behind him, the dogs were barking wildly and for a second it was like walking into a madhouse. Making my way through, I scattered the dogs and reached for the cat who had seemingly turned to stone - he protested violently, went rigid in my arms and continued to make an ungodly sound, I could feel his wailing like vibrations as he pushed to get free. Depositing him in the hall and closing the door behind me, I located my glasses and returned cautiously to the bathroom, having realized along the way that this was no ordinary incidence of hairball attack. Even with my glasses I could see nothing out of the ordinary in the small room until the slightest movement caught my eye - moving closer on my hands and knees, I discovered a tiny chameleon burrowed into the fibers of a dustbroom leaning against the wall. It was frozen in place and camouflaged but alive. I sat back on my knees with a satisfied feeling of mission accomplished which rapidly turned into mission impossible as it dawned on me that I would have to rescue the small creature and rescue called for capture. After several minutes of considering the various possibilities, I decided to try a shoebox, coax the tiny invader into it, cover it quickly, and make a run for the back porch. All of which seemed like a perfectly good plan until the black dog hit the guestroom door like a battering ram and a small army of companion animals broke through and joined forces to separate me from my escape route.

Times like this try my patience. One at a time, I dragged, carried, coaxed and tricked the animals out of the guestroom, found a shoebox and put it over the chameleon, turned it over to insure he was inside and quickly put the cover on. I set him free on the back porch with a warning and watched him disappear into the shrubs, there one minute and gone the next. It was only one small life saved but it had been worth it.

The Horse Who Could Walk on Water

If you went down the front path and to the road, then over the guard rail and down the cliff to the rocks, there was a particular rock that with some imagination turned into a horse. I went there every day, climbed on, and rode off.
Sometimes it was a cowboy's horse, a painted pony with a feisty nature, always wanting to take the reins and run. Sometimes it was a fiery black steed, gallant and heroic, always winning the race against impossible odds. Other times it was stallion, proud and sure footed, who flew across the desert at speed unknown to man. Always it was a friend who waited patiently for me to mount, take the reins, and travel to places far away and mysterious, then bring me safely home. I rode for hours at a time, solitary and completely happy, as only a child can ride in her imagination.

Passing fisherman waved from their boats, yelling encouragement and warnings not to fall. The incoming tide lapped at the horse's hooves and we went faster and faster until we outran it. We rode like the wind, horse and rider in sync against the world. My grandmother's calls went unheard, the fishing boats faded into blurred images, the ocean itself opened to make way. No one could catch us on the rocks and no harm could come to us. We found shells and kelp and small sea creatures, starfish and snails and tiny things swimming in the tide pools. Seagulls flocked overhead, gliding effortlessly against the sky, following the fishing boats as they headed out and again as they returned. We crossed the cove at low tide and at a full gallop, headed for the pastures and hills above St. Mary's Bay. Villagers stood aside, amazed at the sight. The horse seemed to fly, like Pegasus, and I held his mane tightly and urged him on and upward, over the trees and the water and into the clouds. The world was far away, the island a tiny speck below us, lost in a vast ocean churning with with whitecaps and waves. We flew toward it and the mighty horse pranced on the surface of the water, delicate and free, outstretched wings gliding us toward shore.

We won every competition, every event and every race. We rode on the beach and the dusty dirt roads, jumped every fence and cleared every obstacle, always with time and room to spare. We rode into forests and mountains and crossed streams and bridges. We outran fire and got places before the wind. And at the end of the day when the sun began to fall and the sky turned all the sunset colors, we rode home together. Oh, to have such a horse again
for one more ride.

Visitation Rights

A very dear friend who's daughter is in her first year of college recently wrote me about going to Parents Weekend and feeling like a visitor in her daughter's life. The phrase struck me as inevitably sad, nostalgic, laden with loss and resignation. Their lives, lived so closely for so long, have at last separated, as they must for each to travel on. The distance between them will shape and change them both, their relationship is likely to bend and sway as time passes - some ties will be stronger, others may be weaker - but each will be better for it.

Still, the sadness lingers for the past, for the bonds between them, for all a mother invests in the raising of a child, for the shared memories and experiences, for the special intimacy that can exist between a mother and daughter. Never having been a mother, I don't know for sure, but I suspect that there will be more bitter sweetness to come - the child will fall in love, marry, have children of her own. And each crossroad she comes to alone will make her mother proud as well as sad. Her leaving has left an empty space in an empty house and a silence where once there was a happy noise.

Some changes in life are subtle and gradual, slinking up behind us ever so softly and taking hold so slowly we don't notice. Some are sudden, wrenching and loud, caving in our complacency with a crash and demanding our attention. Somewhere in between, children grow up and become young adults striking out on their own with no thought of failure or fear or hesitation, only a need to be on their own in a world bright with promise and adventure.

Visitation rights are granted to the ones who are loved.

Up in the Attic

A proper attic has an aura of musty mystery and dark promise, full of past lives and recollections. A proper attic is a treasure waiting to be discovered and explored. Or a chamber of horrors, best left alone and undisturbed.

Aunt Vi had decided to have a massive summer cleaning and clearing out. She intended to show no mercy and sweep through her home like Sherman through Atlanta, unswayed by old memories or keepsakes. She was, she announced to my grandmother, done with clutter and foolish mementos and other dust collecting nonsense. She was going to wipe the slate clean of the debris of her life and enter a new age of precision and organization, an age she was determined would be knick knack free and ruled by clean lines and open spaces. No more piles of yellowing newspapers and magazines kept for God knew what reason, no more mismatched china or clothes that didn't fit, no more trunks filled with books or pressed flowers or gone out of style shoes or tarnished jewelry. Aunt Vi was on a mission forty years past due. Best you go fishing for a few days, dear, she advised her dazed husband briskly, This may unsettle you. She enlisted the Sullivan boys for the heavy work, got Mac to lend her his pick up truck for transport, farmed out the old cat for the duration, and began. She reached the attic in four days, exactly as she had planned, but then hit a snag. Amid the dust and disorganization, she discovered an old leather trimmed trunk with a rusty brass padlock, nearly hidden in a far corner as if it had been made intentionally inaccessible. There was no sign of a key and she had to break the lock with an old hammer and as she was doing so, she told Nana, a peculiar feeling came over her, Just like a premonition, Alice! and she backstepped in surprise, the hammer falling to the floor with a crash. Though not a superstitious woman, Aunt Vi decided to leave the attic for the nex day and descended
the stairs for an afternoon manhatten.

Several days later, my grandmother asked her how she was progressing and Aunt Vi shook her head dismally, It's foolishness, she told my grandmother, But I can't bring myself to open that damn trunk. Nana frowned, In heavens name, why not? she demanded and Aunt Vi looked away, color suddenly flushing her cheeks. Vi? my grandmother
leaned forward, a hint of concern mixed with curiosity in her voice, Vi, why can't you open the trunk? Aunt Vi lit a ciagarette, poured herself a second drink, fussed with the edge of the tablecloth, rearranged the sugar bowl and the salt and pepper shakers. Sitting in the rocking chair by the stove with Vi's old cat asleep in my lap, I noticed the silence and looked their way. They had drawn closer, heads together and whispering. Nana appeared to be impatient while Vi folded her arms across her chest and was shaking her head but I couldn't hear over the old cat's purring. Is there a ghost up in the attic? I asked and both women whirled and glared at me so fiercely that the cat woke and leapt out of my lap with an unhappy yowl. Little pitchers have big ears, my grandmother told Aunt Vi giving me her narrowed eyed look and telling me to go outside and play. Sounding braver than I felt, I asked if I could play in the attic instead and the two women responded instantly and in unison, NO!

Later that summer Aunt Vi finished her house cleaning and true to her word had uncluttered and organized the house down to the last detail. She threw out truckload after truckload of furnishings, chipped dishes and glassware, old clothes and a half dozen boxes of shoes, moldy books and broken appliances, drawers full of light bulbs and unused keys, fishing gear and empty pill bottles. She cleaned from top to bottom with a vengeance but up in the attic, the old trunk was left behind. It sat squarely in the center of the empty room and in the afternoons a halo of sunlight flooded over it, creating shadows and shapes that beckoned and called to Aunt Vi as she sat cautiously on the top attic step, just watching, thinking, resisting. She never allowed anyone into the attic ever again and though she spent hours watching the old trunk from the doorway, she never crossed the threshold again. After her death, Uncle Mel had it bound up and boxed and paid young William Ryan to take it several miles out past the passage and sink it, unopened.

Perhaps it's still at the bottom of the Atlantic ocean. Perhaps not.

Sweet Home Chicago

It was a quiet crowd and a night of quiet music.

A single performer, a weathered old folksinger who had grown up in the sixties and wore his age on his face but not in the least in his fingers. He held the guitar with a combination of reverence and the ease of an old friend. When he spoke, his voice was deep as a well and echo-y with memory and humor. When he sang, his voice dipped and rose according to his song - dry and satiric one moment, so sad he drew tears the next, and then without any warning, slipping into silliness and nonsense through a haze of laughter and applause. His shy smile and clear pleasure of performing shone. He told stories of his life in Chicago - thirty years in the same apartment - stories of his neighborhood, the German bakery where he so often went, the sights and the people, his first love and how he got over her.

Stories of learning to play the guitar and his father's death, the Cubs, his friendship with Steve Goodman who had recorded "The Dutchman", how he loved the songs and stories of Tom Lehrer, his hero worship of Roy Rogers and having his picture taken with the magnificent Gregory Peck. His audience cheered, clapped, cried and sang along.

He rarely smiled although his tone and face suggested that he might at times - more often his expression was that of a little boy who had told a sly and silly joke - his gaze swept over the small crowd in anticipation and there was mischief in his eyes.The end of the evening came much too quickly and reluctantly we all left for home, better off for a night spent with Michael Smith.

Train Time

"Yonder comes the train!" Uncle Shad yelled to the crowd, "Keep clear of the tracks!"

We obediently stepped backwards, children of all ages and their families, to see the locomotive steaming down the tracks, a monster of a train billowing clouds of black smoke against the sky and making a tremendous noise. The whistle blew, a high shriek that caused many of the women to flinch and cover their ears. Few enough of the folks who lived on the mainland had ever seen such a sight and those who had traveled the forty miles from the island were entranced by the vision thundering toward them. Uncle Shad busied himself in clearing the tracks and getting everyone a safe distance away from the approaching monster - then he stepped onto the platform, a lantern in one hand and a shiny whistle and chain in the other


The train screeched to a halt with a violent shaking of the ground around it and clouds of smoke and steam. The engineer, grinning from ear to ear, waved his cap at the crowd and let go another ear piercing blast on the whistle. Men in uniforms with shiny buttons and starched caps descended the little sets of steps between the railroad cars with passengers following. Each conductor gave his arm to each lady and led her carefully down with a tip of cap and a smile. A wildly exotic assortment of baggage collected on the platform, including a small dog kennel containing a tiny terrier in a frenzy of excitement. Tourists of all shapes and sizes gathered and grouped together, looking around with expectant faces at the ocean and the boats, the watching crowd. Rattletrap taxis from the grand old hotel high on the hill appeared and then it was over and the train pulled out, headed back to Yarmouth, Halifax, St. Andrew's By The Sea. My grandmother gathered us up for a lunch of lobster rolls and fresh scallops at Bill Brown's, a cafe that overlooked the harbor and was much loved by us all, and afterward we shopped and played along the coastline til it was time to head home.

The train ended it's trip having delivered it's cargo of tourists and mail, catalogue orders and livestock, auto parts, canned goods, fuel, medicines. It had brought progress and we had seen it arrive.

Odds Are

Funny, how one's self esteem so often rests on the opinion of others. If 100 people come into the store and say nice things about you, my friend Henry told me, and just one comes in and says something negative, odds are it's the negative thing that you take home. Truth doesn't even come into play.

It's an oddity of human nature, I suppose, that we can be so invested in others to define our worth and so easily shaken in our self confidence by harsh words, often from people we barely know. Even worse, we can choose to dwell on an unkindness, relive it and worry it like a painful tooth. Such moments become the building blocks of resentment and learning to shake them off is a wearying and complicated process. I still hear my mother's voice when I make a mistake or don't know how to do some particular task - scratchy and hoarse from smoking, heavy with resignation at my hopelessness, martyred by my very presence and resentful of all she was forced to do because her children were so useless. It wasn't true but it didn't seem to matter. I understood that none of us would ever be good enough, smart enough, capable enough, worthy enough and while I ached for approval, I also despised her on the rare occasions she grudgingly gave it. It was hard to admit, but I wanted the approval of a mother, not that of a drunk and to an extent that I'm not proud of, the child within still does.

My mother has been dead for years and I've come to realize that it's not just her voice I hear, sometimes it's my own.

No one can make you feel inferior without your consent. - Eleanor Roosevelt

The Party Line

My grandmother gave the crank on the old wall mounted telephone box a vigorous twist, picked up the receiver and said Twenty-one, ring three, please, Elsie.

Elsie had been running the island's switchboard from her neat, little home across from Curt's Store for as long as anyone, even my grandmother, could remember. She was what was referred to as "a widow woman", a frail-looking, petite slip of a thing with a tone of voice that could melt butter or cut through granite, depending on her mood. Any call made to or from the island went through Elsie and she was an oracle of information who had little use for the notion of privacy. She and my grandmother had been friends for all their lives.

Elsie's switchboard was an impressive, old timey board with a maze of push and pull plugs, flashing lights and buzzers and tiny rows of numbers. Theoretically, she was on call twenty four hours every day, but telephone service frequently depended on her domestic chore schedule. If it was wash day, calls might or might not be placed promptly, if at all, and if Elsie had walked down to McIntyre's for groceries or to Curt's for snuff, calls simply died on the vine. Islanders had become accustomed to this and didn't much worry. Tracking someone down on an island twelve miles long was not an especially difficult thing to do - for a nickel, any child would run off in search of someone and deliver a message. Elsie served but liked to remind everyone that she was not a servant. She did, however, answer any and all calls placed in the middle of the night. She knew, as did we all, that

such calls were likely to be emergencies - someone sick or hurt or missing - and she was a vital link for such times, alert and efficient no matter the hour, ready in an instant to notify the volunteer fire crew or the doctor, on those rare occasions that we had one. Elsie was a first responder before the term had been invented.

She retired at the age of eighty something and handed over the lines of communication to the

Melanson sisters. Technology had simplified and automated things by then, telephone service had become something that needed to be overseen rather than provided. Fittingly, Elsie had the first so called "private line" but she was suspicious of it and rarely made or answered calls. Her's had been a job done long and well and she resisted and resented the changes, saying the personal touch had been lost and would never be found again.

Too Little, Too Much

To die at forty-five is to have been robbed. Too little time on this earth and too much left undone. I have lost another friend to a deadly cancer - a young man with a sweet smile, many gifts, friends too numerous to count, and a family who loved him dearly. He was an artist in every sense of the word, talented and generous, optimistic and brave, giving and grateful. His death is one more reminder that God's gifts are transient.

I saw him play several times yet for some reason I have no pictures of him. I waited on him often but can't remember what we talked about. Before he became ill, I ran into him all the time and he would give me a quick hug and a kiss on the cheek or wave to me across a room full of people. We shared a love of photography and music and I knew how much he loved his travels to Rome and how he had fallen in love with the old city. He spent a great deal of time out of the country and I often wouldn't see him for months at a time then unexpectedly would read that he was scheduled to perform at a bar or a benefit. He always drew a crowd. A local photographer took the last picture I ever saw of him, a stark, stunning, black and white shot. He was achingly thin, terribly frail looking, clearly very ill, but with a little help he climbed onto a stool and sang. He was almost too weak to hold the guitar and his voice was painful to listen to but he sang until the pain forced him off stage. He was dying but he wouldn't give up.

I read of his death in this morning's paper, at home with his family in the small Louisiana town where he had been born. Short of a miracle, there had never been any hope of recovery for his type of cancer, a fact which some hoped gave him a measure of peace. He used his time as best he could, knowing that each day mattered and was precious, that each waking moment was fragile and fleeting. He had too little time and left too much undone but he was here and was loved.

Whiskey Solace

When I met him, Andrew was already in his sixties, a tall, elegantly thin man - manicured and tailored, attired rather than dressed, carrying a cane and smoking imported cigarettes from a silver holder. He was a regular at all the bars in town, haunting them from early afternoons until well into the nights. He was what I came to think of as "Jimmy Stewart" drunk - always charming and courteous with a style and flair all his own. When he became unsteady on his feet, he would find a comfortable chair and sit with a slight smile and a martini glass. His driver sat outside with the Mercedes while Andrew read his evening newspaper and drank himself into a blurry oblivion. He was never loud or agitated, never pushy or braggardly, never caused the first bit of trouble for anyone. He minded his own business and drank himself into a gentle melancholia where he found escape and peace from an unkind world.

He had made his money in real estate and oil, had attended Columbia, married well and raised children. He was well liked, educated, successful, wealthy and came from a fine family. He had been a good son, good father, good husband, good businessman - he had worked hard and achieved his goals, had acquired all the trappings of a good life - and then discovered that none of it made him happy. He retired early and began drinking out in the open, making no effort to disguise his alcoholic intake and taking no offense at those who would change him. He slipped in and out quietly, a handsome, dapper man who tipped his hat to every lady and knew every bartender's name. Thank you, my dear, he would tell the waitresses or The usual, if you please, to the bartenders and later they would find a fifty or hundred bill had been left.

He sought and almost always found the good in people, overlooking their flaws with ease and a gentle empathy, hoping for the same kindness in return. He accepted his many companions for who they were, bought drinks generously, never turned away anyone who appeared to be in need. His friends were from high society and low, he embraced them all and he died before his time of a failed liver, leaving his demons behind. In this world, Jimmy Stewart said in "Harvey", You must be oh, so clever ..... or oh, so pleasant.

Tattle Tales

Nobody likes a tattle tale.

For whatever reason, the need to curry favor results in hurt feelings for someone as well as a breach of trust. Children deal with this better than adults, I think, perhaps because of their youth and directness, perhaps because of their lack of fear. An adult tattle tale is more complicated - I find myself searching for motives, trying to discover the underlying agenda, trying to comprehend why someone would tattle rather than simply speak up and out directly. Grown up tattle tales are about control, preserving position and strength, sending reminder messages not to challenge authority. Grown up tattle tales are about power, manipulation and hierarchy, the ability to get someone else in hot water and the need to demonstrate that you can do it. It's a puzzle. There is, it seems to me, precious little benefit to the tattler, except that they look and perhaps feel superior. I wonder if it might not be that tattle tales are insecure and can only prop themselves up by dragging another down.

If there's nothing to carry tales about, a child will go off in search of something while an adult will create an issue out of whatever is handy. We build mountains to watch others fall trying to climb them.

The Stalker

She is completely motionless in the tall grass, not even a tail twitch to give her away, iron-cladly focused on the small dove pecking at the ground some twenty feet from her and nothing distracts her. She waits until the dove turns it's back then takes one silent step in it's direction before sinking back to the ground. She becomes a statue, the slight breeze barely ruffles her fur. Her patience is remarkable, her attention to the dove is intense and unbreakable. The dove pecks on, to all appearances, oblivious of her presence, and she takes another step or two toward it, then freezes and returns again to the ground. She watches and waits with military precision and meticulous timing. When the breeze stirs again and the dove turns away from her, she extends one paw then the other and her body follows almost in slow motion, closing the distance with deadly accuracy - twenty feet becomes fifteen, then ten. The dove continues it's pecking, peacefully unaware of the ever closer peril. Over head, the squirrels begin their morning olympics through the trees. Traffic noises get louder from the street as a bus rolls to a stop at the intersection and a siren goes off from down the block but in the backyard the drama plays out uninterrupted. The dove is joined by another and the cat is now barely five feet away, noiseless and unnoticed in the clutter of morning, her long, lean body low to the ground and absolutely still. The doves hunt and peck like chickens, still not sensing the danger or supremely confident that they can outfly it. She suddenly tenses and springs and the scene erupts - pebbles spray through the air and a cloud of dust rises, there is a screech and the doves take wing unharmed. She is left on the ground below in an impotent crouch from which she emerges and stretches, washes her face with one paw, and casually walks off toward the alley. Having done her best, she is comfortable with her loss and will not dwell on her failure. She has other fish to fry, the day is young, and the adventure is just beginning.

Toy Soldiers

"The shortest distance between two points is always under construction." - Rebecca McClanahan

The little girl on the playground was sulking. She sat crosslegged in the sand beside the slide, head down and hair hanging across her face, little hands scrunched into fists with a look that suggested she was about to cry. No one paid any attention to her and now and again she glanced up at the other children with a petulant expression, eyes narrowed and brows furrowed. She dug her fists into the sand with quick, angry, wanting-to-hurt shoves.

The little boy sat on a bench nearby, pretending to ignore her in favor of a box of a toy soldiers he had spilled into his lap. A soldier in each hand, he played his make-believe battles, crashing them together with soft shouts. He waved the winning soldier in the air for a moment then retrieved the loser from the ground and began again. As he reached down, he surreptitiously looked in the little girl's direction, frowning slightly but making no move to approach her.

After a time, the little girl threw a handful of sand in the little boy's direction. He pretended not to notice and she threw a second handful, this time including some small pebbles. When he looked up and at her, she immediately looked away. He deliberately turned his back to face away from her and she threw a third handful of sand and pebbles, this time with a little more force. The little boy threw his soldiers down and stormed toward her, gave her hair one good pull and then stood over her, hands on his hips defiantly. She reached for his ankle and pinched and he yelled and kicked sand in her face. She jumped to her feet and after wiping her tears away with one grimy hand, shoved him with both hands, knocking him down. Although he wasn't hurt, his surprised look instantly turned to tears, and he was on his feet and racing after her in a second.

They both reached their mother at the same time and began squabbling and trying to outshout the other. After separating and shushing them both, she dried their tears and asked for an explanation.

There was silence and neither would look at the other. She shook her head, scolded them equally, and sent them off in opposite directions. They came back one at a time, each pouring out their unhappiness and blaming the other, each eager to complain about the other but not willing to talk to each other, not willing to try and resolve their differences directly.

Sometimes the difference between adults and children on a playground is that the children don't know any better.