It begins with a small spark of discontent.
Perhaps your feelings get hurt by a thoughtlessly passed remark or well meant reprimand. Someone else discovers a mistake you've made and you are corrected with less gentleness that you think you deserve. You feel the demands on your time are unreasonable or excessive and there are not enough hours in a day to get it all done. It's suggested that you try harder, focus more intently, pay more attention, become a team player, get with the program. There's an unsaid "or else". The words sting, justified or not, and you carry them home where the small spark gets kindled and turned into a fire, which when given enough time, turns into a steady and bright burning blaze. The fire is fed and maintained by those close to you - a friend, a spouse, a partner - and while it may be meant to be supportive and helpful and offsetting, the result is that a minor slight that should die a natural death is nourished until it blossoms and bears fruit. Your hurt feelings turn into a conviction that you are being taken advantage of which turns to resentment which turns to anger. Rather than accept your own responsibility, you decide to take a stand against your oppressor, refuse to be exploited any further, demand your rights and demonstrate the strength of your position. Eventually, whether you quit or are fired, very little is resolved and the entire process is doomed to repeat itself.
As with any destructive and self perpetuating cycle, it's a difficult and painful progression to watch. The search for approval and praise is not something we can conveniently set aside and fragile egos break easily when built on the values of others. Be cautious in making a bid for sympathy and understanding at the end of a rough day - those who care may do more damage than the day itself.
A yellow rose in an etched glass vase sits on his bedside table and a brightly colored balloon floats above it. A pastel get well card is propped up against a few unread magazines. These are the only touches of color in this cheerlesss, antiseptic hospital room. James lays, hands at his sides and eyes shut, with tell tale wetness on his cheeks. In a few hours, the surgeons will come and to save his life, will take his leg, just below the knee. The gangrene has raged unchecked through his ankle and calf, headed for his thigh and beyond. There is no choice save amputation and while he understands that it must be, it's an offense that he has not had time to come to terms with. Infection and pain have taken a heavy toll in a remarkably short time.
The girls sit quietly by his bedside, their presence brings a small measure of comfort. There is no effort at humor or to artificially raise his spirits, no denial of what lies ahead. No one tells him stories about overcoming adversity or what a one legged man might accomplish. There is no attempt to cheer him up or take his mind off it. No one suggests that it's the will of God at work. They simply sit with him, being there so that he is less alone with his demons and his fears. Sometimes they hold his hand, sometimes they cry, but they stay - they sense when there is a time to just be.
The hard part is ahead - the adjustments and compromises he will need to make, the work of therapy and more pain, the habits he will have to change and the acceptance he will need to find. He is tempted to let go and give up, you can see it in his face, so the girls visit each day after work and the nurses are kinder than they need to be.
This soft spoken and gentle man has unexpectedly touched us all.
Professional detachment aside, all our frail sides are showing.
If Nelson Mandella and Fred Astaire were blended together, you would have James.
He is tall and too thin but not in the least gawky or clumsy. He has a shy smile and the manners of a gentleman, courteous and well bred. His skin is richly chocolate and his hands are cared for with slender fingers and manicured nails, a pianist's hands, perhaps, or an artist's. He dresses in cardigan sweaters and tailored trousers, not new but clean and pressed, well maintained. It pains him deeply to have to ask for leniency on his bill - when he is able to pay he writes his checks in advance so as not to make me wait. There is a sweetness in this man that captures all our hearts. He is alone, no children to help out, just one beleaguered sister and one old friend from somewhere in Texas who alternately provide his transportation. He has taken the trouble to learn all our names, he is always on time, and he never breathes a word of complaint or discontent.
Waiting to be called, he sits patiently in the waiting room, hands resting lightly on the arms of his chair, eyes cast downward except to briefly smile at other arriving patients. His once chiseled face is remarkably unlined and caught unaware, you can see the young man he once was, young and good looking with lively eyes, eyes that still twinkle even in his late 70's. He doesn't look at his watch or fidget, doesn't sigh or get restless. He simply waits, calmly and peacefully, surrounded by an aura of near serenity. He gives no sign of being what is medically termed a "non compliant" patient but during his early treatment, he did not follow the doctor's orders to rest and stay off his feet, wanting to make the most of every bit of time he has left. A sore led to an abscess, an abscess to an ulcer, an ulcer to gangrene and finally to amputation of two toes. And the poison continues to spread, his foot and possibly even his leg are at risk. It was this news that finally broke his reserve and his spirit - he sat in the waiting room, now confined to a wheel chair, hid his face with his hands and began to weep. It broke our hearts.
We gathered around him, feeling helpless as we offered hollow comfort and encouraging but empty words. One of the nurses held his trembling hands while the other put an arm around his shaking shoulders. It was an unguarded moment and in it we saw his vulnerable side - lonely, sick, in pain, very frightened and ashamed of making a scene. God will get you through this, one of the nurses told him gently, You can't give up. The other hugged him and nodded, Have faith, she said softly. He looked up, tears streaking his cheeks and gave us a faltering smile.
One day at a time, James, I told him, fighting back my own tears, It's going to be allright. This didn't feel true but I badly wanted it to be, and as we watched him being loaded into the ambulance for the hospital, I think we all said a prayer for him - for strength, endurance, hope, and healing.
It's a good prayer for us all.
Doolittle had loved seagulls since before time. To the horror of his parents, he would stuff his pockets with bits of salt fish and seek them out among the seaweed and driftwood of the cove. After years of patient waiting and daily coaxing, they began to follow him wherever he went, a thick cloud of feathery gray and white birds in graceful flight, yellow beaked and glassy eyed, a cloud of noise in free formation.
Doolittle would sit cross legged in the damp sand and call to them. They came in droves, landing nearer and nearer until he could reach out and touch them, laughing at their flapping, frenzied antics, and offering them his fish bits. They snatched at his fingers and his collar and his boots but never drew blood and though loud and peckish with each other, they were almost dainty with him, almost gentle. Gradually, he was able to stroke their smooth feathered backs and run his fingers along their wings while they ate. Slowly he became one with them and was accepted and befriended with no sign of fear on their part, no hesitation at his approach. He ran along the beach with his arms outstretched and they made a path for him, barring his way only as he neared the treeline or the treacherous rock formations, then they descended in a protective wave, swooping, diving and cawing in warning. He listened and changed direction quickly, his laughter blending with their calls, his footsteps mixing with the sound of their wings.
Offshore, fishermen in passing boats watched and shook their heads in bewilderment and admiration - it was hard to separate the boy on the beach from the cloud of birds around him - harder still to keep in mind that the birds could see and the boy could not.
Having been born blind, Doolittle took his lack of sight for granted and didn't give it much thought. He learned through his other senses, through hearing, touching, and most of all through sensing. People give off waves, he told my grandmother, like heat from a stove. I feel them. He could tell moods through silence as well as voices, could discern falsehoods from truth by tones and sensed rather than heard emotions. Island folk were generous with him, teaching him things that he could not see - how hair could be silky and fine or coarse and rough, how skin could be tanned and leathery or smooth and unlined. He recognized people by their smells - pipe tobacco, shampoo, rum or baking flour -
he learned how to tell one fish from another, how to navigate by sound and wind, how to run his hands through a dog's coat to determine the breed. And he learned to associate colors with temperature, hot for reds and oranges, ice for blues and grays. He could never articulate how he saw these things in his mind but we knew that he did. He had perfect pitch, an uncanny gift for mimicry and whether counting footsteps to ascertain distance or following the birds to the edge of a cliff, he always seemed to know where he was and how far he could go. He was fearless with curiosity and perpetually on the move to explore, investigate and push against limits. He would not be tamed down or confined, would not retreat, would not be defined his blindness or driven into a box.
Hearing of his antics on the beach with the birds, Doolittle's granddaddy, Daniel, pronounced in no uncertain terms, The boy has to be taught to swim. This declaration was met with fierce resistance by all except Doolittle, the general feeling being that the ocean would simply take who it wanted, when it wanted and learning to swim was no real protection, but Old Daniel stood his ground. Sweet Jaysus, he growled at the opposition, This is an island and the boy be blind. Don't take much figurin' to know what needs to be done. So for several mornings in July, Daniel and Doolittle and one of the summer people met at the cove and into the icy water they went. Doolittle learned to swim above and below the water, to breaststroke and dog paddle and lay on his back and not sink. Daniel was well pleased and his mind was put to rest. Leastways, he told John Sullivan, if Davey Jones takes a mind to have the boy, he'll have to fight for 'im.
Davey Jones got his chance a few years later when Doolittle, hearing the sound of an injured gull off the cove's rocky coast, shed his boots and headed toward the cries. He swam just as he had been taught, breathing regularly and stroking firmly into the waves with no panic and no thought of giving in. He swam back, following the sounds of the seagulls above him, the injured bird passive and secured to his shirt. Compassion and friendship took him out and the tide and the gulls brought him back in. Davey Jones had been denied the boy and the gull and sightlessness had conquered the sea.
The black cat in the middle of the road and directly in my path to my driveway was pretending not to see me. I gunned the engine slightly and he paid no mind. I honked the horn and he favored me with a disdainful glance, full of challenge, and he didn't budge. I drove a few inches closer and he turned his back with a switch of his tail that clearly said "Dismissed!" or perhaps "Go around!"
You can't win an argument with a cat, I know because I've tried, so there was nothing to be done except pull to the curb and manually move him. He was less than pleased with this strategy but after an initial warning growl which I ignored, he consented to be carried to the sidewalk with no resistance. I should've suspected that this had been too easy but feeling superior, I returned to my car. He immediately returned to his place in the street, sitting squarely in the center and facing me with an unmistakable expression of victory over the poor, foolish human.
I tried again, this time moving him further from the sidewalk and onto the yard. Stay! I told him sternly, You wanna be roadkill? Again, by the time I'd returned to the car, he was once again in the street and had called in reinforcements, the tortoiseshell from two houses down and the tabby from next door were now all three in the center of the street, defiantly staring in my direction and presenting a united front. I began to consider the possibility that cats could be reincarnated as war protesters from the 60's or possibly a new breed of four footed and furry terrorists. Neither seemed likely but the fact was that three neighborhood cats were preventing me from getting home and it did seem planned if not outright organized. I half expected to hear a chant, something along the lines of What do we want? Peace! When do we want it? Now!
The standoff might've continued but in the interests of getting home and not setting off further protests, I gave way. The cats watched as I left the car and walked to the house and once I'd reached the front steps, they casually drifted away, the battle won. A high five wouldn't have surprised me much but then I remembered that they were cats, not a gang or a a terrorist cell, not boycotters or a picket line, just cats - admittedly, with attitude and a small victory, but still, no more than cats.
Fight only for what matters in this life, Choose your battles, as Uncle Shad told me so long ago, Then choose your burdens. You can't win an argument with a cat.
Stay away from jazz and liquor.
Richard Gere, "Chicago"
The cost of the weekend shows in her eyes - dark circles and dilated pupils. There is a sense of "poor me" about her, put upon and weary, despite a bright smile. She can't concentrate, can't stay focused on a task, her mind twitters from one thing to another like a butterfly and when asked a question, she has to think hard before answering. She speaks of being depressed and overburdened, overwhelmed by the effort of life and responsibility. She is always in the midst of some small drama that is more than she can handle and it overflows into the workplace, making her scattered, forgetful, inefficient. Communication is difficult because she stops paying attention, distracted by a stray thought or a loose thread. She has a meandering mind and the soul of fashion designer - useful for artists and poets, perhaps, impossible to dislike, but uncompromisingly fatal in her job as nurse assistant where accuracy and attention to detail are essential.
Can she change? the doctor wonders aloud to me and though I don't say it, I really don't think so. She is a fragile soul, drawn to the artistic side of life and the pretty things. Dates and times and diagnosis codes hold no interest for her, she is more comfortable with a pencil and a sketch pad than a keyboard. She is not a malcontent nor a complainer, not lazy, not incapable, not indifferent - she's just slightly soft focus and pastel in a sharply defined black and white world and she doesn't fit yet.
I will be sad if we lose her for the world needs flower children with melancholy and rose colored glasses. We are all the same except for what makes us different.
Ain't no sense in chasin' after what you ain't never gonna catch, Uncle Shad observed from his place on an upended barrel in front McIntyre's Store. He sat with his slouch hat pulled over his eyes against the sun, small piles of wood shavings accumulating around his feet and one cheek puffed out from snuff. Mind your footin', boy! he periodically yelled at my brother who was wading in the cove, trying to catch fish practically barehanded, Them rocks be slippery and I ain't no mind to fetch after you! My brother paid no attention - intent on snaring an unwary mackerel, he was hip deep in ocean, holding his home made spear, a pocket knife securely lashed to a thin tree branch. Too much book learnin', Shad muttered and spat tobacco juice at the precise moment my grandmother emerged from McIntyre's. Shadrach! she barked at him, That's a filthy habit! and Uncle Shad winced and wiped his mouth with one flannel sleeve, Ayuh, he agreed, It be that. The other men gathered around snickered at this reprimand although they carefully shaded their smiles from my grandmother's eyes, none wishing to be her next target. After the old Lincoln had pulled out in a cloud of dust and gravel, they prodded the wizened, elf-like little man good naturedly about not standing up to a woman but he refused to take their bait. Ain't much time we be given on this earth, he told them mildly, Best to pick your battles.
It was sound advice, worth keeping and taking, but I didn't know it at the time - a thirteen year old, rebellious tomboy hasn't much use for philosophy and at the time, in a relentless war with my mother, the only thing that seemed worth the fight was independence and the far off possibility of winning. My grandmother was on my side only randomly, when it suited her to join the battle for her own purpose, otherwise I felt on my own and outnumbered, dismissed and set aside. Uncle Shad, having raised two daughters alone after his wife's death, knew about conflict and loneliness in young girls and knew that at the approach of the Lincoln, I had run for cover behind the crumbling old Westscott steps. He pocketed his knife, returned the barrel to it's place and began walking down the road toward the dance hall and The Old Road. At the steps, he paused and called my name. Walk with me, child, he called quietly.
We walked past the fishing shacks and the post office, the barber shop that only opened it's doors only on Saturday nights, the picture show, the dance hall, and the old breakwater. The tide was coming in, gulls were gathering and there was a light, salt breeze. The sun was going down over Brier Island and we stopped to watch the sky turn to pink and blue and fiery red - a late boat chugged through the passage, passing Peter's Island and heading for the last wharf, making slow but steady progress against the choppy waves and all the while Uncle Shad talked to me, about my mother, about growing up, about winning and losing and what it all meant. There's more'n one way to win and more'n one way to lose, he told me as we took the shortcut through Uncle Willie's pasture, then across the road and to the path through the strawberry field. I could smell supper and hear the dogs as they came bounding toward us.
Make up your mind what matters, Uncle Shad called over his shoulder, and then pick your battles.
A word from the 60's - they're alive and well.
Except for the harsh lighting, our local coffee shop and cafe is a step back in time. Once a week, it opens it's doors to young and aspiring singer/songwriters with borrowed or beat up guitars who sing of lost love, inner torment, suffering and politics. There is an abundance of long hair and tattered jeans and sketchbooks. Many carry ragged, ruled spiral notebooks and they compare lyrics and ideas over espresso and herbal tea. Each sings two original songs and each is applauded - whether for talent or effort makes no difference - they support each other and their common ambitions. Awesome! they exclaim and Way to tell it, man!
These are gentle spirits, mostly young, many still in school or in their first jobs, learning, searching and exploring. They push the boundaries peacefully, they protest through lyrics and satire. Their music is often dark and intense, metaphorical and profound, but it can also be light and playful, with a sharp wit and a bite. It's poetry and essays and commentary set to song, sometimes surprisingly good and sometimes appallingly bad. Listening to them reminds me of being in my own twenties - young, dedicated, serious, and in love - with no concept of being 30 or 40 or 50, much less 60, no concept of the future as anything but a bright road with a sunset at the end.
The world has changed beyond measure, beyond anything I ever could have imagined, just as it is likely to do for these young musicians. But the music and those who write and perform it, who dream it, goes on.
No pain, no gain, our old gym teacher was fond of saying.
She was a tightly muscled and bronzed woman with a mane of dark hair that she tied into a taut pony tail during gym sessions. She moved like a wild animal on the hunt, stealthy and quiet with a kind of deadliness in her eyes. She missed nothing, no misstep went unnoticed, no hesitation was left unchallenged, no fear of falling was bypassed. Her girls were there to learn, to perform, to be their best. We were terrified of her.
She wore silk gym shorts and a halter top and bound her breasts flat so that no ounce of skin would even think of moving freely. As she made for the old leather horse and onehandedly bound over it, so quick that it was almost silent, her spotless Nikes blurred and she landed perfectly on the other side, arms outstretched, feet planted firmly on the floor. She was the most graceful and agile woman we had ever seen, a small figure flying through the air with supreme confidence and breathless speed. She walked the balance beam with light, precise steps - climbed the ropes hand over hand in a matter of seconds - did acrobatics on the trampoline like dancing in the air - and soared on the rings, upside down and rigid, by her knees, backwards and then swinging by her ankles. We watched in awe, a huddle of 7th grade girls in baggy bloomers and loose fitting sweatshirts, awkward, intimidated, self conscious and despairing.
No pain, no gain, she repeated over and over as she lined us up by height, appraising and evaluating each of us, slapping away figeting hands, straightening slumped shoulders, encouraging pride and good posture with a firm but gentle touch, three days a week, one nightmarish hour at a time. Under her supervision we suffered through field hockey, softball, basketball, and the dreaded gymnastics classes - ever so slowly discovering that we were capable of far more than we thought - learning strength, coordination, balance, timing and endurance. She taught us how to work together, instilling team spirit and cooperation without our even knowing it. We learned how to win with grace and how to lose without blame or giving up.
If you fall, get up, she drilled us. If you fail, learn from it.
We were fragile, freshman girls on unfamiliar territory - shy, apprehensive, a little lost in this overcrowded and often anonymous high school - and yet this demanding, intense, small woman saw potential in each of us and gave her all to draw it out. By the end of the first year, we had actually begun to believe she might be right. By the end of the second year, gym had become more of a break than a torture. By the end of the third year, we went willingly and at the beginning of the final year when she presented each of us with a set of silk shorts and halter top - in school colors with "AHS" stitched boldly across the back and down the sides and paid for from her own slim earnings - we were athletes and we were worthy.
We finished second in the senior gymnastics competition that year, in the end, the Winchester team outfought us and took home the trophy but in our teacher's eyes, we had given it our all and she was well pleased. So were we.
It's a funny thing, my grandmother remarked one morning at breakfast, that by the time you're old enough to be smart and enjoy life, it's almost over.
She was just in her sixties then, roughly the same age I am now, widowed and well off, with a feisty streak. When it suited her, she spoke her mind plainly and with little thought to the consequences. When it didn't, she could be as silent as a grave. More often than not, she said what she was thinking in no uncertain terms and had no patience for social niceties. Honesty is one of the only advantages of getting old, she liked to tell me, nobody pays much attention anyway.
While my mother railed nonstop about my tomboy nature, my grandmother shrugged it off as a phase and scolded only when I didn't clean up before a meal - nail inspection was mandatory and she would often check behind my ears and send me back to the kitchen sink. Nothing shameful about good, honest dirt, she said firmly, but it does not come to the supper table. Blue jeans and tee shirts were perfectly acceptable everyday wear except on Sundays for church, fried chicken was not meant to be eaten with a knife and fork, cussing was best left to grownups and, within reason, honesty was the best policy, At least until you're my age. I can't remember when her hair was anything but snowy white and I never, ever saw her in anything but a neatly ironed house dress, support stockings and sensible black shoes. She tolerated no interruption to Lawrence Welk or Liberace but thought soap operas a tasteless and inane waste of airwaves. She could be as patient as the day is long or as just as easily frustrated. She loved card games - bridge, canasta, hearts - and was a fierce competitor, ruthless when winning and coldly calculating when losing. When she chose to rule, it was usually with an iron hand and no back talk but when she chose to be kind, she could be stunningly so.
She believed in playing the hand you were dealt but that you made your own luck by paying attention and staying focused, that addiction was no more than a dressed up word for weak willed, that money couldn't buy happiness and that there was an afterlife waiting. You get there little by slow, she often told me, just like anything that's really important or really hard, little by slow.
The storm broke with a surprising violence, flooding the streets in just minutes. Thunder rumbled and lightning cracked across the sky in jagged streaks while patrons on the patio, wine glasses in hand, fled for the shelter of the restaurant and caused a massive traffic snarl at the hostess stand. Servers bobbed and weaved trying to salvage dinner plates and drinks and temporary tables were set up in the Bottle Shop to accomodate the evicted and unexpected guests. Good humor mixed with resignation and umbrellas.
Among the displaced was a couple who had just left the Bottle Shop, a couple made rude and wretched by an over abundance of alcohol. They had been loud and ungracious, yelling questions across the width of the store, tripping over wine displays and generally behaving as drunks often do - they were demanding, obnoxious and petulant, taking without asking from cheese trays being prepared for other diners, interrupting conversations, stumbling into each other, badgering the servers for attention. Also as many drunks do, they appeared to think their behavior was amusing and entertaining to themselves and others though their language was suggestive and coarse and their laughter reeked with alcohol induced humor. Being paid employees, we worked around them as best we could - the guests were a good deal less tolerant, shunning them with glaring, disdainful looks and complaining about their low class manners, hoping they would choose somewhere else for dinner.
Public intoxication is neither a pretty sight nor a funny one. The woman, thin and well dressed and clearly once a beauty, was now fading with deep creases in her face and papery skin that makeup could not hide. The man, pudgy in his khaki pants and polo shirt, wore his white hair in a spiky crewcut, an array of gold chains around his thick neck and a diamond drop earring from one ear. They waved wine bottles around like flags, pretending to do battle with each other and then collapsing with convulsive laughter. Inevitably, a bottle of French wine collided with a wine rack, broke, and sent a shower of wine and glass in all directions - Oh, look! the woman shrieked, I christened a ship! The man's face abruptly changed at that, his sense of humor not extending to his wine stained khakis or the cost of the bottle.
The storm raged for a short while then dissipated, flooded streets returned to normal although the air stayed heavy and wet and the ground was saturated. Like the unpredictable spring weather, alcohol raises its head, does its damage and then retreats until the next storm.
