So Near Too Late

Addiction.

When living with it, I've fought til I was bloody, clawed and spit my way to the edge of a breakdown, been seduced and swept away by the need to lash out and strike back.  And all I ever got for my time and trouble and martyrdom was a migraine, a guilty conscience and a complete loss of faith in reason.  When I was finally free I swore I'd never, ever allow myself to get caught up in it again.  And until last night, I'd pretty much kept to my word - detaching myself from my dear friend Scotty when he crawled into a bottle and died there,  stepping back when our little nurse refused to leave her junkie husband, and being supportive but not enabling of my friend, Kirk, when he deep ended back into drugs and alcohol.  I'm no box of chocolates myself and when his struggle to come to terms and get well turned into a personal attack over an unintended slight, I felt myself about to backslide.  After multiple apologies and an appeal to his sense of reason - all of which were rejected quickly and nastily - I realized that the trap had been sprung and that I'd been sucked in.  It was so near too late that I reacted without thinking, ending the conversation abruptly but as kindly as possible, pulling away before being pulled under.  It was a painful and scary moment, a moment when my own complacency almost did me in and I forgot that you don't argue with sickness - it will use you up.

In my own defense, these things tend to start innocently.

His feelings were hurt by something I'd failed to do - he had what I considered a valid complaint.  I apologized and assured him I'd remedy it, explained that there was a process in place and that it was a work in progress, that it had never been my intention to exclude him.

He became aggressive and accusatory, repeating his charges and expanding them.

I apologized again.

He began to rant.

I apologized a third time.

He launched into a full attack with capitalized curses, saying I'd sold him out for money, that I was a false friend and no better than all the others who'd turned their backs on him.  He demanded to know what he'd done to deserve this ill treatment.

I was on the verge of reminding him about the vicious and malicious on line attacks, about the threats and the menacing, about the bar fight and his subsequent jail term, about how he'd frightened former friends to the point of changing their locks.  And then like a lightning strike, I understood that he was drunk or high or both and had skillfully manipulated me into this argument and back into sickness.  I'd let down my guard and he'd come straight at me - so near too late and I hadn't seen it coming - neither reason nor truth was going to do me any good.  

The following morning there is a not unexpected second attack, full scale, bitter, very hurtful and very final.
I read through the rage and emotional pain, every fiber of my being wanting to protest this rewriting of history and paranoid need to blame.  I feel slandered and abused - just as he intends - and my every urge is to fight back, to engage him and defend myself, to force him to accept responsibility and give up this self pitying, high drama victimhood.  A dry drunk, in many ways, will make you almost long for the drinking days.

The sad truth is that he did this to himself.  I am not responsible for his pain or his outrage and cannot help him find his way.  For my own peace of mind, I decide not to play this old, familiar part - I still remember having a variation of this conversation every day for 13 years - and offer silence instead.  Just because sickness is at the door, I don't have to let it in.  And I damn sure don't have to let it infect me.

Time Served

Rather then toss, turn and fight the gods of sleeplessness for another several hours, at 2am I throw off the covers and crawl out of bed.  It's Christmas Day, I remember hazily, and the bright side of insomnia is that at least  if I do manage to fall asleep, I won't have to get up before sunrise.  At this point though, it seems like a very large if - as weary and cantankerous as this old body is, it still wins out more often than not and all too often sleep proves irritatingly out of reach.  I'm too tired to fight and stress over it so I rouse the dogs and send them out into the yard, turn off the television, and begin to fill the bathtub for what I hope might be a sleep inducing soak.  I can see the moon through the trees, softly halo'd in the dark sky and surrounded by stars.  Except for the insomnia, everything is calm and in sync and I have this vague, restless feeling that any more sleep is like time served - over, done with and behind me.

The house is full of books but reading has never been much of a remedy, I'm too easily caught up between the pages.  Sleeping pills scare me and just the idea of hot milk makes me a bit nauseous.  I feel edgy and short tempered and anxious, even a little resentful of the quartet of cats sleeping so soundly all around me.  When I go back to bed, I do manage to snatch a few hours in dreamland but then it begins to rain and there's thunder overhead.  The cats wake and start their morning prowling and the dogs turn restless, one whines into my ear softly but persistently.  

Merry Christmas to you too, I tell them sulkily, knowing that no matter what might suit me, there'll be no comfort and joy until they're tended to.

It's a hard and cold rain and the morning is dark and dismally grey, not the kind of Christmas morning we were hoping for, I'm sure, but there will still be presents to open, carols to be sung, stockings to be taken down and enormous dinners to be consumed.  In my small house, there'll be shrimp and andouille sausage dip on water crackers with black olives and celery and prosciutto and a half bottle of champagne to wash it all down before I watch Jimmy Stewart and Donna Reed for the 100th or so time.

And maybe a nap or two in between to make up for last night.  

By the time the dogs and cats are fed, the dishes washed and dried and the bed made, Bing Crosby is singing "Ave Maria" in Going My Way and I have a nest made up on the sunroom couch.  The rain doesn't sound quite so dismal anymore and the sky is a little less grey.

I wish you a hopeful Christmas
I wish you a brave New Year
All anguish, pain and sadness
Leave your heart and let your road be clear.  

Community & Crockpots

My friend, Katie, puts it all out there without fear or hesitation.  I admire her openness, her willingness to be vulnerable, her silliness and unwavering faith, her commendable common sense.

We sit in a bar listening to a mutual friend and blues playing musician and she tells me about her husband's death, about her current crushes and her children, her job and her art.  Above all, she believes in a tender (and female) God and what she calls "community" - the integration of family and friends and neighbors to make a kinder and gentler, more equitable world.  She practices this philosophy with shy sincerity and dedication, going out of her way to be helpful and encouraging to those she meets along the way and I feel a strong kinship to her, as if we have traveled some of the same emotional roads and shared some of the same experiences.  I would like to be more like her.

We talk about community, about how much easier it is to give than ask for or accept help, about confidence and entanglements and independence.  She doesn't hold back with her feelings or beliefs, she's articulate and passionate all in one breath - and it dawns on me that being brave isn't about just not being afraid, it's about being not afraid to let it show - Katie offers up her feelings with an honesty that I find fascinating and startling.

The conversation turns to dogs and I tell her about trying to change the little dachshund's diet and the fact that without a working stove I have to rely on a hotplate - my most recent effort to boil chicken meant doing it one chicken breast at a time and predictably I fell asleep in the middle of this haute cuisine extravaganza, waking only after the water had evaporated, the chicken blackened and the house filled with smoke.  She laughed and immediately volunteered to boil the next batch for me ...that community thing again ...and then with a wide smile she made the ultimate practical suggestion, pointing out that if I were to invest in a crockpot, I could do an entire chicken and not even have to be home.  The simplicity and sheer obviousness of this idea was so elementary and so stark that I gawked at her while I tried to digest it and it was several seconds before I found my voice.

A crockpot! I exclaim in wonder, trying hard not be stricken by my own denseness, Katie!  You're a genius!

Community, she says with a serene smile, That's how it works.

About a week later, I arrive home to find a bright red plastic bag sitting prominently on my doorstep.  In it, is a brand new crockpot in its own carrying case - my friend Tricia has taken it upon herself to provide an early and much appreciated Christmas gift - despite the fact that she is fully aware that I can barely boil water, she's taken the time and trouble to do me a good turn.

Long live simple problems and the friends who help solve them.




 

Merry, Merry, Quite Contrary

I find it difficult to explain - especially to friends with young children and good hearts - that I just don't feel the way they do about family or holidays - especially Christmas.  They fret and fuss, worry about my lack of plans, get  worked up when I turn down dinner invitations and are troubled by the idea that I'll be alone.  This year, our youngest nurse is being particularly determined to include me in her family gathering - at the risk of hurting her feelings, I thank her and gently, quietly, firmly, repeatedly, tell her no.  But she's young with two small children and a third due in February - her daddy, who she adored, died this past year and she's very close to her mother.  It's a great deal of responsibility for twenty-two and she can't be blamed for her Currier and Ives Christmas vision - she simply wants everyone to be happy and have a place in it.  I don't tell her that to me Christmas is not much more than a day I don't have to work.

I suppose it's my history.  I began my holiday withdrawal not long after my second divorce though in truth, I'd always have rather been somewhere else.  With a family tap dancing around a drunk during the Christmas season, it seemed superficial and insincere to pretend all was well.  We were imitators, at best, caught up in the hypocrisy of the season, waiting for the Christmas cheer to turn ugly.  During my first marriage, Christmas was suffocatingly inclusive, as if every outrageous gift proved how happy we were, how intact and healthy and centered and unselfish.  I think I knew early on that it was no more than a different verse of an old story and that it was just  harder to find a place to hide.

In the years that followed, I've tried to overcome this aversion to Christmas and bury the bitterness.  It's a pretty season, a time of wonderful, glorious music - I never get tired of Christmas carols and could listen and sing along all year - but it's not a time of family.  It never was.  And contrary to what some may think, that's not a tragedy.

I like Christmas.  I just like peace and quiet and solitude better.  And no one could ask for a better family than the four footed one I already have, not then and not now. 

The only good reason to look back is to see how far you've come. 






  

Life Out of the Carton

I look at the eggs sitting side by side in their protective carton.  They clearly belong together but once I gently lift and shatter them, things unalterably change.  People do the same thing - vow til death us do part then discover that they have limits.  We are not always what we seem or what we would have others believe and like eggs, we have to re-form and change and move on.

Sometimes when I fry eggs, I crack the shells a little hard, the yolks break and dinner winds up over easy rather rather than sunny side up as I initially planned.  Sometimes I wonder if people aren't just like eggs, you might want them together but they get separated by fate or too thin a shell or being too close together in the pan.  Sometimes you just have to settle for scrambled and make the best of it.  Once in the frying pan, the eggs protest and sizzle, slip and slide trying to find their place.  Sometimes they come together and become one, sometimes they fry up on their own, but eventually they end up on toast and get consumed.  Poor eggs, I think, but at least they put up a fight.

Sad to say, not all eggs are created equal.  Each has needs, desires, ambitions, expectations and most of all,
preconceived notions of what life will be with another egg.  Being egg pleasers, these other eggs do their best to conform to what they think will win them the first eggs.  Eggs on both sides can be fanciful creatures, full of sweet words and romance and love conquers all.  Small egg defects can be managed or tolerated, they tell themselves - in the great scheme of things, if you're an egg, to be loved and cherished by another egg is a fine thing, a forever thing.  But eggs, like people, are fragile things and sometimes life out of the carton turns a little cold and a little lonely.  A malcontent egg, even a pampered, coddled and well cared for one with all the materialistic things an egg could hope for, still needs more - a partner, a lover, a friend.  Sometimes an egg has to leave to be happy.  There's no fulfillment in being a side order.

One Good Deed

Brenda Lee was singing "I'm Sorry" and Nana's bridge game was winding down along with the sun when John Sullivan came striding up the front path, carrying my youngest brother in his arms and shouting.  Donnie had fallen off the breakwater and crashed into the pilings, rendering himself fully unconscious and nearly drowning in the icy water before John and Jacob reached him.  He came to, sputtering and choking on sea water, lips faintly blue with cold and drenched to the skin, just as John reached the side steps.

Mother of God!  my grandmother exclaimed, Upstairs, John!  Into the bath tub!

Still fully dressed, Donnie was thrown into hot water while Aunts Pearl and Vi scurried for towels and hot water bottles and Clara and John began to strip him down.  Nana fluttered, her usual calm and collected self in shreds while she searched frantically for the brandy bottle - I'd never seen her panicky before and it was something of a shock.  By the time Donnie had been warmed up, dried off, and put to bed under a mound of blankets, the house was filled with concerned friends and neighbors and John and Clara, still upstairs, were in the midst of an explosive argument - snatches of it, primarily Clara's side, were clearly audible.

Oh, yes, you will, John Sullivan or I'll know the reason why!  Clara's tone was as clear as well water and sharp as a butcher knife.  And when I say every stitch, I mean EVERY STITCH!  There was a brief pause and then You ain't got nothin' I ain't seen a time or two ....followed by an impatient and unladylike curse and then By God, man, you ain't going out without a hot bath and dry clothes and I ain't gonna argue 'bout it no more....now you shed those wet things or I'll do it for you!

At the bottom of the stairs, Miss Hilda stood ramrod straight in her tweed jacket and genuine jodhpurs, looking all the world as if she were headed for a foxhunt.   After several minutes she sighed mightily and slapped her riding crop against her boot with a crisp thwack! and then climbed the steep stairs, mindful to duck her head at the overhang.  Her boots clicked sharply with every step and then we heard her rap on the bathroom door.

Mr. Sullivan, she announced primly in her customary and clipped British accent, One good deed and all that, I fear.  I strongly advise you to disrobe and surrender your wet garments at once.  We are fully prepared to take them by force if needed.

Except for the impatient and steady thwack! thwack! thwack! there was a sudden silence as we gathered near the bottom of the stairs and strained to hear.

Come, John, Hilda continued, changing tactics abruptly and letting just a hint of entreating into her voice, Let's not quarrel.  Do be a good fellow and just pop in and out for a quick scrub.  Jacob's brought fresh clothes and dry boots and Alice has tea waiting.

When it came, the reply was deafening and nearly set the walls to trembling.  ALLRIGHT!  John Sullivan roared furiously and I was reminded of a bad tempered lion.  A door opened and slammed shut, nearly whisking Clara off her feet and into the hallway where she came perilously close to colliding with Hilda.  ALLRIGHT!  John shouted again, WOMAN, LEAVE ME BE!

And John, Clara added sweetly, Unless you're allergic, there's a little thing called soap...... and then both women hurriedly descended the stairs, laughing together and just barely in time to avoid a pair of heavy, wet, and airborne boots.

My brother was up and around the following day with no ill effects.   
John Sullivan, the reluctant hero, never lived it down.

Window Dressing

On an idyllic sunny and warm December afternoon, with the windows all thrown open and the ceiling fans purring steadily, I lay on the couch and listen to the leaves rustling on the lawn.  Sunlight through the blinds makes flickering patches on the walls but the day is so unexpectedly mild that the cats show little curiosity, far more interested in watching the street and the dry, dancing leaves.  They cock their heads at each faraway child's voice and every leaf kicking footstep but they don't stir from their window seats except to stretch and yawn.  Remarkably, the dogs sleep through these gentle noises and all is as peaceful as the clouds drifting by on a lazy summer's day.

Except of course, that Christmas is a mere three weeks away and as much as I dislike the cold, 80 degrees is just somehow all wrong.   When I catch myself considering turning on the air conditioning - my hand is poised on the switch and a quick flick would do it - I turn away in horror.

Madness, I think to myself, Madness and sheer indulgence.  Don't be such a wuss.

There is, after all, a principle involved here.

Snow would likely be on the ground if I were in New England and my daddy, if he were still alive, would be wrapped up in long underwear and woolen socks with a knit cap pulled over his ears and a cat in his lap.  He'd be reading or maybe working a crossword puzzle, keeping a close watch on the fire and fretting about the cost of heating oil and the weather forecast.  But here in Louisiana, it's practically summer - knock out roses are in bloom all over the city and Christmas shoppers are in shirt sleeves.  It feels out of balance and off kilter when I walk into the office and see the lighted tree with its twinkling lights.  Carols are playing everywhere and the Salvation Army Santas are sweating in their red suits and beards.  The red, green, and silver decorations are up downtown but convertible tops are down - it's an unlikely mismatch of seasons, of holiday goodwill and home comings - and I confess it's hard to work up much Christmas spirit when it all feels so much like window dressing.  Sometimes I think but for the music I would be a hopeless grinch.

Last night I sat in a bar listening to a friend of mine put aside his usual set and play a few carols - a solo guitar doing a soft, sweet "What Child Is This" will bring peace and tears to even the coldest holiday hearts and I was no exception.   

May each life have one white Christmas, just for the memory of it.




 

Old Age: A Jar of Preserves & A Pillbox Hat

Miss Beverly was the first patient of the day.

She arrived, as always, a few minutes early, dressed quietly in a two piece navy suit with a polka dot blouse, pearl earrings and navy pumps.  A small pillbox hat sat on her wispy white hair which curled around her ears defiantly.  She gave me a bright smile as she signed in with one trembling hand, the other clutched her shiny, plastic purse with a death grip.  

No one prepared me for being this old, she remarked more to herself than to me, My Stars, how intolerable my handwriting has become!  

You're doing fine, I assured her, Just sign for me at the bottom and come on in.

She's one of the lucky ones, I think.  At eighty-eight, she still has all her faculties and all her limbs, walks unassisted, still drives, and manages to live within her income.   She lives alone, save for an old tomcat she invited in one day, and while this makes her children fuss and worry and sometimes hover, she holds onto her independence as tightly as she does her purse.  Her little cottage in an older and very respectable part of town is paid for and neatly maintained.  On warm spring days, she likes to tell me, when her arthritis isn't too bad, she still gardens a bit, roses mostly and azaleas which need far less care.  She doesn't find life easy anymore, but she does find it precious.  The only thing I've ever heard her complain about is her handwriting - her hands are pale, blue veined and fragile looking, her rings no longer quite stay in place and it's become hard for her to grip a pen - it annoys her to be what she refers to as un-precise in her person.

Oh, well, she says with a resigned sigh, I don't suppose poor penmanship will be enough to keep me from The Promised Land.  Surely the Good Lord will overlook my scrawl but still, my dear, and she gives me a wink, I do miss being able to read my own hand.

She has brought a glass jar of preserves on this visit and a wax papered tin of biscuits.  She hands them to me though the window and makes me promise to see that the doctor shares, it being so close to the holidays.  The label on the preserves is illegible and slightly smeared and, she confesses with a small frown, she can't exactly remember whether she made apple butter or mayhaw - she thinks about this for a moment then shrugs her thin shoulders, as if to say what does it matter - and takes a seat in the waiting room.  

"Old age is like a plane flying through a storm.  Once you're aboard there's nothing you can do." ~ Golda Meir

  

Trials, Troubles & Old Friends

The road to hell, my Aunt Pearl said with a dark glance in her sister's direction, is paved with good intentions.

Stuff and nonsense!  Nana barked at her but my poor and overly sensitive Aunt Vi immediately burst into helpless tears and covered her face with her hands.  Miss Clara, the unintended victim of Vi's latest mail order cosmetic course - this one in hair coloring - stood at the kitchen sink with a towel wrapped around her head and  wailed pitifully.

Good Lord, Clara!  Pearl gave a hugely exasperated sigh, Do stop caterwauling!  It's not the end of the world!

It's not YOUR hair that's green!  Clara protested and launched into a fresh barrage of sobs, And it isn't YOUR turn to sing solo on Sunday!

Oh, for mercy's sake, Nana said, nearly shouting to be heard over the unfeminine racket, This isn't helping a bit! Can we please start figuring out how to fix it!

These four women, all of whom had been friends for most of their lives and seen one another through each and every imaginable trial and trouble, stood in the fading afternoon light in the kitchen and looked at each other uncertainly. These were strong, self reliant, eminently practical women - well, Aunt Vi might've have had more than her share of moments of nervous indecision but on the whole she could be counted upon for a reasonable sort of stability - but none wanted to be the first to admit that green hair was outside their collective experience.  These were women who prided themselves upon their independence and common sense, trusting that most if not all problems came with solutions - it was a matter of knowing where to look and what to look for.  Defeat in the face of adversity was unthinkable, an unacceptable outcome, a travesty.  These were not women who were accustomed to failure on any level - island women were fighters and survivors - they endured hurricanes and bad marriages and blizzards and ungrateful children and epidemics. I knew this because I'd heard the stories for as long as I could remember.  They had, however, never been confronted with green hair.

Well, Nana began to muse, bleach got us into this so that's no solution.

Food coloring?  Vi suggested timidly.

Dye?  Pearl said thoughtfully, What color cancels green?

Clara, dear, Aunt Vi's voice was shaky but determined, Clara, please, dear, try not to become hysterical.

This was too much for Miss Clara who whirled on poor Vi and tore the towel away, displaying a shock of green ringlets, falling all the way to her shoulders.  Her eyes were on fire.  Hysterical?  she repeated shrillly, HYSTERICAL?  I look like an asparagus!  All I need is salad dressing, you dimwitted old hag and YOU did it!  She snatched up Nana's cast iron skillet and raised it over her head, advancing on Vi with deadly aim.  With a start I realized the meaning of the phrase "Murder in her eye".

Oh, for heavens sake, my grandmother exclaimed with a mild curse, Clara, put that down this instant!  You know I haven't seasoned it yet!

From the pantry door I watched as the kitchen fell suddenly silent and Miss Clara, pausing in mid swing, turned to look wild eyed at Nana.  What?  she asked a startled voice.

I said I haven't seasoned ..... my grandmother began and in that one moment, all four women realized the utter absurdity of the scene.  Miss Clara replaced the skillet, Aunt Pearl began to laugh and slipped one arm around Aunt Vi.  My generally humorless and strait laced grandmother dissolved, laughing so hard she was forced to lean on the counter to remain upright.  I watched all this from the narrow doorway of the pantry and imagined I would never understand grown ups.

Red and green make brown, I said at last and all four women looked at me.

In my coloring books, I added, red and green make brown.

And indeed they did.  There was a long and animated discussion before they settled on ketchup - it was the proper color and Nana said tomatoes were acid-y.  It might counteract the bleach, she declared, And if it doesn't, Clara, you can always be a side dish.  This struck them as hilariously funny and they started laughing all over again.

The pantry offered a full bottle of ketchup and I watched in amazement as they bent Miss Clara over the sink and Aunt Vi lathered in the entire family sized bottle while Nana and Pearl chattered cheerfully.  There was a brief debate about how long to "leave it in" but Vi logically said that half an hour should do as it was the same amount of time she'd left in the bleach and coloring rinse.  Clara carefully wound a fresh towel around her sopping head and all four women retired to the sun porch for tea.

A half hour later, she was once again bent over the kitchen sink while Vi, eyes squeezed shut and mouth moving in silent prayer, rinsed for all she was worth and Nana and Pearl hovered anxiously.  Remarkably enough, it worked - well, after a fashion - towel dried and combed out, Miss Clara's hair had turned a new and mostly acceptable shade of brown.  Studying the result in the dining room mirror for several long minutes, Clara finally pronounced that it would do.

Nothing anyone would remark upon, Aunt Pearl agreed after a critical survey.

With a hat, no one would notice a thing, Nana said firmly.

Never again, Clara, Aunt Vi fervently swore, I promise! And she grinned a little sheepishly and crossed her heart.

A Good Place To Be

Funny how life comes at you.

Recently, an old friend from the childhood I spent on a small island in Nova Scotia connected with me and sent me to a site about the life and times of the village where we grew up.  There were names and pictures of people and places that sent me reeling with nostalgia and sweet, sweet memories.  I scrolled through page after page, often fighting back tears and feeling incredibly lonely for those summers by the ocean.  Simply put, there has never been a time in my life when I was happier - though I was from away, it was and will always be home.  It calls to me still, reminding me that time is not as endless as I once thought, that I need to go back and recapture those memories on film, surround myself with old friends, lost loves, and salt air.

More powerful is the realization that to me, those summers meant serenity and peace and innocence.  Life was - and still is for those who stayed or returned - cleanly simple and straightforward. 

The house at The Point is still there, still a stone's throw from the water, still almost exactly as I remember it except that it's no longer in the family, a fact which saddens me enormously.  Many of the people I knew and loved are gone but the village remains and I still dream about it.

We were different.

Younger.

With all the time in the world.

And in a way, we still are.

Island life fed my soul, gave me roots and a sense of belonging.  I  learned the value of community and friendship,  how people could come together and form a united front, the way in which friends and neighbors got along.  Houses and cars were never locked and if someone was in need, everyone knew and responded.

There were no luxuries, none of the things I took for granted when we left - no paved roads or fancy cars, no color televisions, no department stores or dinner parties.  

It was just home and a good place to be.

“Sometimes memory is the only gift we give ourselves and the only hope we have of finding our way home.” ~ Harley King

I'm going back one day because my heart never left.

The Black Powder Panic

In a famous scene from "Casablanca", Claude Raines as the Chief of Police, is ordered by the occupying Nazis to close Rick's Cafe.  Just prior to being handed his winnings, he exclaims - very tongue in cheek and in that elegant, edgy accent -  the following:

"I'm shocked - shocked! - to discover gambling is going on in this establishment!"

In the wake of three explosions - two last month and one as long ago as June, 2011 - the EPA, ATF and our local parish sheriff's department have suddenly uncovered a million pounds of black powder being improperly stored at  an army ammunition depot turned National Guard facility not far from the city.   They are, so they say, shocked, stunned and dismayed at this discovery.  The danger to life and limb is unclear but as a precaution, an evacuation has been urgently recommended although not made mandatory while the explosives are moved from their current home - cardboard boxes on wooden pallets out in the woods - to secure bunkers in an undisclosed location.  

Judging by the extent and the doomsday tone of the news coverage, you might think that a hidden cache of nuclear weapons and radioactive waste had been discovered next to a schoolyard and that authorities had acted within nanoseconds to protect the public.  You might even think that the existence of the explosives had gone undetected for the last several decades - that it had been a well guarded secret, an intentional cover up by a greedy, danger be damned, profit minded company.  You might even think that no one who could've done anything to correct it ever had a glimmer of the danger, that everyone except the offending storage company was innocent as newfallen snow.  Yep, you might think that.

So the hazmat teams suit up and the trucks roll, businesses reluctantly close their doors and anxious families pack up and leave.  How exactly, I wonder, do you go about moving a million pounds of explosives, where do you take it in a weekend's time and who pays for the lost revenue, the upset lives and the frightened children.

A cynic might be suspicious but personally I'm shocked - shocked! - to finally have all this come to light.  A million pounds of black powder concealed in plain sight for over 60 years and no one - well, except for the locals and the guards and the hunters and businessmen and the National Guardsmen and the newspapers and the military - no one knew.    

Wonder what whoever wrote that line for Claude Raines must be thinking.

Focus & Forgive

Focus.  Forgive.  Let go and move on.
We are all so much stronger and braver than we imagine - we just don't always know it - or as a friend recently shared with me - whatever doesn't kill me had better start running.

Focus.
If we're fortunate, there'll be someone near and dear to point this out to us.  No matter how troubled the time, no matter how deep the wound, life does go on and we do mend - maybe not today or tomorrow, maybe not next week or even next year - but healing comes to all of us.  It's in our nature to survive and do all sorts of things we never dreamed possible.  There's always a choice to be made, always a chance to stop, look both ways, and change direction.   Sometimes I wonder if the first step isn't to stop looking in the mirror and look into the eyes of a friend instead.  Get a new perspective and see what they see rather than what you've come to expect or what you imagine you are.  Even if you don't agree, it'll give you something to think about, to practice, to focus on.  Learn to stay focused and time will pass, things will get better.

Forgive.
Start with yourself.  Dollars to doughnuts, you're your own worst critic and you likely deserve a break.  But for mistakes, we wouldn't learn much "sliding down the razor blade of life" as Tom Lehrer so inelegantly sings in one of his satires.  Go easy, pay attention to what you demand of yourself, be sure it's reasonable.  Give others the same consideration.  Don't judge too lightly, too harshly or too quickly.  Be fair, be patient, be generous, be kind and when you fall short, give yourself a little slack.  Time will pass, things will get better.

Let go and move on.
There's a lot of territory to cover between surrender and acceptance, a whole lot of ups and downs and uneven ground to navigate.  We all hold on a little tighter and a little longer at the prospect of unhappiness or loneliness or suffering.  We resist change for no better reason than the uncertainty and disruption it may or may not bring into our lives.  We deny and bargain, fight and make up, step forward and step back, and dance away, all to maintain position and keep chaos at a secure distance.  We treasure the illusion of control, never seeing that it's a magic trick, a little emotional sleight of hand designed to make us feel grounded and more or less safe.  We're afraid of losing our footing and falling - we forget that when we fall, instinct takes over and we get up, as many times as it takes.  Let go of the bad stuff.  Leave it behind and move on, time will pass and things will get better.

Truth is stranger than friction ~ Jimmy Durante

Fast Food & Relatives

My friend, Michael, who owns and operates his modeling business from his home, calls me and is sputtering with indignation and nearly incoherent - he is in his dressing room preparing for an interview with a prospective client when he notices a battered old car pull into his driveway.  Four young black people loudly emerge, a full two hours early - they are dressed for lawn work and each carries a crumpled paper sack of fast food and a grubby plastic container of soda.  They slouch their way to his front door and lean on the doorbell and he swears he can smell the obnoxious odor of fried fish and cooking grease all the way on the second floor.
This offends his senses and he descends the stairs, in his dressing gown and with no make up, and throws open the heavy front door, fully prepared to evict this low rent trash from his property.  When they tell him they are there for an appointment, he is overcome with surprise and shock and makes no attempt to hide his distaste, although he assures me, he is gracious - in his way - pointing out that anyone who arrives two hours early and has the effrontery to bring his whole ragtag family, cannot be welcomed and further, that as this is clearly his HOME and he has not asked them to lunch, he CANNOT BELIEVE they would have the indecency to imagine that he would allow them to bring their nasty, fried food inside and further, even if it weren't his home, HOW STUPID DO YOU HAVE TO BE to think he would see them under such circumstances.

They protest that no one told them they couldn't bring family or food and he coldly informs them that THIS IS AN INTERVIEW NOT A GODDAMN PICNIC and with a grimace, orders them gone.  They linger, trying to argue and sway him but he stands firm.  WE WILL NOT GET ALONG, he tells them and gathers his silk robe around him with a dignified swirl.  BEGONE BEFORE I SET THE DOGS ON YOU.

I am in tears at this sad tale, laughing so hard I can't speak, and he gives me his best imperial glare and demands to know what sort of person comes to an interview in unclean clothes and brings fast food and relatives and what has the world come to and finally WHAT THE HELL IS SO FUNNY.

This only makes me laugh harder.

The world is a hard place for people with high expectations.

Dark-Thirty

Now and again I feel the need to hibernate, to lock the door and unplug the telephone and simply wallow in sleep.  Long weekends are perfect to indulge this small sin - to retreat and thoroughly shut out the world for a few days - to give all my time and attention to my little ones and have absolutely no routine or rules to follow. 
It's wanton idleness in its grandest form and I revel in it, though of course it wouldn't do for every day.

On the fourth day, I decide it's time to at least make an effort at being productive.  At dark-thirty, somewhere around 4am, I throw off the covers and trail the animals into the kitchen.  I drink a bottle of chocolate milk, light a cigarette, and begin filling food bowls.  The dogs and I step outside into the darkness - chilly and very quiet at 4am - and while they wander the yard, I plan my day, making a mental list of what's to be done before I can return to my snug, little nest in the sunroom.   After three days of solitude and total inactivity, it's more difficult than I imagine to wake up and plug in my motivation.  

This, I tell the little dashchund, is how it starts.  One day you're a productive, tax paying citizen and the next you're living under a bridge.

He yawns.

It takes until noon to get things in order.  Litter boxes changed, laundry done, dishes washed and put away, a quick dusting and even quicker vacuuming, all done with a certain half heartedness, just a means to an end.  I realize, only a little sadly, that I've had enough solitude - exactly enough to be ready and almost (not quite but almost) anxious to rejoin the world and go back to work.  Aside from the television, I haven't heard the sound of a human voice in four full days.  It's been a good rest.

The sun goes down, the streetlights come on and the dogs and I curl up on the couch for a final nap.  All's well that ends well.

Thanksgiving, 2012

Another Thanksgiving is just a few days away - I get my usual share of invitations and turn them down as gracefully as possible, thankful for the offers and not wanting to hurt anyone's feelings, but anxious to sleep late and spend a peaceful, solitary day with my animals and maybe a memory or three.

Even after all these years, I'm no fan of family and  certainly not one of family holidays.  As a child, they were to be endured if not feared and as an adult - in the suffocating embrace of a supposedly intact and openly loving family - I thought I might be strangled.   In hindsight, both extremes seemed as equally unhealthy as they were different.  In one, I tried to manage and deny the emotions. In the other, I tried to copy and manufacture them.  I've found it's far easier on my peace of mind to have to do neither.  Truth is, that without my camera to shield me, even a small crowd gets on my nerves and makes me want to seek a quiet and out of the way corner.  After an initial smile and hug, I'd rather not be noticed at all.  When a friend recently told me that what she liked most about my photographing her was not being aware I was even there, I took it as high praise.

There's something to be said for family traditions, I suppose, but honoring and keeping them alive when you'd rather be somewhere (anywhere!) else is hypocrisy.  So while I thank everyone who so kindly invited me into their homes, I'll keep to my own traditions - sleeping in with the little ones and enjoying a day off to myself, a day when I don't have to follow a routine or even get dressed and have to leave home.

It won't be the day I remember at my grandmother's with the white linened table set for nine and tiny sherry glasses of apple or tomato juice at each setting.  

It won't be the elegant restaurants where we went when she was too old and too weary to cook.

It won't be the sunny and exquisitely formal dining room with my first husband's family, all silver candlesticks and servants gliding in and out from the kitchen.

It won't be the shaky card tables at my mother's lake front cottage with store bought everything.

But it will be mine.

And just as as afterthought......as needless as it is, I can't help but be a little grateful for the primal if slightly comical urge that my married friends have to worry over and feed single women on these kind of holidays.   That at least is a tradition I can accept.

Pretend With Me

Since The Cat Who Lived in the Garage has moved on - perversely, I  miss her - I find myself worrying about the remaining felines who prowl the neighborhood.  It's 40 degrees and there's a light covering of frost on the grass but they're out and about anyway.  If they mind the cold, they don't show it much.

Mostly they're non-approachable, long and lean, wary and suspicious of humans, gradually turning feral.  A few of my neighbors regularly leave food out for them, some try and trap them, but on the whole their presence is accepted and ignored, just a small, sad part of the city landscape.  Like the poor, they are always with us, throwaway animals that survive the traffic, the weather, the hunger, and even the owners who turn them out or leave them behind.  If I could, I would feed, shelter and love them all - they've done nothing to be treated so cruelly.

As it happens, The Cat Who Lived in the Garage has not gone terribly far - the little dachshund is an intrepid escape artist and if I'm not watching carefully, will tunnel under the fence or squeeze through an impossibly small opening - as he did this afternoon when I turned my back to unload the washing machine.  I tracked him to the adjoining yard and discovered him exploring my neighbor's back porch while a familiar grey and white cat observed him, unnoticed, from the safety of the back fence.  She gave me a careless glance then without a sound, gracefully descended onto the yard and indifferently strolled past both of us and into the neighbor's utility shed. The little dachshund never had a clue and when I called, he trotted right to me, perfectly willing to give up his temporary adventure in favor of the promise of an early supper - he likes to escape and explore but shows no interest in wandering very far - even so, I scold him gently before blocking off his latest escape route.  He pretends not to notice what I'm doing and I pretend that he won't do it again.

“We are what we pretend to be, so we must be careful about what we pretend to be.” 
 Kurt Vonnegut 

  

Random Acts of Friendship

I've never asked for or accepted charity in my whole life and always thought it was a blessing.  I suppose I like to think that I can overcome things with patience and time and sheer stubbornness but now I find that a savings account would be far more practical.  I'm ashamed to admit that this latest round of disasters has me too depressed to think clearly.  I can't even seem to get angry.

If ever there was a time for faith and internal fortitude, this is it but I don't seem to be able to find much of either.   This too shall pass, I tell myself, and One day at a time and a regular litany of other clever, little trite but true sayings that rattle around in my head.  I remind myself that there are people without enough to eat, without water or shelter or jobs, without a computer to categorize and complain about their misfortunes.  And I wait for that small voice to kick in and tell me to be grateful, to trust, to persevere, but lately that voice has been as silent and useless as the broken central heat and air.

Or, as I discover later in the same day, maybe I haven't been listening hard enough.

Help arrives first in the offer of a loan for a new central heat and air system.  I am so stunned by this generosity that I'm caught between being speechless and in tears.

Secondly, friends arrive and within an hour of my being home, the latest electrical crisis is resolved and the gas fireplace is working in the event of another loss of power or heat.  I don't know how to thank them, not just for the repairs, but for the kindness.  

Thirdly, a musician friend asks that I let her organize a benefit to help cover some of the substantial debt. I very nearly choke on my own pride at this generosity but manage to swallow hard and accept the offer.

Asking for help comes hard to me.  I value my independence and am accustomed to solving my own problems.
But there are times when the wall you're up against won't budge and the rock is pushing so hard it curls your toes.  That's when you discover the true meaning and blessing of friendships.  I'm not sure I deserve it or that I will ever be able to repay these kindnesses, these random acts of friendship.  But I'll try.

Nana's Table

Once a week or so during the sweet summers we spent on the island, Nana would pack the old Lincoln with empty paper bags and an apple basket or two, and we would drive just a little ways up island to Lily Smith's farm for fresh vegetables - tomatoes right off the vines, cucumbers, curvy squashes and sleek onions, new potatoes and peas and best of all, Lily's finest sweet corn.  Supper would be an extravaganza.

We shelled and husked all afternoon while waiting for the boats to come in and never once thought of it as work.  When the sun began to go down, she would give me a quarter or fifty cents and a few pages of old newspaper and send me to meet the incoming boats where the fishermen would wrap up fresh scallops or a piece of haddock or even a couple of lobsters.  I carried these delicate prizes proudly and carefully, never giving in to the temptation to hurry or run, even though the live lobsters rustling and waving their pincers  scared me half to death.  I didn't like to think about that part of it - it had been a shock to discover that they were alive when Nana dropped them into the oversized kettle of boiling water and I still felt guilty.  It was, to my child's mind, an enormous sacrifice and a fearful way to die although I always managed to overlook their suffering by the time I took my place at the table.

The meal would be leisurely, lengthy and country elegant - Nana would never allow a butter substitute or store bought bread, frozen berries were forbidden when we had a strawberry field and a blackberry patch just outside the door, and the thought of artificial whipped cream made her cringe.  My grandmother set a real table with real ingredients and no short cuts were allowed.  The sun would be down by the time we finished and  left the table, staggering and groaning through the clean up, wanting nothing more than to collapse into soft chairs and sleep, but Nana had never left dirty dishes overnight in her entire life and she never listened to a word of protest.  We wrapped leftovers, washed and dried the dishes, cleaned the kitchen, reset the table for breakfast, stoked the old stove - and only when she was satisfied did we drag ourselves off to quiet corners to recover.

Personally, if you can't toss it into the microwave or pick it up at the deli, I'm not inclined to take the time or trouble - odd, considering where I come from and how I was raised but there it is. 

We all set our own table, choose who will sit at it and what to serve.  It's a feast - if we want it to be - no matter who's in the kitchen.  Don't forget to say grace.

Sour Grapes

The morning after the election brings a number of wildly enthusiastic postings about the outcome and a vicious surge of hateful, toxic, right wing ones.  Quite a few republican friends seem to want to leave the country and I'm overwhelmed with an urge to help them pack.  I respect their right to disagree, even to be be bitter and poor losers, but to be labeled a "traitor" because you don't share their political agenda is offensive.  For the first time that I can remember, I block the worst of them - let them spew their poison and racism elsewhere - they're entitled to their opinions but I don't have to listen.  And the country will survive this hatred and snarling disrespect just as it always has, although it does make me yearn for the literacy and intellect and reasonableness of the north.  I sometimes think that my part of the country values hypocrisy and superficial courtesy more than it does tolerance or equality.

I drive to work with a sense of relief and celebration, passing the clutter of now irrelevant Romney/Ryan signs still stubbornly standing in the front yards of the mansioned streets.  Living in the south often feels lonely to me - in my heart, I suspect that there are still too many of us that have never completely gotten over the Civil War - but the votes are in and it's time we all began respecting the rules and the results and most of all, the rights of others.  Equality extends to all regardless of race, income, gender, sexual preference or political party.

If that doesn't suit you, you don't have to stay.  I really will help you pack.