No Time for Tea

It was an oddly built house, two stories set securely into the hillside at the very top of Schoolhouse Lane but with a glassed in sunporch on stilts on the front. It looked and felt off kilter, as if the supports might just uproot in a strong wind and set the entire house tumbling down the impossibly steep incline and into the sea.

“What nonsense!” my grandmother said briskly, “I declare, that house has stood fifty years and will stand for another fifty!”

Still, after Uncle Len had remarked that the structural integrity of the house was compromised, it was hard not to notice that she kept her visits brief and took pains to avoid the sunporch. She denied this lack of faith often and loudly, of course, but there it was.

“No time for tea!” she would say brightly, drop off a basket of biscuits and jam or fresh honey and hastily shuttle me out the back door. When it came to the house on Schoolhouse Lane, she was always on her way to somewhere else and running late.

Miss Hilda, however, who passed the house twice a day on her morning consititutional, was far less inclined to be tactful.

“A horror, Alice,” she would say through clenched teeth, “An absolute architectural, L shaped horror, there's simply no other civilized way to put it. I shall never understand what they could have been thinking to make such an abject failure of a proper sunporch! It's a blight on the landscape.”

“I Imagine they were thinking of the view,” Nana would suggest mildly and Hilda would snort with disapproval.

“Perhaps the view will be adequate compensation when those spindly stilts give way and the whole structure collapses like a house of cards,” Hilda would reply haughtily, “ I remain unconvinced.”

The house never did give way to the wind or the storms, not even to the elemental forces of not one but two hurricanes. But long after it's residents and critics were well buried, a night fire swallowed it whole and in time the weeds and wild grass reclaimed the ground. Last time I was home, I stopped on the road above where the house had so proudly stood. Not a remnant remained except the view.

Milk & Maple Cake

Just before the storm, hit, the wind abruptly died and the ocean went dead calm. There was a bitter heaviness to the air, something you could almost taste, and a sense of doom in the gathering clouds. It came on so quickly that we were nearly caught unawares. In minutes the bright summer afternoon was gone, replaced with a darkness that glowed 'round the edges and settled like an impenetrable cloud over The Point.

My grandmother, who still remembered what war was like, sprang into action like a drill sargeant, rounding up Ruthie and I, corraling both nervous dogs and sending us all into the dining room, the only interior space the house had to offer. She settled us into a corner and like a magician, whisked off the damask tablecloth and flung it over us for shelter. In an instant, the world turned completely and smotheringly black.

“Dark ain't gon' hurt you,” she shouted firmly to be heard over the thunder, “Jist stay put!”

Terrified and close to tears, we stayed, holding each other and the dogs tightly.

It was a vicious storm. The walls vibrated with each crash of thunder and we could hear lightning crack like gunfire. At one point, Nana said later, the old candlestick telephone gave a shriek and a hiss and erupted into a shower of sparks.

“Like to stop my heart, that did,” my grandmother confessed, “Damn thing could've set the house afire.”

And then, just as quickly as it had begun, it was over.

By the time Ruthie and I crept out from under the tablecloth, Nana was surveying the damage.

The swing set had been thoroughly uprooted and lay forlornly on it's side. The flag pole was intact but had developed a definite ocean-ward lean and the clothes line was in tatters. One of the double garage doors was off its top hinge and sagging badly but most odd, was the splash of color in the middle of the strawberry patch – Willie Foote's infamous red Radio Flyer wagon, the very vehicle in which he'd soared over the guardrail and into the sea just a few years before – lay upside down and only a little more battered than usual. It's wheels were still spinning lazily.

“I declare,” Nana sighed, “You girls best go rescue that wagon 'fore Wille comes lookin' for it. He's right fond of that old thing. And stop in at Uncle Len's on your way back. 'Pears to me we'll be needin' some carpentry done.”

Ruthie and I, reluctantly but dutifully, righted the wagon, pulled it up the driveway and trudged all the way to Willie's, arguing every step of the way about how much trouble we'd be in if we left it on the side of the road instead of trying to cross the front yard which was always a waist high tangle of snarled up grass and weeds with a life of their own and who knew what slimy creatures living in the underneath. It was well known that not even the Sullivan boys, as brave and reckless a crew as we had, wouldn't cross the yard without their snake boots on so in the end, we decided to set the wagon on the edge of the yard and kick it in a few feet.

“Close enough to trip over,” Ruthie decreed and took a step backwards in case we'd woken anything up.

“Ayuh,” I muttered, keeping a cautious eye on the ditch, “C'mon, let's go back. Nana was makin' a maple cake before the storm. Might be done.”

“Race ya!” she yelled without warning and took off like a shot.

We ran so fast and so hard that we completely forgot about stopping at Uncle Len's and Nana scolded us both for being such flibberty gibbets but then said, never mind, she'd go herself on the way to the post office. We had cold milk and warm maple cake and the storm, like all the ones that had come before, was soon forgotten.

Easter Tidings

“Nothing like Easter Sunday to bring out the faithful,” my grandmother observed sourly as she winced her way up the church steps of the Baptist church, “Warms your heart, don't it, Jan.”

My mother, a devoted Christmas/Easter christian, glared at her but Nana pretended not to see and my daddy pretended not to hear. He took both their elbows and steered them firmly inside while we trailed along after. It was, as predicted, standing room only and being an uncommonly warm morning for April, the sanctuary reeked of lilies and too many kinds of perfume. There was not enough space for the six of us in one pew so my daddy wisely separated my mother and grandmother and split the three of us children between them. Despite the crowd, the service started on time with all three choirs singing the processional loud enough to make the old stone walls tremble. I was, as usual, swept away when we stood for “Christ the Lord Is Risen Today”.

Baptisms were a traditional part of every Easter service so there was no sermon. Instead, we witnessed a solemn parade of white gowned church members accept Jesus Christ as Their Personal Savior before being lowered into the warm water and emerging sin-free, at least for a time. Later I would come to think that 12 is far too young and tender an age to be making, never mind understanding, such vows but at the time I still had hope and determination for my own salvation. I hadn't been tested then and I wanted very badly to believe.

We sang another hymn while the minister dried off and dressed and then he blessed us and the choir launched into “The Hallelujah Chorus”.   Even my world weary grandmother seemed moved by the music and a half century later, I still know every note of the soprano part just as I was taught and still get goosebumps when I hear it.

“World'd be a better place with more music and less preachin',” she remarked to the pastor as we passed.

“Amen, dear lady,” he smiled and patted her hand, “Amen.”

Intervention

Sometime over the weekend, the computer at work crashed - and did a thorough job of it, to be sure, it won't even start much less provide internet access - and we are so disgustingly technology dependent that there's nothing I can do without it. I explain this to Michael, call the IT folks to schedule an intervention for late this afternoon, and resignedly head home. It means going back this evening but it can't be helped. I do my best to be optimistic but it's yet another body blow when the tentative diagnosis of a failed hard drive is confirmed almost immediately.

I will not, will not, WILL NOT wonder what else can go wrong. Apparently it's interpreted as a challenge.

I spend the in between time with an old Bette Davis movie and the three dogs. The tiny one has adapted so well, he now feels free to chase, straddle, ambush and generally harass the kitten. She, in turn, stalks, swats and ferociously feints at him. It's loud, enthusiastic, a tad obnoxious and almost entirely playful so aside from warning him that she could easily knock him into next week and reminding her that he has teeth, I don't interfere. I'm not going to be the least bit surprised if they end up best buddies.

When I get back to work, things have not gotten any better. Our trusty IT girl has vanished with the malfunctioning hard drive in tow and Michael is in a state over the mail. The forwarding order from three weeks ago has still not taken effect and there's no telling how many checks are out there in the postal service never-never land. When you can get them to actually answer their telephones, the post office employees are drearily indifferent to our missing mail dilemma and their collective double speak sets my nerves on edge.

I leave Michael to his muttering and set out for home where I can close the door and hug my dogs.  I think reality needs an intervention.

Told You So

On a sunny but cool-ish April afternoon, I let the dogs out and the little dachshund immediately goes straight to the doggie door on the garage and wiggles through, just as he's been doing for the past week. I've followed him once or twice but have never been able to find whatever it is that he's so convinced is there. I've been inclined to think that one of the neighborhood stray cats has been searching for a place to have her kittens and as has happened before, the little dog would alert if it happened but so far there's been nary a single bark. I suspect it's a waste of time but he's becoming a little obsessive about it so I decide to traipse after him one more time.

The garage, to put it charitably, a combination landfill and hoarder's paradise, is a disaster and I often wonder how it's still standing. I try never to go in except to do the laundry and I confess there have been times when the darkness and mustiness have unnerved me. You never know what may be lurking in those black corners, rustling and watching in yellow-eyed anticipation.

But this is broad daylight, I remind myself, and the little dachshund isn't afraid, so why should you be?

He has managed to climb up on the old church bench and then navigate to the mid-level shelf, nosing aside an old ironing board and weaving around a half dozen old paint cans, a roll of discolored carpet and several boxes of trash. I climb up after him, vaguely thinking that if I fall and break a hip, I'm going to regret leaving my cell phone on the charger and not in my back pocket but what the hell. The dog sits, cocking his head at the space between the exterior wall and the shelf and looking somewhere between expectant and curious. Still, I see nothing, no movement, no eyes (yellow or otherwise), no hidden dangers. The dog whines very softly, paws gently at the wall and pushes away a clump of lint the size of a basketball and I'm suddenly up close and personal with a pair of red-rimmed, curious eyes, peering at me from less than a foot away. It's a young 'possum, definitely annoyed but not overly concerned by my presence and completely indifferent to the dog who is now panting and wagging his tail furiously.  While I'm considering what, if anything, to do next, the small intruder makes an independent decision, turning tail and easily slipping over a board, back into a nest of lint and out of sight.

The little dachshund sighs with disappointment but there's a definite glint of "I told you so" in his eyes.  He's not likely to let me forget this.

An Anniversary Wish

The boy I once wanted so desperately to marry has just celebrated his 46^th wedding anniversary and I can't help but smile.

I can barely remember how young and foolish and innocent we were then.  It would never have lasted, of course, but at the time I was so blinded by possibility that I couldn't see how it could ever have gone wrong. I imagined a cottage on the edge of the sea, with a fireplace for the winter and a vegetable garden for summer. I'd learn to make bread and fish chowder, we'd drink honeysuckle tea year 'round and raise dairy cows or maybe rabbits. There'd be a cat for every window sill and a whole pack of dogs to keep us company when we were snowed in on the long winter nights. Come spring, we'd invite family and friends in and make our own music on the veranda until it was summer again and then we'd go berry picking or fishing in the cove or shell collecting along the shore. Youth knows no limits and young love no shackles. Seasons, however, come and go and come again as new. Landscapes change and rarely go back to what they were. It's easy to get lost in the world you leave behind, to mourn for it and remember it better than it really was but reality is a obstinate, determined sort of creature and will have its way. Put 1500 miles and an ocean between lovers and they will move on.

That was the last summer I was to spend on my beloved island. I was seventeen, he was twenty and although we kept in touch for a time, it was mostly superficial. Like it or not, both our lives were already neatly laid out and the summer - while a blissful and precious time – had been only temporary. He packed his old Chevy with his books and his grade twelve diploma and got a job with the mainland newspaper and a one room apartment that overlooked the water. Not long after, he met his wife. I dutifully went to college and stalled for time and it was some sixteen years before I saw him again and then only for a moment. I remember feeling warmed by the fact that he was as good looking as he'd ever been, that his smile hadn't changed the least little bit and that he was so clearly well and happy. Marriage, children and island life agreed with him.

“Wish you had time to meet my wife,” he told me.

“Me too,” I said and to my surprise, realized it was true.

That was over 30 years ago and now he's a grandfather, happily retired, growing roses in a cottage with an ocean view and celebrating his 46^th anniversary with a lady I never got to meet but suspect I would like. Probably a lot.

Well played, old friend.